Boring Portfolio Report
Wednesday, August 27, 1997
by Greg Markus (TMF
Boring)
ANN ARBOR, Mich. (August 27, 1997) -- Hey, it wasn't much of a gain, but we'll take it. After being down for most of the day, benchmark averages finished in the plus column, albeit by the thinnest of margins for the S&P 500. The Boring Portfolio fared noticeably better, gaining more than half a percentage point in net value.
TIDEWATER (NYSE: TDW) rose for the third straight day, gaining $5/8. Stocks of deep-water drillers -- and companies that service them, such as Tidewater -- showed continuing strength following this morning's opening of bids in the U.S. government's Minerals Management Services (MMS) auction of exploration leases in the western Gulf of Mexico.
To learn more about the MMS, the auction, and related information, you can visit their Website. It's more interesting than it may sound, actually.
The big Borefolio event today was a 13% surge in shares of PRIME MEDICAL SERVICES (Nasdaq: PMSI). The bid on PMSI rose $1 3/8 to $12 1/8 on volume exceeding 450,000 shares. That's a typical week's worth of trading action for PMSI.
What news accounts for this, you ask? None that I could locate.
Recall that PMSI sold off yesterday as shares of UROLOGIX (Nasdaq: ULGX) soared on news that Urologix had received FDA approval of its Targis microwave device for treating benign prostate hyperplasia (BPH).
Prime Medical is currently developing mobile routes to offer treatment for BPH with a competing device, the Prostatron. Quite possibly, some traders exited PMSI yesterday on concerns that the Urologix news challenged Prime's strategy. As noted here last night, any such concern may be unfounded, however.
The Borefolio team placed a call to Prime late yesterday, and the company returned our call today. Their take on the situation is that the Urologix development is decidedly good news for Prime.
As a spokesperson at Prime told the Borefolio's Mark Weaver, MD ([email protected]), increased public awareness of the availability of microwave therapies for BPH will benefit all providers.
That makes sense to me. After all, it's unlikely that a guy will walk into his doctor's office and say he wants "Targis brand microwave therapy" or "Prostatron (TM) microwave therapy." A more likely scenario is that as news disseminates (no pun intended) about the effective and comparatively painless microwave thermotherapy alternative to surgery or drugs, more middle-aged men with BPH will seek treatment.
In a way, this development reminds me of what folks at CISCO SYSTEMS (Nasdaq: CSCO) told me some months ago when Cisco stock sold off on news that INTEL (Nasdaq: INTC) was introducing certain networking products of its own. Basically, Cisco said that anything that increases interest in networking or traffic on networks is ultimately good for the networking industry. And that anything that's good for the networking industry is good for Cisco.
Getting back to Prime, an executive there reaffirmed today that the company is open to using Urologix's device as well the Prostatron, depending on whatever urologists in various regions of the country may prefer.
Prime continues to develop its routes for thermotherapy treatment of BPH
and is finding a great deal of interest among urologists about partnering
with Prime in the new venture. The first such route, in North Carolina, was
announced recently, and two additional routes are on track for finalization
before the year is out.
Drip Portfolio --
$500 and $100 per month turned into $150K?
Fool Message
Boards -- Speak your mind!
Evening News
-- All the news,
early.
Daily Double -- More room to run?
Daily Trouble -- Value
in this butchered stock?
The Fool Portfolio
-- Fool Port trying to catch the S&P.
Fool Four -- 23% annualized.
(c) Copyright 1997, The Motley Fool. All rights reserved.
This material is for personal use only. Republication and redissemination,
including posting to news groups, is expressly prohibited without the prior
written consent of The Motley Fool.
Stock Change Bid ATLS --- 27.63 BGP - 1/8 23.81 CSL - 13/16 41.75 CSCO - 1/2 77.06 GNT + 13/16 43.56 ORCL - 1/4 38.38 OXHP -1 3/8 74.63 PMSI +1 3/8 12.13 TDW + 5/16 52.81
Day Month Year History
BORING +0.53% -1.94% 21.10% 39.36%
S&P: +0.07% -4.26% 23.35% 46.99%
NASDAQ: +0.27% 0.11% 23.59% 53.28%
Rec'd # Security In At Now Change
2/28/96 400 Borders Gr 11.26 23.81 111.55%
8/13/96 200 Carlisle C 26.32 41.75 58.59%
5/24/96 100 Oxford Hea 48.02 74.63 55.39%
2/2/96 200 Green Tree 30.39 43.56 43.36%
6/26/96 100 Cisco Syst 53.90 77.06 42.97%
3/8/96 400 Prime Medi 10.07 12.13 20.42%
3/5/97 150 Atlas Air 23.06 27.63 19.81%
11/21/96 150 Oracle Cor 32.43 38.38 18.32%
12/23/96 100 Tidewater 46.52 52.81 13.51%
Rec'd # Security In At Value Change
2/28/96 400 Borders Gr 4502.49 9525.00 $5022.51
8/13/96 200 Carlisle C 5264.99 8350.00 $3085.01
5/24/96 100 Oxford Hea 4802.49 7462.50 $2660.01
2/2/96 200 Green Tree 6077.49 8712.50 $2635.01
6/26/96 100 Cisco Syst 5389.99 7706.25 $2316.26
11/21/96 150 Oracle Cor 4864.99 5756.25 $891.26
3/8/96 400 Prime Medi 4027.49 4850.00 $822.51
3/5/97 150 Atlas Air 3458.74 4143.75 $685.01
12/23/96 100 Tidewater 4652.49 5281.25 $628.76
CASH $7890.00
TOTAL $69677.50
