Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Technology Stocks : Micron Only Forum -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: yard_man who wrote (34994)	6/15/1998 9:17:00 PM
From: DavidG	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 53903

Tippet, It wasn't a trick, they just had to account for their inventory for that quarter. Nobody wants inventory, but it happens. If only every company can be run as well as Dell.<g> I saw Mike on Moneyline tonight, and everything is just great. Expect Dell to just keep going up while Asia is tanking and the world goes into Recession.<vbg> DavidG

To: yard_man who wrote (34994)	6/16/1998 8:48:00 AM
From: mike iles	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 53903

tippet ... welcome to the big world of writedowns ... since MUEI talked about this in their press release I would guess they just underestimated the value of the notebooks when they wrote them down ... not even really a mistake since these things are based a lot on guesswork and people tend to be conservative ... yes, in this case it looks like a one-quarter event. The dark side of all this is that writedowns give companies a lot of leeway to manipulate future earnings ... if you're going to have a writedown and report a huge loss (which Wall St. will in any case treat as a non-operating event), you might as well write off everything, including the kitchen sink ... mark it down to well below it's real value and then this gives you an artificial boost to earnings as you sell off the assets in the future. As I said, I don't think MUEI did this deliberately ... but my real point is that they didn't make 3 cents in the quarter ... actually they were in the red ... regards, Mike