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Strategies & Market Trends : Value Investing -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Paul Senior who wrote (6512)	3/31/1999 9:36:00 PM
From: Mike 2.0	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 78451

All, I saw cover story in today's USA Today (you know, that paper that hotel guests step over in the morning :-) -- the headline is: HAVE YOU MISSED THE MARKET BOOM? MILLIONS LOSING BILLIONS AS MONEY LANGUISHES IN BANKS. Now at first I figured they'd make the valid point that bank passbook/money mkt rates still are unacceptably behind money mkt mutual funds...nope. The article says a person they were profiling who had some $ in bank savings @ 1-3% interest "easily could have made twice as much on that money. If he had invested it in a S&P500 stock index mutual fund..." Amazing. So now the S&P is the place for the rent money huh? Bank savings? Aw that's for chumps. In fairness to USA Today author she finally later suggests switching from bank savings to money mkt mutuals. Fine. But to compare a passbook savings account to stocks for your "seed corn" money is IMO an unconscionable comparison and the shape of things to come...down.

To: Paul Senior who wrote (6512)	3/31/1999 11:45:00 PM
From: Paul Senior	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 78451

FWIW, moving to a full position with CTZ (Chicago Title), a stock that works for me on many levels: Value: pe under 8, no debt, maybe 4x cash flow Dividend: 3.7% Spin-off: from Allegeny Margin of safety: 5% stock repurchase recently announced Business power: Chicago Title writes one of every five title insurance policies in the US. They are consolidating (that's IMO) by buying small shops to expand their presence/capabilities. Negatives: not a lot of history available (to me); stock may continue to fall as Allegany shareholders dump; p/bv is 1.75. It may be widely assumed, but not proven (to me), that if housing market declines or interest rates rise, CTZ will suffer, and its stock also. Other info: FAF - a competitor, was Marty Whitman's #1 holding in 1/98. Joe Cornell, president of Spin-Off Advisors, said (3/4/99) of CTZ, "I keep scratching my head. This is a no-brainer". (aside: Paul Senior says though -g-, there ain't no no-brainer stocks, and if there are, then them are the most difficult kind to make money with. -gg-)

To: Paul Senior who wrote (6512)	4/1/1999 2:39:00 AM
From: Bill Zeman	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 78451

Paul and Thread IDTC may not be a traditional "value stock" right now, but it is a stock that seems almost sure to appreciate significantly in the near term. And after all, making money is what we are about more than just sticking to a certain strategy, right? Update: Since I last posted, IDTC drifted back into the 12's where it probably really was a value play. After that, they announced a deal with Netscape where their leading internet telephony product would be packaged in the tool bar of the next release of the updated Communicator. Since Netscape provides the browser for half the internet users, (50 million browsers), needless to say investors saw this as bullish and pumped the stock up to 20 in 2 days. Since then it has been trading between 16 and 18 waiting for news on the promised IPO/spin off I wrote to you about previously. It rallied today on a CBS Marketwatch news piece on IDT's efforts to buy back their bonds and thereby clear the way for a (still exact details unknown) spin off of the internet division. This almost sure soon to come IPO/spin off is what makes this stock almost a sure lock to about double in the next few months. Here is why: 1. The spin off will stop the internet drain on earnings and be immediately accretive to the eps of .08 - .10 a share of the core booming telco business. 2. The new Net2Phone company will now finally be recognized and valued as a premier internet stock. Since the CEO Howard JOnas owns 1/3 of the shares outstanding, (12 million), I have got to believe that the terms of the IPO/spin off are going to be very favorable to share holders of IDTC common stock. Check this quote and link out: Freidman, Billings, Ramsey and Co forecasts revenues of $45m for Net2Phone in 1999, potentially giving the company a market capitalization to the tune of $450 million. "Even by conservative estimates, we are looking in the region of at least $300m market capitalization," said Riyad Said, an Analyst at Freidman, Billings, Ramsey and Co. ilocus.com IDT's current market capitalization is only 400 million or so. This IPO spin off will potentially double the business value overnight!! These valuations could go MUCH higher. Remember EBAY. They control 89% a projected 3.8 billion dollar market by the year 2001, and their stock does a ten bagger in less than a year. IDT must control close to 90% of the IP telephony market that is at least going to be as big by 2001. What will Net2Phone do? The internet upside potential of this stock is not yet priced in because the telco part of the business is 10 times the size of the internet business, and there is still uncertainty of the details of the IPO/spin off. Have any of you guys kicked yourselves for not being in the internet stocks a year ago on the ground floor? IDTC is providing another opportunity. I sat and watched YAHOO and ELNK and others rally day after day from the sidelines. I'm not sitting and watching this one. Bill Zeman