Kristen,
Don't mean to offend you, but I feel ...
ego has nothing do with investing.
Investing is best when it is most rational.
No matter how much we hate to hear it, I'd
rather hear bad news about companies I own
than good news. The good news take care
of itself and gets reflected in the stock price.
To be honest, accounting statements are
worth something, and there is accounting
truth to the claims that " MRVC is a company hasn't
generated (after Xyplex acquisition)
any retained earnings since its history."
I think the charges MRVC took for Xyplex, have
brought the negative sentiment to the point it
is possibly skewed.
Likewise, accounting knowledge would not be
enough to value a high-tech company , such
as MRVC. The inherent risks in a high-tech
business apply, of course, but valuations of
high-tech company must take into account how
you value technical expertise, an item nowhere
to be found in 10Q/10K. This is where I think
shorting MRVC based on financial statements
is a mistake.
Furthermore, when a questionable accouting
issue is brought up and not debated upon, the
questions arised will definitely hurt a long's
conviction. Now that it is debated upon and
seems to be overcome (at least some of it), the
longs will end up with a stronger conviction.
The silence of the majority to discredits does not mean they
are not affected at all. I believe, you can
be silent, but you may sell out just because the
possibility of the accounting issues, which if
left undebated, would cast doubt to your convictions.
You don't have to sell to be affected. The fact that
you did not buy more, could also be a sign that you
are affected. Even in the Yahoo thread, I note a few
people who said they stopped buying because of the bold
claim by the shorts. How, then, without, debating
the issues, can one say he/she cannot be affected by
the so-called bullshit claims?
While false discrediting is bad, false
optimism is just as bad. Investigation has
to be done, when it is called for.
As to your question whether any big guys really
read this. I think there are more guys who
get affected by this thread than people think.
Back in the early days of Motley Fool, a certain
Wall Street Week analyst confessed to reading the
MF board for her stock picks. She may not be
Warren Buffett, nor Peter Lynch, but even if
Peter Lynch,read this. You would not know. The best
answer is to presume they read it, and post what
you know on the board. It doesn't hurt. A few
minutes of typing on the keyboard, will hopefully
make us rich. BTW, Wall Street Journal, now has
a new column "Heard on the Net" which summarizes
what they gather from message boards. That must
mean something for WSJ to start covering it. And
the current lawsuits filed by companies against
board imposters must mean something, too.
I personally have gotten messages that some people
who shorted covered because of some of the posts I
wrote. I am not gaining credit for this, but I think
as longs, everything we do helps :-) Besides, this is
a fun group not to share truth with.
The post by Terry is an honest experience by a dissatisfied
customer, we can't deny that. But just as you can't take
one incident to the extreme and say it represents the whole
sample population, you can't ignore it either.
I personally am relieved some real negative things are being
known, otherwise there would be not a single explanation
of MRVC's low valuations, but insiders selling or shorting
their own shares. A certain negativity has to be
healthy for a contrarian play. And the increased support
Xyplex brings to MRV should address this issues.
So, probably Terry's experience is posted on the net and
seen by many people. Despite that, MRV is holding its own
at 22. Now, the experiences of many satisfied customers
are not very visible. Human crowd tend to exaggerate. So,
if for every one Terry, there are 99 happy customers who
don't tell the net about their experience with MRV, but
Terry's experience is so visible on the net, the stock price
probably thinks there are 99 Terry's for every one satisfied
customer. This perception brings about opportunity.
But, I personally know that a lot of people are greatly
happy with MRV's fiber optics stuff, which luckily, sell
for higher profit margins and would be the real engines of
growth for the wired industry. And even Terry did
summarize by saying MRV's current switch product lines are
great at a good price. (It's just the service that he is
complaining about, which hopefully will be corrected with
the Xyplex deal).
Probably, Jack can share us his views once he starts reselling
MRV products. BTW, MRV products ostensibly have better margins
for resellers than Bay. (i.e. incentive by resellers to
move MRV products). This I got after investigating the resellers
I hope I made some sense. But even if I did not, I will gladly
be labeled random in exchange for a higher stock price :)
I tell you, in my many years of successful investing, I have
never had to investigate this much about a company. The effort
hasnt' paid off yet. I've made 15 times my money on CMGI
in 1.5 years, by basically going into a coma after buying them
really cheap. I admit, I first picked this up without much
investigation. But certainly, this experience has made me
a better stock analyst, if not a better private investigator.
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