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 : Phoenix Technologies (PTEC) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Marc Phelan who wrote (3020)	1/14/1999 9:58:00 AM
From: Mark Brophy	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 3624

Here are the latest contest results. We're trouncing the Russell 2000 and the Intel portfolio. Ticker Feb. 3 Today Change ADPT 23.0625 24.5 6.2% ALTR 38.5 62.75 63.0% APCC 26.875 49.625 84.7% AWRD 10.125 10.71875 5.9% CPQ 33 45.875 39.0% CREAF 19.875 15.125 -23.9% CS 15.5 9.8125 -36.7% INTC 86.3125 139 61.0% LSI 27 21.5 -20.4% MTZ 33.125 26.4375 -20.2% PTEC 11.875 8.75 -26.3% PWAV 14.375 18.9375 31.7% SEEQ 2.375 1.40625 -40.8% TLC 15.625 24.6875 58.0% TSEMF 10.1875 8.875 -12.9% VISX 21.375 116.625 445.6% VLSI 21.875 12 -45.1% ------ Average 33.1% Ticker Feb. 3 Today Change AVID 32.5625 24.875 -23.6% BBTK 3.875 2.9375 -24.2% CNWK 32.875 73 122.1% INTC 86.3125 139.875 62.1% MRVC 24.5 7.5 -69.4% PTEC 11.875 8.75 -26.3% RSYS 35.9375 28.75 -20.0% SMSC 9.25 6.375 -31.1% SYSF 5.5 0.28125 -94.9% WAVO 8.40625 8.8125 4.8% XIRC 11.3125 39.25 247.0% ------ Average 13.3%

To: Marc Phelan who wrote (3020)	1/14/1999 10:50:00 AM
From: Mark Brophy	Read Replies (7) \| Respond to of 3624

It's time for the new 1999 contest! Here are the rules this year: 1) Phoenix is automatically entered. 2) To be eligible, contestants must have posted 3 messages to the Phoenix thread in the past year. 3) Each contestant must choose 2 stocks and write a paragraph justifying each decision. See descriptions from last year reproduced below as examples. 4) No speculative stocks are allowed. Excluding acquisition writeoffs, the company must be profitable the last 4 quarters and have price/book < 5 or P/E < 30. 5) No penny stocks. The price must be higher than 5 on Feb. 3 to be eligible. 6) No foreign stocks or ADRs, except Canada. SEC filings or Canadian equivalent must be available. 7) Company must have a profile listed in the computer/electronics half of SI. No medical stocks this year! 8) The price at closing on Feb. 3, 1998 is entered as the initial contest price. Contestants may retract previous choices any time before closing on Feb. 3 for such reasons as price changes between the initial choice and current price. 9) Maximum 15 stocks are allowed, so only the first 7 contestants are entered. Here are last year's descriptions: Adaptec ADPT @ 22 1/2 - Owns the SCSI market which may or may not be all that important by itself but is also the leader in I/O. In addition, they have adapters for Fibre/Satellite/Ether & Giga/ATM & are big into Firewire (1394 offhand?) which I think will be increasingly important w/increasing multimedia peripherals. They also own the best CD/DVD packet writing recording software on the Windows and Mac fronts. P/E on last 12 mths is 12.5 & 3Xbook. Yr high 54 1/2, yr low 19 1/2 Altera has just been beaten down too low. It is the premiere company in the manufacture of PLDs (Programmable Logic Device) chips and is suffering because of the Asian crisis, but is very strong looking longer term. American Power Conversion (APPC). They make power units for PC's and servers. If the power goes out you still have time to shut down your PC. Also protects from brown outs, lighting, bad power sources, ect.. Stock has a PE of 19, a 52 week low of 15 3/4 and a high of 34 3/8. They beat earnings last time. Award Software (AWRD) - This is yet another company that has been sold off because of their large Asian exposure. They removed all doubts about the matter last Thursday when they released a blockbuster earnings report and announced a repurchase program. The fastest growing part of the BIOS business is the embedded market and Award has the largest portion of revenues in that area. Award's emphasis shows great foresight compared to the user assistance specialty of SystemSoft and big vendor pandering by Phoenix. Cabletron CS @ 13 1/2 - Beat up networking competitor with CSCO & Bay. Recently got a steal of a deal buying DEC's networking stuff with largely product discount payments. DEC channel deal expected to add significantly in first year. P/E on last 12 mths is 8.7 & 1.7Xbook. Yr high 46 1/2, yr low in 12's Compac is the leading seller of personal computers in the world. It's been continuing to add to its market share but has been beaten down for the last six months or so ever since the mini crash, and now with Asia bearing down. With its recent announcements of its merger with Digital, and an exclusive agreement with Radio Shack, CPQ is primed to grow and break out of its slump. CREAF. Creative Labs- Has been grossly punished by the asian crisis. PE 6. Owners of the Soundblaster sound card have a bright future. Price 16.50 Intel, I believe will continue to recover and surpass new highs by the end of the year. As we approach the Merced introduction and an array of new network products, earnings growth should become more evident. LSI Logic P/E 20.7 A Fortune 500 designer and manufacturer of high-performance semiconductors. ASIC technology and CoreWare approach to system-level integration enable customers to create electronic systems on a chip to increase performance and lower costs. (MTZ) MasTec builds telecommunications networks for phone and cable TV companies; also, there isn't a telephone pole in Dade County that wasn't "carefully" installed by them. The company is quickly penetrating the lucrative Latin American market, and have acquired Sintel (Telefonica de Espana) BellSouth and T de E make up 50% of the sales. The founder, Jorge L. Mas Canosa, recently passed, and this probably accounted for most of the stocks drop from 55 to 20 over the last few months. Recently, his son purchased an additional 100,000 shares, and the last three times he has traded, the stock has reacted accordingly by huge margins. My father is happy he bought 2,000 shares at 21 1/2 not long ago. PWAV--Powerwave...PWAV designs, manufactures and markets ultra-linear radio frequency power amplifiers for use in the wireless communications market. The Co's. amplifiers increase the signal strength of wireless transmissions while reducing interference....approx $4/share in cash...P/E of 11...history of torrid growth in sales/income....beaten-up because most of their business is in Korea...recently deals with Nokia/Nortel may help decrease their exposure to Korea...stock starting to rebound...if it goes up too much before Feb 3, I may replace it with another stock. TLC. The Learning Company- Leading the educational software industry. PE 9. Discounting buyouts. Cyber Patrol becoming the standard filtering agent for parents concerned about kids and Internet Usage. Computer penetration rates increasing, due largely to parents buying second computer for their children. Price 15.50 TSEMF--Tower Semiconductor...Israeli-based independent "foundry" manufacturer of semiconductor integrated circuits...over $6/share cash, over $12/share book value...stock is around 9 1/2, PE is around 7. Stock has been beaten up over their forward-looking statements for the next 6 months (some orders cancelled, etc), but stock is way undervalued here (IMO). VISX - This company makes laser vision correction systems and holds in partnership with another company the rights to a number of patents covering the laser vision correction process. Thay make more money (and have very high margins)on royalties from the patents ($150/per procedure) than they do on actual equiptment sales. Their stock price has been hurt by some pending litigation and the asian crisis. They were just approved by the FDA to treat more severe cases of myopia. VLSI - They sell chips for wireless phones and other applications. Although their customers such as Ericsson have a large Asian exposure, the company is still very profitable. They've ramped their fabs and have had a good profit margin the last 2 quarters, which they expect to continue. The balance sheet is strong and the P/E is low. They repurchased 1.5m shares last quarter at an average price of 21.84 and the price is now 19.