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Non-Tech : E*Trade (NYSE:ET) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: ecommerceman who wrote (6301)	4/30/1999 2:56:00 AM
From: Spytrdr	Respond to of 13953

what the quarter results show is that EGRP is GROWING MUCH FASTER than all the other online brokers, both year over year and sequentially. EGRP is also MUCH BETTER than Schwab and of course the rest too. i wish you guys who don't, had a chance to try ThePulse... it's a FREE SERVICE for active traders ("power traders") at E*Trade, very very similar to a professional Bloomberg terminal, with level II quotes and so much more, it's really AWESOME, AWESOME, AWESOME. Schwab doesn't offer anything closer to that, not by a long shot. EGRP is SUPERB. besides, they will offer soon: - online banking - forex trading - international investing in all the major world markets 24 hours a day they are gaining accounts at breackneck speed, they had 900,000 by quarter release date, and 100,000 JUST A WEEK AFTER THAT! at this rate (100,000 new accounts PER WEEK) boy, where will we be by the end of the year! the Merrill Lynches and Paine Webbers will go broke if we keep growing like this! they have a conflict with their "channel" (their brokers), just like Compaq never could compete with DELL because it had a conflict with the distribution channel it could never resolve, the same way, Merrill and the traditional brokers are locked at a crossroads, they are paralized, are not reacting, it's TOO LATE FOR THEM, momentum has shifted, they are LOSING ACCOUNTS AND FUNDS UNDER MANAGEMENT AT A VERY RAPID PACE.

To: ecommerceman who wrote (6301)	4/30/1999 3:11:00 AM
From: Spytrdr	Respond to of 13953

EGRP in NASDAQ 100 AND in the S&P500? WOW April 29, 1999 Who's Next for the S&P 500? By Paul R. La Monica LET THEM IN As of April 27, 1999 Source: Zacks Investment Research YESTERDAY I looked at stocks that I think should be kicked out of the S&P 500. So who should replace them? In last month's index effect screen, we focused on three companies from a list of 12 that PaineWebber strategist Ed Kerschner thought were worthy: Best Buy (BBY), Biogen (BGEN) and Lexmark (LXK). All three appear to be strong candidates for inclusion. Here are several more that I think deserve some serious attention from the S&P Index Committee. ETrade Group (EGRP). Yes, this is an Internet company. But ever since the America Online (AOL) addition at the end of last year, many have wondered if more Internet companies could follow. How about Yahoo! (YHOO) or Amazon.com (AMZN)? Not so fast. "The absence of profits disqualifies you regardless of market cap," says Leo Guzman, president of Miami based Guzman & Co., a brokerage that tracks changes in the S&P indexes. Yahoo! is profitable but accounting questions have raised concerns about the quality of the portal's earnings. And Amazon.com isn't expected to break even until 2001 at the earliest. It's worth noting that although ETrade is expected to lose money this year (mainly due to increased advertising expenses), it was profitable the prior two years and is expected to return to the black next year. And earnings consistency obviously was a reason that AOL was the first Internet S&P 500 stock. ETrade has another thing in common with AOL that Yahoo! and Amazon cannot claim. In February, ETrade was added to the S&P MidCap 400 index, moving up from the SmallCap 600. Membership in the MidCap is often a prerequisite for moving to the S&P 500, though promotion doesn't happen overnight. America Online served a nearly three-year stint in the S&P MidCap 400 -- it was added to that index in February 1996 -- before being given the big promotion to the S&P 500. If you read the guidelines for adding and removing stocks to all S&P indexes, one thing is clear. They stress that the S&P committees are looking for companies in emerging industries with financial and operating stability. So inclusion in any of these indexes is a sign of respect for an Internet company. ETrade is known mostly for its online brokerage services but it is expanding into investment banking and asset management, making it more like a traditional brokerage. To that end, ETrade could easily be added to the investment banking/brokerage part of the S&P (there are currently only four brokerages in the index). Of course, the big question is, Will ETrade have to wait three years to get in? The most well-known and best-run Internet companies could wind up being true growth stocks: profitable companies with strong levels of earnings increases. Eventually companies like Yahoo!, Amazon.com, eBay (EBAY) and AtHome (ATHM) might wind up in the S&P 500 without ever serving time in any of S&P's smaller indexes. And it's painfully obvious that the Nasdaq is underrepresented. Only 39 of the S&P 500 stocks are listed on Nasdaq. In a market where the technology sector is incredibly important, that has to change. To that end, there are several semiconductor stocks in the S&P MidCap 400 that would be prime candidates to join Intel (INTC) and the five other semiconductor stocks in the S&P 500. Xilinx (XLNX) is probably the best bet since its market cap is the largest. Earnings have grown at a 20% clip and sales have increased 18% over the last five years. But Linear Tech (LLTC), Maxim Integrated Products (MXIM) and Altera (ALTR) are also S&P MidCap members with strong levels of historic earnings and sales growth in addition to healthy prospects for future growth. While sales for these four companies are still relatively low -- Xilinx's $662 million in revenues is the highest of the four -- these four chip stocks all have larger market values and higher expected growth rates than current S&P semiconductor components LSI Logic (LSI), Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) and National Semiconductor (NSM). Another Nasdaq stock that should be added to the index is wireless communication equipment company Qualcomm (QCOM). Sure, the recent runup in the stock may be a tad much. But even before the dramatic increase, its market cap was in the $5 billion range. And with over $3 billion in sales, earnings growth over the last five years of 44% and expected growth in the range of 30% it is worth a look from the committee. Add to that the fact that wireless telephone firm AirTouch (ATI) will be removed once it is acquired by British telecom firm Vodafone (VOD) and an addition of another wireless related company like Qualcomm makes a lot of sense. Finally I have two consumer-oriented companies that could replace Tupperware (TUP) and Polaroid (PRD): Harley Davidson (HDI) and Starbucks (SBUX). Harley, amazingly enough, is just in the S&P MidCap even though the 98-year-old company has a market cap of over $9 billion and sales last year of $2 billion. Harley Davidson's earnings have increased 21% over the last five years and are expected to rise 22% this year. And it goes without saying that a Hog is so much cooler than plastic food containers and instant cameras. Starbucks has proved that the specialty coffee business, unlike microbrewed beers, could be a viable investment play and not just a fad. Starbucks' sales have increased 44% and earnings have soared 33% over the last five years. With a market cap of $5.8 billion it would still be below the median market cap for the S&P 500, but at least Starbucks is a company with earnings that are expected to grow at a frothy pace of 31%. And growth, above all else, is what the S&P should be looking for when replacing companies that are being acquired as well as laggards with little relevance in today's market.