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To: stockman_scott who wrote (122558)	5/5/1999 5:35:00 PM
From: Chuzzlewit	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 176387

Many of the ANALysts are biased and maybe even in bed with CPQ. I'm not sure I would agree. An analyst friend sent me a copy of an "analysis" from a buy-side analyst at another house. The analysis was of AMZN, a company I have studied in significant detail. What struck me was that the "analysis" was focused entirely on earnings, not cash flow or balance sheet issues. That leads me to believe that a lot of the "analysis" is done by rote. There seems to be very little original thinking that goes on. If you were to do a thorough analysis of a company like AMZN you could not escape the Ponzi-scheme structure of the cash flow. Yet this analyst didn't address that issue. And that issue is really key to understanding the company. So I have come away with two potential views of these analysts -- one a bit less charitable than the other. My first view is that they are honest, but overworked and rely entirely too much on guidance from the companies they analyze. In other words, they are unwitting dupes who have too much work and too little time. My second, less charitable view is that many of them are just plain stupid. They are unable to generate original thought or novel ways of looking at things. The "analysis" is done by rote, and means very little. However, I do need to defend analysts when it comes to issues like target prices. The market is inherently unpredictable, but analysts are expected to make predictions. Management also lies to analysts. Those factors put analysts in untenable positions. And then there is the issue of validation. Each of us wishes to find that the analyst community agrees with our assessment of stocks. We are outraged when they do not. In fact, the only time I hear analysts being praised is when they upgrade stocks that we own. I don't think analysts are dishonest -- just overworked and inept. TTFN, CTC