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To: Paul Dubsky who wrote (15258)7/12/1998 8:04:00 PM
From: Ron McKinnon  Read Replies (2) | Respond to of 53068
 
Hu Paul

hope you have been well
LTCW

Ron #1 said
buy this here and look for 50-200% gains by next Spring

Ron #2
looked over the financials in depth
concluded that the "real" book value is zero
that the basic business model is flawed
that the only real sponsor Merill Lynch may well have bailed
and other negative stuff

part of me says listen to #1, buy a tad in an IRA and take it off my daily quote screen

but on Friday #2 prevailed and I sold my 5 1/8 from Thur at 5 9/16 on Fri

I dont have a clue which personality will be right on this one



To: Paul Dubsky who wrote (15258)7/12/1998 11:50:00 PM
From: DanZ  Respond to of 53068
 
LTCW.

Hi Paul,

It's nice to hear from you and I hope you have been well.

From a TA perspective, LTCW has support between 4 1/2 and 5 and the money flow index is in a buy zone. Based on TA, I would buy it with a stop at about 4 1/8.

From a FA perspective, the stock looks cheap on a price to sales and price to book basis although I took a closer look at the balance sheet after reading Ron's comments.

<the "real" book value is zero>

Nearly all of the company's equity is in paid in capital and the intangible assets increased substantially on the April 30, 1998 balance sheet. When you look at the equity from this perspective, I can see where Ron is coming from.

The retained earnings are only $672,000 out of total equity of $34.5 million and the intangible assets increased $23 million to $36.9 million from January 31 to April 31. Intangible assets are 44% of the total assets of $83.6 million. The increase in intangible assets is most likely a result of the acquisition of Sosebee Enterprises (dba Cellular Warehouse). Long term debt also increased $20 million as a result of that transaction.

It's going to take some more research to figure out why the intangible assets increased so much. Did they receive anything physical or are they just accounting for good will? Intangible assets implies good will to me, and if that's the case here, then I have to agree that the "real" book value is much lower than $4 although I wouldn't go as low as 0. The other thing to consider is that even though this might not make the stock look as cheap on a price to book basis, it doesn't affect the price to sales ratio which is still dirt cheap.

<the basic business model is flawed>

From what I have read, the cellular market is expected to grow rapidly for the next several years and this should benefit LTCW. The following is an excerpt from a recent speech given by the Senior Vice President of Texas Instruments.

"Sales of digital cellular phones hit 86 million last year, up from less than 50 million in 1996. We expect that strong growth to continue for the wireless market. Sales of digital cell phones are expected to grow another 45 percent and hit the 125 million mark in 1998. And within five years, annual sales of digital cellular phones will exceed 300 million."

Industry alliances such as Bluetooth should also spur growth for cellular telephones since they are developing standards that will allow you to connect laptops to cellular phones without wires. This will allow people to access email, the Internet, etc., with a laptop and cellular telephone and I think the cellular market is on the verge of explosive growth.

While LTCW certainly has competition in the retail market for cellular phones, I wouldn't go as far as to say their business model is flawed. The only possible negative that I could come up with is that two customers accounted for 100% of activation commissions. However, I think this is typical for cellular phone retailers since AT&T and Sprint PCS dominate the market. Perhaps Ron will be kind enough to expand on what he meant.

All things considered, I think the stock is a buy and plan to hold it unless it breaks down below 4 to 4 1/4.

Dan