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Technology Stocks : Oracle Corporation (ORCL) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: MeDroogies who wrote (10481)	4/14/1999 9:03:00 AM
From: VICTORIA GATE, MD	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 19079

Oracle Corp. (ORCL) 23 5/8: relational database developer to repurchase an additional 85 mln shares.....

To: MeDroogies who wrote (10481)	4/14/1999 9:23:00 AM
From: Michael Olin	Respond to of 19079

I'm no accountant either, but here is my best guess: 1. Why repurchase shares after a split? Why not just NOT split? Oracle ALWAYS splits the stock when it approaches a $60 share price. I don't know what the reason is, but just look at where the previous splits were. Not splitting is not an option, the split is some kind of moral imperative for Larry. 2. It says that shares will be repurchased, and some of the proceeds for this will come from the sale of shares under the company's plan. Well, why sell stock to buy it back (unless it is being bought back at a cheaper price), when you can just retire some of what is on hand? My reading is that Oracle does not want to decrease the number of shares held in the company treasury. The company said it will use the repurchased shares to offset the effects of share issuances under Oracle's stock option and employee stock purchase programs. Oracle is not deciding to sell stock just so they can buy it back. They have no control over how much stock is sold via the ESOP or the exercise of options. Repurchasing stock on the open market to offset ESOP and option sales maintains the amount of shares held by the company. Or, I can have it all completely wrong... A better question is why my friend (and IOUGA board member) Michael Abbey is quoted in Computerworld saying that "The only way Oracle will get their installed base of users lock, stock and barrel to heavily adopt and upgrade to 8i is through some sort of financial incentive" I'm sure you just meant that's what it would take to get us all to upgrade immediately, right Michael? We'll all get there at our own pace. Hey, I'm still supporting an Oracle V6 implementation, and I know of a system still running V5.1 on a PC. Tell me the quote was taken out of context, eh. -Michael

To: MeDroogies who wrote (10481)	4/14/1999 9:25:00 AM
From: The Duke of URL©	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 19079

The two are not related. A split has no real effect, 2 for 1 is twice as many outstanding shares for 1/2 the price. It is used by some some companies just for publicity, sometimes it creates interest in the stock among the uniformed. It does however, make the price more "bite-sized", a more marketable price, it also increases the commissions paid to a fee broker. In intel's case, since the stock is already widely known, it may have no publicity effect, at all. A repurchase normally, if done, and a lot of companies announce a repurchase but never do it, is beneficial, if it is the companies best use of its money. It actually does increase the value of the remaining outstanding shares. The tax gimmick is this, stock option grants dont decrease current earnings, the buyback doesn't effect current earnings, so the employees get compensated without reducing current earnings. Maybe larry thinks the stock is too low. Don't know, haven't reviewed this buyback. Duke

To: MeDroogies who wrote (10481)	4/14/1999 1:17:00 PM
From: wbASSETt	Respond to of 19079

Re-purchace stock? Don't forget the other good reason - publicity. It's a good show of confidence in the stock (akin to insider buying) & it is a positive way to get the company into the News. (even it ORCL never actually buys a share) They are playing on the sheep to say " if they think their stock is a good buy, then it must be" GE ( et.al) does this every so ofter, just to get a little boost....plus sometimes the stock realy IS under-valued! wbASSETt