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 : Dell Technologies Inc. -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: stockman_scott who wrote (115302)	4/8/1999 5:03:00 PM
From: D.J.Smyth	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 176387

<<Wouldn't it seem that as DELL transforms their business and takes it to a new level that....the ANALysts should consider a MUCH HIGHER valuation as "appropriate"???....>> Morgan Stanely obviously does. And which brokerage firm has been the most responsible for the internut stocks trading at such lofty premiums due to One Very Meek and Mild Analyst? Principally Morgan's Stanley's Mary Meeker. They target Dell for $100. And Guess Which Mild and Meek Analyst was influential in the target price of $100? If Mary and her buddy in Comp says Dell is worth $100, Dell may get there. idg.net When Analyst Mary Meeker Talks, Net Stocks Go Bananas Last week, we said Net stock analysts had been playing God, with 12-month targets being hit in more like 12 days. And if analysts are indeed prophetic, then Barron's cover story on Morgan Stanley Dean Witter's Mary Meeker might as well have been the Book of Mary. Let us read a passage from Barron's scribe Andrew Bary, Verse 1, Line 2: "But only the cognoscenti realize that a lot of [Net stock mania] has been whipped up by Mary Meeker." No sooner were these words pronounced, than the Net stock faithful bidded up her "current favorites" into an celestial realm: Yahoo up 14 percent to 247.50; eBay up 17 percent to 296.375; Amazon up 11 percent to an eye-popping 318.75. Barron's Bary hailed Meeker as the most influential Net analyst, but said some nonbelievers knock her as a cheerleader. Still, he said she's been dead-on with most past predictions (AOL, Dell, Compaq), and is compensated by Morgan with pay of "perhaps several million dollars a year." One analyst said Meeker's real test will be when she has to finally temper her outlook on those "Nifty Nets"; another said, "We dread the day when she decides to downgrade the stocks." The online tech press basically followed like sheep, with ZDNet's Larry Barrett filing a story heavily quoting from Meeker in Barron's. Barrett did knock the huge market updraft caused by "press releases of varying significance" from Netcos. These include a deal for Onsale on Yahoo's Small Business area, and AOL making a pact with Dell for desktop promotion. Wired News was a bit more skeptical of Meeker, with a front page blurb saying, "Yet another Wall Street analyst says the Internet is the greatest thing since chunky peanut butter." Wired said Meeker's "anointed" stocks all were up 10 percent-plus, and one analyst summed up the situation well: "It's getting a little out of hand. You have a lot of money chasing a few stocks and a ton of short sellers." CBS MarketWatch's Stephanie O'Brien gave more credit for the Net surge to Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks, tying AOL's rise to the No. 1 hit flick, You've Got Mail. And analyst Keith Benjamin told her: "It's a retail frenzy feeding on itself. Speaking rationally today is a fruitless endeavor." (That was the most rational thing said all day.) Benjamin was also quoted in an Interactive Journal roundup, knocking Onsale's rise as "getting ahead of itself;" the Journal also dinged the Yahoo deal as "decidedly meager on such important details as the timing." Another analyst was more enamored with Cisco, with a research note boosting its target to $120 because it's a relatively cheap Netco with established earnings. The New York Times, meanwhile, might as well have been reporting from Mars, with Kenneth Gilpin saying there's an "apparent mania for Internet stocks." (In other news, Clinton was apparently impeached.) He did score on a few points, noting the Nasdaq index had shot up 50.7 percent since Oct. 8, oh so long ago; and he saw that Meeker's own company, Morgan Stanley Dean Witter, was up almost five points. She's obviously earning her keep, and then some. 'Net Queen: How Mary Meeker Came to Rule the Internet The Wall Street Journal Sense of Urgency Sparks Internet Stocks Interactive Age Meet the Mover, Mary Meeker Wired News Net Stocks Soar, Hitched to Star AOL CBS MarketWatch A Variety of Factors Help Tech Stocks March Higher The Wall Street Journal Stocks Rise Again, Buoyed by Technology and Internet Shares The New York Times