Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Technology Stocks : America On-Line: will it survive ...? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Vic Glassley who wrote (12425)	12/11/1998 7:13:00 AM
From: Craig A	Respond to of 13594

My wife did the same thing in '95 but sold it. It is now my largest holding and I thought I was buying too high a year ago. My research effort has been reduced because there seems to be nothing but positive coming out from AOL and the analysts. This stops me from compulsively trading. It went to 88 yesterday and I bought more. I will hold that too. I think the rules have changed a bit concerning diversification. Still necessary but , with such a growing industry, a lot of us are also buying DELL,MSFT,INKT,EMC etc. As I said before...burgers, oil, or internet..hmmmmmm.

To: Vic Glassley who wrote (12425)	12/11/1998 12:26:00 PM
From: Mark Brophy	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 13594

The future might not be so bright. AOL has 15m customers, but there are 600m people in North America and Europe, so they've only reached a small minority. They'll probably get 20m or 30m customers before the growth stalls, but I think we can be sure that growth will stall because the net isn't a very good experience with 28.8K modems. There seems to be a lot of wishful thinking on this thread about the potential of AOL to make deals with the cable companies. They're over their heads in debt and have turned to Paul Allen, Microsoft, and AT&T to finance their future ventures. AOL only has $1.25b cash, so they can't finance the purchase of even a small cable company. Even if AOL exceeds current earnings projects substantially, they still won't have the $4b cash that Paul Allen paid for a small cable company. AOL could also solve their bandwidth problem by hooking up with phone companies and using ADSL. I expect it to happen because the AT&T-TCI combination will be such a juggernaut that the local Bells and AOL will be forced into each other's arms. But, those companies are used to big profits and don't operate with the loss carry-forwards that constitute one of AOL's main assets (even after 15 years in business!). My monopoly, U.S. West, charges $40/month for ADSL in addition to the charges from my ISP. I've passed on the deal because it's not worth $60/month for me with the content available on the net today.