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Biotech / Medical : VISX -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Bajasurfer who wrote (712)	10/7/1998 11:30:00 PM
From: John Q Binford	Respond to of 1754

I agree earnings are not going down. They are growing at an incredible rate. The shorts are trying to take aim on Visx as the market is very weak so they see a shorting opportunity. However, next Wednesday Visx will report excellent earnings. The growth in procedures and earnings and machine sales may very well attract some new big money. To some degree we need the shorts to make more stock available for the new money ready to go long.

To: Bajasurfer who wrote (712)	10/7/1998 11:32:00 PM
From: John Q Binford	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 1754

Here is a note I posted on AOL Motley Fool. Along with the market panic, there were short sellers taking aim at the company once again. Several untrue rumors were floated to try to send the stock south. However, real earnings will be released next Wednesday after the close. Expectations were recently raised from $.53/sh to $.58/sh fully taxed. I am hoping for around $.60/sh fully taxed. I don't think we will be disappointed as the company is running on all cylinders. Now for the rumors: Short Seller Rumor/Lie #1: That Mark Logan was leaving the company. Truth for #1: Visx confirms Mark Logan is ABSOLUTELY NOT leaving the company! What a bold face lie by the shorts! Short Seller Rumor/Lie #2: Visx is going to lower the per procedure fee, or be forced to lower it. Truth for #2: Visx has no intention to lower the fee. If anything the price on the overall procedure is holding up or even increasing. Other manufacturers will also be charging a per procedure as it is the only way to make money as a manufacturer (otherwise system sales would have to cost $2+ million/machine). Short Seller Rumor/Lie #3: Visx has questionable accounting practices. (i.e. citing the untrue CFRA report that came out last May.) Truth for #3: Visx's accounting practices are extremely conservative. Visx in no way tries to hype their earnings. Judge the balance sheet by the growth in cash. Visx has typically grown the cash in-line or ahead of the actual earnings. There are no receivables buildup or other funny business going on! Don't confuse Visx's conservative accounting practices with Summit's. Short Seller Rumor/Lie #4: Procedures may not be doing that well. Truth for #4: Procedures are way ahead of schedule. The summer slump didn't happen. Things are looking good heading into the strong season. Short Seller Rumor/Lie #5: BEAM/ATCI will blow Visx out of the water. Truth for #5: Machine sales at Visx have never been better. And with new technology on the horizon, why are so many docs committing to buying a new Visx laser? This is over and above the ones upgrading to the S2. The answer is that Visx has the best laser, and can make the docs the most money. In my opinion, ATCI teamed up with Summit because they had to. ATCI couldn't fight the strength of Visx's patents. So, a poorly managed unsuccessful company (Summit), is spending alot of their cash buying an almost broke ATCI. And now Summit will have two independent manufacturing lines. It seems to me that Summit will be bleeding money for quite a while. And they won't have the financial strength to "give" away their machines as that would lead to huge losses. They don't even have a game plan on what they tell their current APEX Plus customers. Supposedly, ATCI will try to target the high volume docs who use a center, which will not make them friends of LVCI, LCAV, etc. etc.