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Technology Stocks : Copytele - Another XEROX in future -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?


To: Ken G who wrote (1053)11/5/1997 11:41:00 PM
From: Brad Zelnick  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 1320
 
Ken, do you mean to say that when I've borrowed your stock to short I've been paying you? If you have it on margin, it is available to me to borrow, so that I can short it. Once it's borrowed, it's borrowed. Hence, if you want to squeeze you can keep the shares out of your margin account, or take delivery. Then I have nothing to borrow, and cannot short. If I have already borrowed it, and you take delivery, then I have to replace it with someone else's or buy it back to cover my short.

Actually the way you describe the situation is almost like what Mr. Krusos does now - He prints up more shares, awards himself options, borrows money to buy the shares covered under the options, sells the shares, pays off the loan, and pockets the rest. So long as you don't notice that your %ownership in the company is diluted, you don't care. So long as the market doesn't notice the stock watering, the price stays the same. Every one gets rich, as you say. This is what is so fascinating about Copytele: everyone is getting rich on it - you, me, Krusos; And the company has no product.

My willingness to take personal risk would be related to Copytele's behavior. They need to show a lot more technologic prowess at this time to cause me to withdraw my negative opinion. If they appear to mount a winning PR campaign, I would readily step aside, let the price rise and short more. Look at it this way - at a stock price of $18 the market cap would be one billion dollars. They have invested 1/2 million dollars in a Chinese JV. Talk about profit margin! (I promise you that every time Copytele adds a billion dollars of market cap through stock price appreciation, I will reassess my position.)

Meanwhile you catch me off base with the profit margin. I used a net margin of 1% because it was an easy number. At $2500 the margin should be greater, but they won't sell any. Let's talk 10% on a $250 instrument. Numbers are the same. (Have you seen the National Semi - Cyrix specs for their $200 pentium class computer?)

Far as the costs of shorting, they are related to the total dollar figure. The price of the stock has nothing to do with it. If it can be borrowed, it can be shorted. The prices are negotiable.

I agree that it's a lot more fun to short in double digits, so get out and buy, buy, buy. Shorters nirvana is a stock that goes to zero.(Our double digits are the double zero.) Second best is a stock that goes nowhere. Only a fundamental business change for the better would cause you to close the position. In the Copytele case, their window of opportunity appears to have closed.

Brad 00 Zelnick



To: Ken G who wrote (1053)11/6/1997 11:02:00 AM
From: Tim Kenney  Respond to of 1320
 
>The difficulty (not impossibility) in shorting at this low price, if I might restate, comes from the
individual brokerage house margin restrictions in doing so, along with some SEC limitations on margin
requirements.<

News flash. Ken finally makes a valid point. (But, then again, you all know the story about the 1000 chimps....)

Many brokerage firms will not allow clients to short shares that are under 5 bucks a share. (These are otherwise known as the brokers that do not get any of Timmy's business.) I had always believed, for those exact reasons, that COPY had authorized and was planning a 2 for 1 split--i.e. to get the stock under 5 bucks thus making it more difficult to short. But guess what, Denis? The market got it under 5 all by its lonesome. If any of you are looking for a broker who will let you short COPY at any price, Schwab would be one. They have no restrictions on short selling low priced stock, and they have oodles and boodles of misguided clients who hold long COPY shares in their margin accounts.

Elliot: As far as shorting the stock, I believe that COPY is the core short in any portfolio. It may take a long time, but the stock will unequivocally wind up at zero. Unfortunately, I am not sure I would want to initiate a short position at these levels. I have to believe that Denis has at least one more trick up his sleeve. If not, there will still be plenty of time to short it as it goes from 4 to 3 to 2 to 1 to 0. I usually never short anything under 1 1/2 bucks due to onerous collateral requirments, but have made plenty off dogs that have hung a around 2 forever before making the final plunge. My last three were Edison Brothers, Caldor, and Bradlees. It ultimately took NYSE delisting for these to take their ultimate plunge under 1, but they were still deliciously shortable and frequently borrowable before then. In the case of COPY, being a Nasquack stock, its ultimate demise will come when Nasdaq boots it first from the National Market System to the small cap market, and then to the OTC bulletin board. (In fact, it may not even stop at the Nasdaq small cap market first.)



To: Ken G who wrote (1053)11/6/1997 1:58:00 PM
From: Tim Kenney  Respond to of 1320
 
TIM SEES THE LIGHT!

I want to humble myself before everyone, who has ever or will ever view this board, that I was WRONG on COPY. I chose to see darkness where there was light, and took unabashed sadistic pleasure in trying to destroy the dreams of Denis, Dom, and the Solv-Ex guy. I have come to realize after a recent painful experience that causing other people and companies (i.e. Solv-Ex, COPY, Diana) pain, is no way to lead one's life. One cannot overcome personal misery by trying to destroy the lives and livelihood's of others.

I guess the reason I chose to pick on COPY and its shareholders was because I took pleasure in the company of all the other naysayers here. My advice to you other bears is to seek help. See your priest or psychologist, or get your doctor to prescribe some of those new (legal) drugs. You cannot live happily by contributing to the misery of others. Take it from one that has been there. For those of you who have a quote record, you can witness that at 1:15 today I closed out my short position in COPY by purchasing 2000 shares at 4 1/16 and another 2000 at 4 1/8. And, I can tell you that I feel that a huge weight has been taken off my back. I may even be a buyer at these depressed prices, but I think I will take a night to sleep on it.

Sorry to all those I have hurt. Optimists are all brothers, and pessimist doomsayers are all destined to empty lives. They may at times profit, but they will never be happy. Love to all of Mankind!