Fool Portfolio Report
Monday, January 22, 1996
SET YOUR VCR! The Motley Fools will be on CNN Business Day at 6:15 am Tuesday. Or, if you happen to be up that early anyway, just fix your eyes on the toob and bask in the Foolishness.ATTENTION WASHINGTON, DC FOOLS:
Come meet fellow Capital area Fools at the DC book signing! Tomorrow, Tuesday, January 23rd, from 12:30 to 1:30 PM, Tom and David Gardner will be at the Reprint Book Shop, 455 L'Enfant Plaza, S.W.; Washington, DC.
The KingFools themselves will be there with quills ready to scrawl on anything you might want signed. Not only that, you'll get to meet other Fools from the area -- what a treat! Questions about how to get to the bookstore? Call 202-554-5070. We hope to see you there!
(GLOBAL FOOL
WIRE)
by MF Bogey (David
Forrest)
--(Cranston, RI. Jan. 22)-- Evening everyone! Bogey here. With Tom and David Gardner in NYC today kissin' babies and pounding the pavement promoting their new book "The Motley Fool Investment Guide", I've been asked to pinch hit for them as they schmooze with all the literary big wigs.
Where to begin?
Well, I got a call from my Grandmother today. Gram asked me what I had been doing with my free time lately. I told her I was just bein' a Fool. She wasn't amused. Ya see, Gram gets a little confused about things from time to time, she mixes up certain important bits of information and tends to get pretty upset about her "confusion."
Apparently my Mom told Gram that I was doing some work for this computer on-line service that had to do with investing. Well, as soon as Gram heard this she called me right up and wondered how I got a job working for the Beardstown Ladies? I told her that I didn't work with the Beardstown Ladies, but that did me no good. The only thing my Grandmother knows about the stock market is that she heard a bunch of "older" ladies have gotten together and invested on their own and did pretty good.
Like I said, Gram gets a little confused and it's darn near impossible to contradict an 87 year old woman without fear of having your ear wrangled the next time you see her!! So, I gave her a "phone kiss" imagining what the other receiver must look like with all that red lipstick on it and I said "Goodbye". Gotta love Grandma.
Speaking of confused "older" folk, did anyone see Alan Abelson's column in Barron's this weekend? Nobody? C'mon, you've got to be kidding. Well, judging by the movement in our dear Iomega stock today, you might get the impression that the entire investing community took a hiatus from Barron's this weekend. [Not the worst idea I've ever heard :) ]
For those Fools who missed it, Mr Abelson, as he's apt to do, pontificated on the treachery that is the "S-3". The S-3 is the document filed with the SEC that details the secondary offering being done by IOMG. Never one to point out the incredibly obvious, Mr Abelson referred to the merely obvious "boilerplate" comments in the S-3 that spelled out the risks associated with investing in the common stock of IOMG. Pretty standard stuff for anyone who's ever read an S-3. Alan?
Now, as we all know, Fools the world over discussed these S-3 comments in great detail over a month ago in the IOMG folder. So, no great revelation from Mr. Abelson. The disturbing part of the Barron's article is that Alan Abelson wouldn't know a Zip drive if it bit him. It's just another example of the out-of-date analog world commenting on something they know nothing about with the sole intention to scare the living bejeezus out of anyone who'll listen. IOMG plowed ahead $3 3/4 to $43 3/8 today. So much for the "news". Earnings are Wednesday!
In other news.... America Online is in negotiations with Netscape to license that company's popular Internet browser. In such a deal, AOL CEO Steve Case may take a position on Netscape's board of directors. AMER closed up today over $4, or better than 12%, and NSCP closed up over 11%, which tells me that investors are just as happy that Netscape wants to work with AOL as they are that AOL may work with Netscape. So much for the death of the online service at the hands of the Internet.
Two of our Beating the Dow stocks, General Electric (GE), off $1/4 to $74, and Chevron (CHV), off $3/8 to $53 3/8, had news today but I won't bore you with the gory details, you can read all about it in our Industry Area under Dow Stocks News. You see, fellow Fools, with companies this size, we pay more attention to the tenets of BTD than we do with the bits and pieces that flow daily from the newswire services. Buy the lowest priced, highest yielding Dow stocks each year and hold 'em for a year. That's it. Simple. Foolish. 20% compounded annually. Cha-ching! Cha-ching! GE was down $1/4 to $74 and CHV closed off $3/8 at $53 5/8.
It was a great day for Foolishness, up 4.98% today and 87.27% since its humble beginnings in August of 1994. Just goes to show that great research, provided mostly by our readers, coupled with the mentality to "watch the calendar and not the clock" can provide outstanding results.
Have a great night everyone!!!
AMER +4 3/8 AMAT +1 1/8 CHV - 3/8 GE - 1/4 GPS --- IOMG +3 3/4 KLAC + 3/4 S + 3/8
Today's Numbers
Day Month Year History FOOL +4.98% 0.29% 0.29% 87.27% S&P 500 +0.26% -0.41% -0.41% 33.81% NASDAQ +1.08% -2.16% -2.16% 42.94% Rec'd # Security In At Now Change 8/5/94 680 AmOnline 7.27 39.13 437.96% 5/17/95 335 Iomega Corp 15.11 43.38 186.99% 8/5/94 165 Sears 28.93 40.38 39.58% 4/20/95 155 The Gap 32.55 43.38 33.26% 8/11/95 95 GenElec 57.91 74.00 27.77% 8/11/95 110 Chevron 49.00 53.63 9.44% 8/24/95 130 KLA Instrm 44.71 28.50 -36.26% 8/24/95 100 AppldMatl 57.52 35.00 -39.16% Rec'd # Security Cost Value Change 8/5/94 680 AmOnline 4945.56 26605.00 $21659.44 5/17/95 335 Iomega Corp 5063.13 14530.63 $9467.50 8/5/94 165 Sears 4772.65 6661.88 $1889.23 4/20/95 155 The Gap 5045.25 6723.13 $1677.88 8/11/95 95 GenElec 5501.87 7030.00 $1528.13 8/11/95 110 Chevron 5389.99 5898.75 $508.76 8/24/95130 KLA Instrm 5812.49 3705.00 -$2107.49 8/24/95 100 AppldMatl 5752.49 3500.00 -$2252.49 CASH $18981.96 TOTAL $93636.34