To: Dean Dumont who wrote (6887 ) 7/20/1998 1:47:00 PM From: James Harold Alton Read Replies (1) | Respond to
bgtit, We all make mistakes, it's just that some have a hard time to admitting (not directed at anyone on this BB) those mistakes and apologize for them when this happens. I think that you have this right about the buyback. It was something that was discussed for a long time and became expected by some if the conditions allowed the company to engage in one. The SMTK deal of course opened that door and it's my understanding that Murphy elected to deliver on what he felt he had promised the shareholders. IF the deluge of CC shares had not happened, the buyback could have had a very significant effect on our price/stability. As it was, the shares bought back just helped keep us from dropping lower than we have and that part is probably not insignificant. Knowing what we know now, would it have been better to have not done the buyback? Perhaps, but is this a fair way to look at this? Would any of us have bought shares of DCTC above $3-4 in the past if we knew that in the future we could have bought them for less than $2? Of course not. We also do not know just how important the support that the buy back $$ were to us, since we do not have all of Murphy's insight. Consider for instance,if our stock having been lower had cost us the Edge deal? How many shares of Preferred was that one deal worth to us?
