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To: Lucretius who wrote (118)	5/6/1998 4:23:00 PM
From: Broken_Clock	Respond to of 14427

Inflation is and always has been a fact of life...only a matter of the degree of inflation that we are currently experiencing. True deflation can never happen with fiat money or the world will implode into chaos. Kind of like a bad marriage....once one partner starts cheating the other has two choices: ignore it and live in hell or confront and the marriage goes down the tubes. Methinks the world is in inflation hell.

To: Lucretius who wrote (118)	5/6/1998 4:41:00 PM
From: Thean	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 14427

LT - Your MU short is getting some respect! Today is the third day and MU has a hard time piercing $32. I'd say the odd of MU going down the next few days is 60:40. However, not sure for how long. Hopefully it retested the bottom of the range which is ~$28. And then if you are not greedy by then you ought to cover. Now that is all hope of course because as your luck goes these days, things just want to happen in your opposite way!<ggg> Now if we again get a sea of red tonight in Asia, I'd sell everything tomorrow and start with a clean plate. Teddy, the lobster offer was good. But thank you I was asking because I couldn't believe my local supermarket was selling for $6 a pound. I think they may not be from Maine or MA. My wife bought mussels for dinner today instead! Yam, yam. LT - when I have the time I'll tell you the finer points (differences) about all the SE Asia countries. For now, if Indonesia goes banana, it's not going to good for the entire region. However, Singapore, Malaysia, Brunei, and likely Phillipine will have political stability in this environment. But their markets will all tank bad. Malaysian local banks have stopped loaning funds for business purposes and they are focusing on collecting old debt right now. The banks are not in good shape. So goes your MBK. Its time will time but not now. CCI on the other hand is in great shape because it stands tall among all the banks because it is a US bank.

To: Lucretius who wrote (118)	5/6/1998 5:05:00 PM
From: Teddy	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 14427

Luc, i'm sure you'll love this one: Boy am I getting sick of people who come on CNBC and say that stock prices are cause for worry. Here's my take: Stock prices are always cause for worry. Think about it. Stock prices were absurdly high in 1984 versus the recovery then. They were ridiculously overvalued after the Gulf War, I mean like that should have changed anything. They overshot where they should go by a mile after Clinton got elected, because after all he is a Democrat. They ramped much too much last year in light of 1996 earnings. Enough is enough is enough. Certain stocks are overvalued. I spent the day trying to get someone to write me a put on K-tel (KTEL:Nasdaq) so I could blast that piece of garbage to kingdom come. Nobody will sell them to me. Some of these faux-Internet stocks are leading-decliners-in-waiting. I want to bet the big enchilada against some bogus bio-health care stocks that not only have no cure for cancer, but have turned out to be misquoted baskets of hope. However, if I have to sit here and fret about the overall level of the market and watch the futures rip through the market all day, I know that I will be sidetracked by my main mission: looking for opportunity. Here's what I see: Asia, which I thought was done going down, took a new leg lower this week, which has been the safety valve for interest rates all along. Bonds, which had a scare north of 6% -- a real cause for worry if they kept going up to, say, 7% -- have calmed down nicely and are doing well. The Middle East has become less of a worry with these carrier announcements. The Cisco (CSCO:Nasdaq) quarter, which had plenty of people spooked six weeks ago, turned out to be FABULOUS (and yes I am long). Look, I hate to be a defender of anything. I am a seeker of opportunity, not a tormenter of bears. But we do not need to evaluate the market every single minute. That makes you nothing. As long as interest rates remain low, and companies keep blowing out numbers the way Cisco did, these valuations for certain parts of the market make sense to me. Am I comfortable with them? What are they, pillows? Warm slippers? Good-fitting flannel sheets? Heck, I don't buy stocks out of comfort. I buy stocks out of opportunity and risk assessment. Is the risk high? Of course. But it has been high since October 1982, with the possible exception of an interlude, roughly defined as October 1987 until February 1988. ....That's why you should look for stocks you like, not futures on stocks that you don't like. Not SPX puts because of some interview where the policy maker mouths the politically correct thing. Let me leave you with one thought. Other than a few moments when Dell (DELL:Nasdaq) got poleaxed by the press for some bizarre currency hedging it did a few years ago, and when a great ex-Goldman Sachs analyst was criticized for his coverage of the stock in a bogus Heard on the Street column, Dell has flown. In fact, THIS STOCK HAS BEEN OUTRAGEOUSLY EXPENSIVE SINCE IT CAME PUBLIC. Yet, it remains a large position of mine, and has made me more money than any stock in my lifetime, save Cisco. Go figure. Guess I should have shorted it. Would have been real right on the valuation -- the heck with the money I made. NOT!