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Microcap & Penny Stocks : ACRT about to move to new highs -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Qualopec who wrote (1364)	2/6/1998 5:58:00 PM
From: Doo	Read Replies (4) \| Respond to of 7054

Thanks for the post. Now I understand. We have a flock of Individual Investor parrots on this thread who are bullish. Now it is all clear. You folks better hope what your mouthing is something other than spoon fed hype.

To: Qualopec who wrote (1364)	2/12/1998 10:53:00 PM
From: Andrew Q. Viet	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 7054

Here is the highlight of the conference call posted by someone at Yahoo: The conference call contained no blockbuster news that might be expected to give the stock a quick bump. As previous posters have noted, most of the questions dealt with either (a) what are you doing to reignite the stock price and (b) how do TADs work. That said, here are some highlights: 1. Earnings. Aharoni said in response to a question about third quarter earnings that "he was very comfortable with what we are doing." The general thrust here was that the numbers being discussed by Wall Street -- no specific numbers were mentioned in the call -- were in line with where the company is going. 2. Market. Aharoni said on several occasions that "the market is huge." He laid a vision of an Actrade with a well-developed network of offices that could exploit the market's potential. 3. TAD versus International Trade. Aharoni said that a big part of Actrade's profit comes from the international trade division but that the future of the company belongs to TADs. 4. New offices. Actrade plans to open more offices. Candidates for new offices include Los Angeles, San Francisco, Dallas, Pittsburgh, Richmond, Vermont (I think he meant Virginia), Baltimore, Oregon, New Jersey, and Ohio. 5. Workforce. During FY97 (ended June 30, 1997), Actrade generated $22 million worth of business using four sales people (or account executives). Actrade now has 18 sales people, with 11 having come on board in November 1997. Because so many account executives came on board recently, only 6 are now fully trained. It will take a while before the new people are up to speed and can carry their weight. Aharoni stressed that one positive is that the veteran account executives are generating even more business than they had in the past because of economies of scale (e.g., repeat business, referrals, etc.). Another member of Actrade's management said that the company expects to make another dozen new hires in the next 30 days. (continued in next message) (continued) 6. Sinking stock price. Aharoni said the company would not buy back stock in the near future in order to give the stock price a shot in the arm. He said several times that he is not a Wall Street person but a businessman who is intent on growing a business. He pointed out two things that some of the callers seemed incapable of grasping: (a) the price of the stock in the long term will be determined by fundamentals -- if the company takes advantage of the opportunity before it the stock price will go up; and (b) his financial interest seeing the stock price go up is greater than any other shareholder's -- all his wealth is tied up in company stock and as the stock has lost $10 a share since the beginning of the year he has lost $25 million. 7. Rumors. Several callers brought up the rumors on the internet. Company policy is not to dignify them all with response. Aharoni was candid about financial problems more than a decade ago in Israel. The corporate lawyer jumped in to repeat that bankruptcy is not unknown among American entrepreneurs. Aharoni also denied the rumors about the need to restate earnings. His specific words were: "ridiculous" and "absolutely no" and he hasn't heard anything like this from his accountant. 8. The future. Aharoni said that successful companies need three things: (a) a good product; (b) financing; and (c) a network to sell the product. He thinks that Actrade has a great product with the necessary financing. He and the rest of management are now in the process of building that sales network. My general impression was positive. Aharoni was clearly focused on building the company for the long term rather than looking for gimmicks to give the stock a quick bump. He didn't equivocate when it came to denying the rumors. And in listening to him and the corporate attorney I can see why they don't want to get in the business of responding to each and every charged aired on the internet -- it alls smacks of being asked to answer the question of when did you stop beating your wife. Final impression. I think a lot of the callers -- especially those irate at the falling stock price -- would benefit from reading the annual report and the 10-Qs and 10-Ks. Many people seemed unfamiliar with the company they own.