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To: Bill Harmond who wrote (56465)	5/13/1999 12:31:00 AM
From: Dell-icious	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 164684

Hmm William Microsoft's current business are throwing cash out. They don't really need a large investment (of the order of the billions that it is investing) in the near future. Eugene's question/statement compared the rates of return of in the next 3 years or so when Microsoft's core businesses will continue to grow hugely but the cash it is accumulating was being kept in T-Bills. In comparison, it is clear that Microsoft's current investments will grow much faster. It is not inconceivable that microsoft will be sitting on a diversified market cap of more than $100 Billion in 3 years. This is Buffet's game plan being executed in the high tech world. In fact, I know of one individual who simply tracked microsoft's investments in publicly held companies and with the exception of its small investment in AVID (which was mostly to get rid of its money losing softimage division) - he has made a lot of money. Look at its investment in cable companies. It's 150 mill in aapl has more than tripled. Their 1 billion in comcast has about doubled now I think. Your statements about CE possibly not spinning off as much cash as Windows is open to judgement. CE is actually doing fabulously well. Web TV has nearly 1 million customers already. However, this is a question that needs to be answered 3-5 years out. Until then Microsoft's new investments in publicly held companies may pay off very handsomely. It is a giant investment company that is not bound by the silly rules that mutual funds are subject. They also don't have any one withdrawing cash on bad market days. Maffei and Gates together can possibly be better investors than Buffet is in the offline world. Eugene is right - MSFT is IMHO a real buy at these levels. It is creating a solid base. Then when win2k is released and the Y2k problems are out of the way early next year - i expect msft to take off and double in 2000.