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 : Amazon.com, Inc. (AMZN) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Impristine who wrote (32200)	1/2/1999 10:26:00 AM
From: llamaphlegm	Respond to of 164684

As the 'Fifties wore on, investors were prepared to pay a higher price for glamour. In the bull market that followed, such issues as Texas Instruments and Xerox sported P/E ratios of more than 50. Just as 1930s and 1940s investors had been overly pessimistic, so those of the 1950s appeared to discount not only the future, but the hereafter as well. Does this sound familiar? Had you purchased shares in some companies like these, you would have reason to celebrate today. But how about others, such as Aerojet General, Itek, Ampex, Fairchild Camera and American Photocopy, some of the forgotten glamour stocks of close to half a century ago? You don't have to go back that far. How many of the biotech stocks of a decade ago are still attractive? Perpetual youth isn't a gift given to mankind -- or to stocks. The lesson: The market goes to extremes -- both on the downside and upside -- but has a nasty habit of eventually steering itself back toward rationality. That's something that today's intrepid Internet investors might do well to remember. ROBERT SOBEL is professor emeritus of business history at Hofstra University, senior fellow at the Milken Institute and author of The New Game on Wall Street. barrons