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Technology Stocks : CMGI What is the latest news on this stock? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: The Vinman who wrote (459)	4/30/1998 5:35:00 PM
From: Sowbug	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 19700

Ok, fine, but the problem is that only the shorts are asking that question right now, and that's why most of them are losing money. I think you're missing my point, which is that NOBODY disagrees with you on valuation. EVERYONE agrees that these companies are overvalued by any traditional measure. But valuation is currently IRRELEVANT. A certain percentage of people throughout history saw the potential of companies like KO, MSFT, IBM, ORCL, GE, WMT, T, and GM when those companies first offered shares to the public. Those people loaded up the truck at the split-adjusted initial price of $0.01. What if those people had paid ten cents per share instead of a penny? Today their net worth might be merely $10 million instead of $100 million. Some of us believe that the recent appearance of Internet companies represents another point in history like that. You don't, and one of us will be right. I don't care if I pay $50 or $100 for these companies. Yes, my vision of the future may be wrong. But my downside is 100% and my upside is much, much higher. You're in the opposite position, we're both comfortable where we are, and I wish you luck in all your investments.

To: The Vinman who wrote (459)	4/30/1998 9:36:00 PM
From: Carlos Ferreira	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 19700

The value of company is exactly what someone else is willing to pay for it. If you don't want to pay $96, then fine, maybe someone else will. If there is no one else, then the price (value) goes down. Internet search engines company are perhaps the most misunderstood "internet" companies. They are really media stocks and not tech stocks. They are a "user" of technology. They do not sell it. CMGI's business model is not well understood. They are a venture capital company that specializes in providing capital and management help for companies to mature and then eventually be sold to to the public. The fastest and most profitable way to make money in the stock market is to take a company public. This is mainly due to different ways private and public companies are valued. You complain that YAHOO has a market cap (value) of 7 Billion dollars. Well can you imagine owning even 50% of YAHOO before it went public? You would be worth 3.5 billion right now. This is the type of business the CMGI is in. Now, they can't do this every quarter or even every year, so critising last quarter's results or even the previous results is meaningless. After all they can only "make" a profit after selling a company or selling a portion of a company. Internet companies are not commodities. By the way, most successful companies are "always overvalued". I have been saying this about Microsoft for at least 10 years. Had I only been "stupid" enough to buy some back then. The stock market is a sorry place for people to insist that they are right. Carlos BTW, I think the "market" doesn't know how to value this stock. That is why you get >5% price swings both sides day after day. Only time will tell. Best of luck with your investing.