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Technology Stocks : CheckFree Holdings Corp. (CKFR), the next Dell, Intel? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?


To: Robert Gintel who wrote (499)12/5/1998 4:34:00 AM
From: AugustWest  Respond to of 20297
 
hi bob, nice to see you here on the revised CheckFree thread. If we're gonna ride with this thing into the 21st century, gotta' have an image that captures the respect we deserve.

since this is a nice reference post-#500, here are a few things that might be helpful to come back to from time to time

CheckFree home page checkfree.com

sec.yahoo.com
most resent SEC quarterly filings reported on 11/13/98

biz.yahoo.com, and quote.yahoo.com for yahoo detailed and basic research.

integrion.com deal with Integrion(10/29/97)
integrion.com Integrion home page.

genesis of genesis datamation.com

oh, also a little known thread inspired by our resident ghost that consists of mostly what I caonsider relevant news, when I keep it current that is. #Subject-22257

And finally from the home page:

CheckFree has been the leading provider of electronic commerce processing services and software products for over 15 years. We have revolutionized the way money moves for over 1000 businesses and 850 financial institutions. Last year we processed over 85 million electronic transactions worth $15 billion for over 2.5 million merchants and 1.5 million consumers.

CheckFree offers the industry's only proven and 100% reliable payment processing infrastructure that allows bills to be paid via any user interface, any delivery channel, and any payment delivery system. Our suite of business and financial solutions helps financial institutions, corporations and their customers sharpen their focus on the bottom-line and keep their electronic future in sight.


I'm sure I'm missing a good chunk for stuff here, but I'll save it for #1000 if I can score it.



To: Robert Gintel who wrote (499)12/5/1998 9:52:00 AM
From: av ram  Respond to of 20297
 
Bob,

I really appreciate the valuable input provided by you and others on this thread. I agree that most important step for CKFR now, is to expand and get as many financial institutions on board as possible. But I failed to understand following:

- With tons of deals and all the good stuff , why revenue growth is so weak (pity 9% for latest quarter) in such as growing industry. Why can't CKFR has say growth rate of 40% or so? I am surprised to note declining revenue growth in license area.

- While its understandable to see bigger expenses in growth phase, I would be interested to know the nature of such expenses. Large R&D expenses make sense but not the cost of processing, servicing and support (without corresponding revenue increase). Usually software companies have managed expenses very well.

As I side note, it seems that Piper Jaffray has been reasonably successful in his followings (recent winners include MACR, THQI, INTC). And I hope same will follow for CKFR but I am still in process of doing more homework on this company. Until then I should confess, I have taken 'short term trading' approach for the company.

Thanks to all.

Regards,
av



To: Robert Gintel who wrote (499)12/5/1998 10:39:00 AM
From: Brooks Jackson  Respond to of 20297
 
Bob -- thanks for the VERY informative post. Patience, patience....



To: Robert Gintel who wrote (499)12/5/1998 11:25:00 AM
From: g_m10  Read Replies (2) | Respond to of 20297
 
Robert, your input is priceless.
My gut filling didn't fail on me when I posted in #253 and 277 that Piper's upgrade was actually a cover up for a sell off, but what was before negative now turned positive.
Here's my understanding of the recent events.
1. CF decided to revise future earnings down.
2. Instead of dropping a bombshell at a CC meeting they found time to quietly give analysts the whole picture instead of scary headlines.
3. They timed revision with Piper's upgrade and Oracle news.
4. All those events combined provided a soft landing for the stock when negative news was released. It was not even landing so far. Friday closing price was $3 higher than it was 10 days ago. It may still come down, but nothing compared to Aug.12 crash.

In August when I was upset about CF sloppy PR job I wrote:
Kight must've given them a guidance in advance. They'd
appreciate it and provided a soft landing for the stock.

Message 5533295

If my understanding of the situation is correct, CF just demonstrated a textbook example of how soft landing should be done. Masterful job. My most sincere congratulations to Pete and his PR team. They have progressed far beyond PR101.
And thanks again to you Robert.



To: Robert Gintel who wrote (499)12/5/1998 12:21:00 PM
From: Charlie Smith  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 20297
 
Bob:

the confusion index is very high amongst the participants who are trying to make all this come together, especially when different vendors are telling different stories. One consultant who spoke in a very compelling manner, even went to far as to advise the attendees to forget Checkfree and Transpoint and have a few banks get together to form a utility to create Bill Payment and Bill Presentment themselves.

I mentioned this back in October:

Message 6195495

Even if a few techno-savvy banks with substantial wholesale cash management (lock box) customers manage to put together a bill presentment system, how do they cost effectively link with the rest of the world? I'm curious as to what was this consultant's rationale for a "home grown" solution? Long term cost? Control of customer data?

Also, as you said, FUD factor is high and rising, so it seems to me that if FTU (or anybody else with a national presence) can get some momentum re subscriber numbers, they could break away from the pack and force the fence sitters to move.

Finally, two questions:

First, what were Chase's technical difficulties?

Second, re:

Checkfree has told the industry that they can't wait for the banks to move at their own pace and therefore are moving ahead on their own to develop a portal capability which Checkfree may offer directly to consumers themselves; but we will have to wait until sometime early next year for more information on the specifics, while Checkfree develops the necessary software to make this happen.

Why not build on the Excite/Intuit partnership to do this instead of taking the time and money to do it in house?

Thanks again for all your insight.

Charlie



To: Robert Gintel who wrote (499)12/5/1998 1:53:00 PM
From: g_m10  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 20297
 
Returning back to your post, Robert. Too much information to respond in one post.

But from the first day I met him,...He would be quite happy to end up with 50% or 60%, and consider himself a big winner.

I hope that was pre-August Pete. I'd feel better if he was speaking of 20% and kept in mind 30-40%. Even 20% of the whole market would be enough to exceed Tom's estimates of the stock price growth.

Oracle and CF make for a very powerful strategic partner whose sales force can help bring in many important customers with whom they have long established relationships. Oracle and Micrsoft are arch rivals.

A couple of years ago Oracle dumped Novell in favor of inferior (not my opinion) software from MS, despite their rivalry. This time MS power failed. Choise of CF in favor of MS sends a very clear message:
1. CF is far ahead of MS in EBPP.
2. Quality of CF products, services and pricing makes it unattractive even for Oracle, much less for banks, to attempt to duplicate them.
3. Oracle with all its customer support is standing behind it, not just tiny CF that not everybody heard of. This fact might be more important for banks than the first two.

Just MHO.



To: Robert Gintel who wrote (499)12/9/1998 8:13:00 PM
From: Benny Baga  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 20297
 
>>>In the meantime, we must expect to hear of wins by the competition.

Maybe this is what you were talking about (Bank Systems + Technology):

Chase Manhattan Marshals Billers

While many banks are focusing on attracting consumers, or "eyeballs," to their Web sites for on-line bill payment, New York-based Chase Manhattan Bank is lining up billers.

The wholesale division of the financial giant is talking to about a hundred of its large corporate customers about delivering bills to consumers through the Internet, e-mail, telephones and pagers, with payment and remittance data received electronically. Chase plans to launch its on-line bill delivery service in early 1999.

At presstime, Chase was assisting billers in readying their accounting and billing systems for electronic payments, said June Felix, senior vice president of Chase Treasury Solutions, the cash management are of the $400 billion bank.

"Just being able to present bills without being able to receive payments doesn't provide the benefits of cash-flow and information management that billers are seeking," she said.

On the bill presentment side, Chase is helping billers deliver bills through a consolidator, the biller's own Web site or "push" technology (e-mail). Chase has been conducting internal pilots of CheckFree's E-Bill service.

The bank also said it plans to use TransPoint's E-Bills service but, at presstime, declined to provide further details. Denver-based TransPoint is owned by Microsoft, First Data Corp. and Citibank.

"We're looking at going beyond both TransPoint and CheckFree, which is to help our billers reach all of their customers," Felix said.

Citibank's position as provider of pay-anyone services to TransPoint may cause complications for other banks, Felix noted. "There will be a lot of hesitation with most banks about what kind of relationship they're going to have with TransPoint," she said.

Chase's emphasis on the wholesale side of the on-line bill-pay equation, Felix added, differs from the approach of other banks, which are focusing on the retail side and are simply telling billers to install back-office servers. "We will help billers get to all of their destination sites," she said.




To: Robert Gintel who wrote (499)1/1/1999 9:39:00 AM
From: Capt  Respond to of 20297
 
*********************** HAPPY NEW YEAR *********************

Bob, thanks for all you input on this thread, I wish you a very prosperous year.