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Technology Stocks : Discuss Year 2000 Issues -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Skeptic who wrote (542)	11/26/1997 11:02:00 AM
From: Joseph E. McIsaac	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 9818

<< I totally agree. The extreme positions are (a) Y2K will be a non-event and (b) it will be the end of the world. Almost certainly, the truth will be somewhere in between. >> I was recently asked by a journalist about my opinion on whether or not the Year 2000 will have any catastrophic effect on banks. I believe that the Year 2000 will cause: 1) a tremendous escalation in mergers & acquisitions from 3Q 98 to 1Q 99 and a great reduction in the number of community banks out there. 2) a few catastrophic hits on certain banks and product lines that slip through the cracks. New Years Eve 1999 we'll all be watching CNN as they finally get to reuse some of their Gulf War graphics to depict notable Y2K failings. "This scud missile depicts the story from New York, where the subway displays are reporting that all trains are running approximately 100 years late...". 3) Third-world nations are going to get rocked. Most of the central banks in Africa and South America are WAY behind in their Year 2000 programs. They are all looking to import U.S. technology (an upside to this whole issue). And remember -- the U.S. with its 11000+ banks is not the norm, most nations are reliant on just a few banks. 4) For the U.S. marketplace, the whole issue is really about losing money. If the press would stop hyping the extremes so that the truer message about this being a business risk management issue could get through, we'd all be better off. Bankers don't react to all-or-nothing predictions, but when you explain that their ROI (return on investment) could suffer if their loans or investment instruments lose a point due to Y2K problems, now that speaks to them!