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Non-Tech : Littlefield Corporation (LTFD) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: mark cox who wrote (7421)	2/17/1998 8:02:00 PM
From: Yamakita	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 10368

Some further notes on the cc, apologies in advance for any repetition of points already covered: Much of the conference seemed contradictory to me. On the one hand Wilson and Orton were trying to sound as exuberant as it's possible to sound, given all negatives of the company's current situation, yet on the other they, especially Orton, didn't give very encouraging numbers. Eight bingo centers have been closed, though they emphasized that it's more profitable to run 14 good centers than it is to run 20 mediocre ones, some of which were competing against themselves. Four additional bingo acquisitions look as if they will close in Q1, bringing the total to 18. Wilson stressed the acquired centers, with just one exception, were not the ones closed down, nor are to-be-acquired centers likely to be closed down (let's hope not - - otherwise why bother). 10-15 more are in negotiation. Orton said that if all goes right - - and there was quite a bit of hedging on this point - - we'd have 30 by mid 98, some of which will be in Texas, Kentucky, Alabama, and Canada. I thought he was hedging again in talking about the company's goal of 30% ROE; he talked how too much cash on the books will make this difficult, but that over the long term it is still "possible." Not exactly a vote of confidence, imo. They will consider a stock buyback if the price continues to lag, but stressed that the money can be more profitably used for acquisitions. He noted the many "challenges ahead" as far as improving profitability and regulatory issues in SC. The .44 predicted by Kecseg will not be met. Scott was right in predicting the shortfall. This is very bad news. Q4 was hit hard by a "smaller than expected seasonal bump," higher expenses, higher labor costs (?), travel costs associated with acquisition hunting, and higher consulting costs. What consulting costs??? Also they have to pay video gaming license fees up front, which offsets cash flows and leaves them flat. They have no intention to take on additional debt; don' t want to dilute the shares. No additional gaming acquisition until the political climate clears up in SC. Predicted .25~.35 per share for 98, with the possibility of hitting .40 if things fire on all cylinders. He made it sound like a big If. Said that, with all the dilution and taxes, earnings will actually be double those of 97, even though a casual investor would see flat-to-down earnings just looking at the numbers. Kecseg sounded worried to me in his question about management. He asked if they are looking for additional people now that Logue and someone named Carl (? - - who the hell is that?) are gone. Wilson: [paraphrasing] "Logue left on good terms. There are no bad issues between us. We will keep open our options open for new people, but we're not actively looking. Our current management and team and our board is solid." Mark, I didn't hear anything about adding more people to the management team over the next couple of months, but I may have missed it. I thought Mims sounded the most confident/convincing. He seems like he's been down this road before. All in all, not exactly a confidence-building cc. I'm sure we'll all be fine LONG TERM, but I suspect that things will get ugly yet again tomorrow.