Fool Portfolio Report
Friday, August 30, 1996
(FOOL GLOBAL WIRE)
ALEXANDRIA, VA, August 30, 1996 -- The Fool Portfolio scored a touchdown on its final day of August, racking up a gain of 1.06% vs. losses of 0.82% and 0.31% for the S&P 500 and the NASDAQ, respectively. Wait, did I say touchdown?!!
Down, set, hike!
Brown 49! Brown 49! Set, hut one, hut two! (That was the way the ol' CBS "NFL Today" show used to start, for those of you who remember the weekly half hour that brought Irv Cross to America.)
Hold on, now! Time for an audible:
"Fool one, Fool two, Fool SETTTTTT! Fool twenty-five. Scamper. Red dog. Fool dog right."
OK, OK, I'm sorry. I'll shut up with this meaningless jabber. You just have to understand that I'm gearing up for FoolBall right now. Forget about stocks for a sec, OK? FoolBall is the one thing we have to console us every year when we kiss our Indian summers goodbye.
Yeah, that's right. FoolBall. NOT NFL football, a cheap knockoff. FoolBall is our Foolish companion game to that Monday NFL contest that's shown nationally by the network that dropped from being #1 rated to #3 rated in the space of the past year.
Anyway, a couple of years ago the founders of The Motley Fool dreamt up what we thought might make for an exceedingly amusing few hours of TV every Monday in the fall. We created FoolBall, the game that scares the "T" out of football. Each week for the past few seasons, we've presented our readership (and anyone else who bothered to enter as an office buddy, or spouse, or whatever... the more the merrier) twelve questions quizzing you about the events that will occur on that Monday telecast. This ain't trivia, sister, this is the real stuff: predictions. Bold ones. The ultimate "short-term market calls." Predictions so concomitantly silly and meaningful that it could only be the stuff of Folly.
Our questions, as you'll see, have as much to do with the culture surrounding each Monday game (the advertisements, the announcers, the mascots, etc.) as they do about the game itself. There's a mix, of course... this game appeals to the hard-core NFL fan as well. (Any hard-core fan knows that the Monday games are historically ridiculously dull blowouts, so that hard-core fans can appreciate FoolBall all the more since actually keeps these games interesting to the final gun.)
But the game may be appreciated most by the many NFL widows and widowers, y'know, the other person who sits through the game because his/her spouse is a rabid fan. These other people now have as much or more rooting interest, as they strive to predict whether the kicker will hit a ball out of bounds, whether announcer Dan Dierdorf will talk about what he's eating during the game, whether any lineman will get in one of those silly helmet-slapping "fights" with a member of the opposition. Or whether Microsoft will advertise that night. Or whether we'll see more shots of the cheerleaders or the home team's defensive coordinator. And just how many instant replays will be shown over the course of the game?
Only in FoolBall. The first week begins now, and it's your opportunity to get in on the ground floor for our usual assortment of motley prizes! To find FoolBall, try keyword FOOLBALL. (How's that for intuitive?) And you can play it on the World Wide Web this year at: /foolball/foolball.htm. Print out the questions and read 'em offline if you like, then take the few minutes to type in your answers on our screen and submit. We keep full statistics on all our players, and provide timely results and standings, and e-mail notices. Fool on!
OK, back to our regularly scheduled program. The Fool Portfolio won the month of August with its Friday close, beating the S&P 500 2.99% to 1.88%. (We lost to the NASDAQ, which was up 5.64%.) This is the first market-beating month we've had since May, so a delight to behold it is. Medicis rose a buck today -- again -- Iomega rose $5/8, and 3M hit a new Fool high of $68 3/4.
3M, that's right, not 3Com. Anyone noticed this pleasing duality? 3M and 3Com, bedmates in the Foolfolio. Or, as I've taken to calling 'em, Trois Com and Trois Em... les deux Trois! Trois Com got knocked down today by as much as Trois Em rose: $1 3/8. Trois Com also went back into the red, down a quarter from our purchase. No matter, it was a nice comeback week overall.
No news today on any of these. Appropriately quiet before the long weekend. And that's the way I'll spend it: quietly. We look forward to seeing you, dear reader, with the opening of September's trading on TUESDAY (Monday is a full holiday for the markets).
Best wishes for a most unWise holiday!
--- David Gardner, August 30, 1996
Today's Numbers
Day Month Year History FOOL +1.06% 2.99% 26.49% 136.19% S&P 500 -0.82% 1.88% 5.85% 42.23% NASDAQ -0.31% 5.64% 8.49% 58.50% Rec'd # Security In At Now Change 5/17/95 2010 Iomega Cor 2.52 15.38 510.37% 8/5/94 680 AmOnline 7.27 30.25 315.93% 1/29/96 375 Medicis Ph 18.57 41.00 120.75% 8/11/95 125 Chevron 50.28 58.88 17.08% 8/12/96 110 Minn M&M 65.68 68.75 4.68% 8/13/96 250 3Com Corp. 46.86 46.63 -0.50% 8/12/96 130 AT&T 54.96 52.50 -4.48% 8/12/96 280 Gen'l Moto 51.97 49.63 -4.52% 8/24/95 130 KLA Instrm 44.71 19.75 -55.83% Rec'd # Security Cost Value Change 5/17/95 2010 Iomega Cor 5063.13 30903.75 $25840.62 8/5/94 680 AmOnline 4945.56 20570.00 $15624.44 1/29/96 375 Medicis Ph 6964.99 15375.00 $8410.01 8/11/95 125 Chevron 6285.61 7359.38 $1073.77 8/12/96 110 Minn M&M 7224.44 7562.50 $338.06 8/13/96 250 3Com Corp. 11714.99 11656.25 -$58.74 8/12/96 130 AT&T 7144.99 6825.00 -$319.99 8/11/95 280 Gen'l Moto 14552.49 13895.00 -$657.49 8/24/95 130 KLA Instrm 5812.49 2567.50 -$3244.99 CASH $1379.61 TOTAL $118093.99
