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

To: 16bit who wrote (6760)	4/15/1999 6:59:00 PM
From: James Clarke	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 78594

No no no. The Borders website exists already, and it is under the control of Borders, so there is no new competitor created. And you don't spin it off, you sell 20% of the stock. Mattel ran big today because it is about to do exactly that. I think Mattel is still a buy, even 50% above the bottom. Visit Mattel's website, and I think you will find as I did one of the most intelligently structured web strategies a "stodgy" company has produced. And it is profitable. (don't get me wrong - the internet is not the reason Mattel is a buy, but its certainly a plus) On the conference call today, the reason Mattel is planning a partial-IPO emerged. Obviously they think it will goose the stock, but there is another reason. They want to acquire online assets. You don't do that with Mattel stock. But if the Mattel.com stock were to go to insane levels, it becomes an acquisition currency. That's what they're thinking. I read something about AMR last week - I can't recall where, that said if you're a company with a subsidiary that has an internet business that may trade for more than the parent company is worth, YOU SELL IT NOW. (AMR-Sabre-Travelocity) JJC

To: 16bit who wrote (6760)	4/15/1999 7:05:00 PM
From: Michael & B.Anne	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 78594

I would not buy borders .. they have too many disadvantages vs online sellers in general and amazon specifically: 1) lower fixed costs - much less in bricks and mortar 2) NO INVENTORY - don't even consider the idea of inventory turns 3) live off the float .. they get their money now, suppliers in net 30 (I think that is true) 4) lower cost of sale - in addition to lower fixed costs, greater sales volume per employee. I made that up .. but before buying would certainly find out for sure. where did I go wrong ? regards

To: 16bit who wrote (6760)	4/15/1999 7:41:00 PM
From: Freedom Fighter	Respond to of 78594

Byron, >>Why would Borders spin off its Internet business? Wouldn't that be like spinning off a competitor?<< I wouldn't recommend they spin off the entire business. But they indicated through their statements that they are not extremely high on the online bookselling business. On the other hand, the stock market is frantic about anything that starts with "E" or ends with "com". So they could probably get an obscene amount of money for a portion of their business that they do not expect to be anywhere near as valuable as the market might offer. The cash received could then be used to fund all sorts of other value enhancing things. It's just a thought that I would consider. Wayne