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To: Glenn D. Rudolph who wrote (60803)6/6/1999 7:02:00 AM
From: Mark Fowler  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 164684
 
report
He favors the larger companies because "they tend to get stronger." "The
strong
get stronger, more powerful and have higher profit margins. Companies like
Cisco and Microsoft have control over the pricing power of their products
and
have terrific margins to show for it. Those are the kind of businesses we like
to own now and in the future," says Malcolm. He does not like to invest in
commodity type products that have little or no pricing power. Those types
of
companies include; semiconductor, DRAM manufacturers and other related
areas
that he feels have little or no pricing power in their products.

Malcolm notes there are 2 types of Internet companies, those that are the
leaders and have not reached full potential and those that are 2nd and 3rd
tier
players, which may be overvalued. "The leaders in this space will garner a
disproportionate share of the market and the profits." He states, "What we
have
seen recently in the Internet space is no different than any other business
cycle that we have seen in the past. The first phase of a new business
cycle in
the Internet space brings about a large number of new businesses, all
competing
for a top position in their space. The second phase is the consolidation
phase,
which we are seeing now. For instance, AOL's purchase of Netscape or
Yahoo!'s
purchase of Broadcast.com. At this point in time, you will start to see the
new
leaders emerge. The ones that emerge are the ones that acquire other
businesses. We want to be invested in these blue-chip leaders of the
Internet."

He compares Yahoo's! profitability to that of Microsoft's

One of Malcolm's favorite Internet stocks is Yahoo!, which traded as high as
$244 in early April and is now under $150. He compares Yahoo's! profitability
to that of Microsoft's, which has gross margins of 90% and net margins of
48%
(as of last quarter). That means Microsoft keeps $0.48 for every dollar that
comes in. Yahoo! has comparable margins that include gross margins of 90%
and
net margins of 38%. "That makes Yahoo! one of the most profitable
businesses in
the world and we like to own businesses like that." He adds, they have a
strong
balance sheet with little debt, $600 million in cash and one of the largest
market shares in terms of eyeballs, with around 60 million users world wide.

Malcolm compares traditional media ads on television and the ones viewed
on the
Internet. He argues that there are high production costs that go into making
a
TV commercial, and the margins for those traditional media companies are
very
low. For an Internet ad or the ones that appear on Yahoo!, there is not
much
production costs and, as a result, they have very high margins. Another
area
that he feels Yahoo! has a strong grip on is their e-tail area. "Yahoo!
receives a cut of the e-tail business that flows through their domain. That
also is a high margin business." Based on his figures of future cash flows, he
thinks Yahoo! today is worth $300 per share.