Conference nyoss1::market_investing

    No, Netscape Communications is privately held.  When, and if, this
    company floats an IPO, my bet is that you won't be able to get within
    100' of any IPO shares...

    There's an annoucement that they intend to go public in the late
    summer.

    
    The euphoria associated with IPO's today may be a very good
    contrary indicator.  The number of IPO's tends to peak at
    market tops.  Picking the top is nearly impossible, but
    a bit of caution may be warranted.
    
    /jeff

	FWIW, SpyGlass, the company I believe that competes with
	Netscape (ala Mosaic) went public yesterday with an IPO
	at 17 but opened of course much higher, and closed at 27.

	How does one get in at the IPO price?  In the past I've
	been told IPO's were only offered to the brokers best
	customers (ala already rich) .....

    Don't IPOs also go to stuff like MUTUAL funds etc... etc...
    
    Suresh

    Just read in the Globe that Netscape will make an IPO sometime soon.
    Most likely it will be near impossible to get in on the early action.
    Typical result is very quick upsurge followed by either stability or 
    a significant drop.  It may be best to wait several months and if it
    does fall off look again.  Trying to get in on the initial action 
    usually can get you burned.

    Does anybody know who the underwriter is for Netscape?

    >     Typical result is very quick upsurge followed by either stability
    > or a significant drop.
    
    Amen to that. Remember the biotech stock craze? When biotech firm
    Alteon went public, their stock rose in the first day almost 100%, from
    15 IPO price to 29. There was talk of bringing action against the
    underwriters for under-pricing the offering, but I think it was just
    due to the fact that the market had a taste for biotech stocks. It is
    now hovering just over 7, has been as low as 3 5/8 in the past year.
    				Jim
    

According to netscape's web page press release, Morgan Stanley  and 
Hambrecht & Quist are acting as co-managers. If you make contact and
manage to get the "red herring" please post the contact name and phone number.

Mark

 Netscape Communications - Initial public offering is expected to rocket
	{The Boston Globe, 25-Jul-95, p. 33}
   Netscape's IPO next month is expected to be one of the hottest public
 offerings in the decade.  Yet, buried inside the company's preliminary
 prospectus - which was distributed this week - is a sobering statistic,  Based
 on a projected price of $13 a share, the 2-year-old company would begin public
 life with an astronomical market capitalization of nearly $500 million.  Few
 IPOs exceed $250 million, and the average well-publicized issue is somewhere
 closer to $100 million.  And if, as at least one analyst expects, the company
 shoots up to $30 on the first day of trading, the market cap will exceed $1
 billion.  "The revenues have to go to the moon to support that kind of market
 capitalization," said Forbes Tuttle, director of research with IPO Value
 Monitor, an independent research firm specializing in initial public
 offerings.  Although Netscape plans to offer 3.5 million shares to the public,
 less known is that there will actually be more than 36 million shares
 outstanding once the company begins trading in mid- to late August.  That's
 because existing, private stockholders in the company will automatically be
 assigned a total of 33 million shares, giving the public less than 10%
 ownership in the company.  Contrary to what many investors believe, market
 capitalization - not share price - is the true reflection of what investors
 think a company is worth.  And value is generally associated with profits.
 Netscape, however, has no record of profits and has only generated $16.6
 million in revenue in its first 6 months of sales.  Microsoft, by contrast,
 posted net profit of $39 million on sales of $198 million in 1986, when its
 market capitalization was a comparable $525 million.

	Well it's happened.  Today netscape went public.  The IPO
	price was $14.  Before it even traded it was up to $28.
	Now in it's first hour of trading it's at $71 ............

    Actually the IPO got priced at $28 and opened at 71. Lots of trades at
    71 - seems like everybody is taking their money out. Looks like a good
    short at that price.

> Looks like a good short at that price.

	Seeing it's an IPO, it would be my guess no exchange is trading
	options on it yet.  Is there another way to short the stock without
	using options?  (maybe if you sell real shares you don't own, and
	then buy later that same day if/when the price drops??)

    
    Why does it say the low of the day is 70/share ???
    I thought it was priced at 28/share ???
    
    WOW!  What a gain!  Did anybody get in on this ???
    
    Symbol        : NSCP         Exchange    : NASDAQ
    Description   : NETSCAPE COMMUNICATIONS CORP COM             
    Last Traded at: 70.5000      Date/Time   : Aug 09 11:56:50
    $ Change      : -1.5000      % Change    : -2.08   
    
    Volume        : 90700        # of Trades : 4860     
    Bid           : 71.0000      Ask         : 71.2500  
    Day Low       : 70.0000      Day High    : 75.0000  
    52 Week Low   : 70.0000      52 Week High: 75.0000  

>    Why does it say the low of the day is 70/share ???
>    I thought it was priced at 28/share ???
    
That's the way they do it.  There were no actual trades at $28...
those were just gifts to favored clients.

.14>			Is there another way to short the stock without
.14>	using options?  (maybe if you sell real shares you don't own, and
.14>	then buy later that same day if/when the price drops??)
    
    That's exactly what you'd do. But first your broker has to be able to
    find a client with shares held in a margin account, in order to borrow
    the shares so they can be sold. I'm not sure how that would be handled
    for an IPO, where no daily accounting has as yet happened.
    
    Trading opened at 71, peaked at 75 and has since dropped to 67. Still a
    stratospheric P/E.
    
    The term "Lillehammer" comes to mind.
    
      John

	Looks like either reality has set in or those underwritters
	did alot of profit taking ........ (ignore volume, sql server
	doesn't deal well with high volume stocks)

Symbol        : NSCP         Exchange    : NASDAQ
Description   : NETSCAPE COMMUNICATIONS CORP COM             
Last Traded at: 58.2500      Date/Time   : Aug 09  4:02:02
$ Change      : -13.7500     % Change    : -19.10  

Volume        : 732300       # of Trades : 11372    
Bid           : 58.2500      Ask         : 58.5000  
Day Low       : 53.7500      Day High    : 75.0000  
52 Week Low   : 53.7500      52 Week High: 75.0000  

    Further reality has set in. Stock today down to 52.5 from an open of
    58. I predict 32 by end of August.
    
    to -1
    It's not the underwriters who are making the money. They made theirs
    simply by bringing out the offering. The people who made the big bucks
    are the very favored, and very few, who were allowed to buy at $28, and
    then sold at $71-75. I suspect VERY few of these were individuals -
    rather big time fund guys.

    I wonder if put options are on the market yet for NetScape. As much as it
    has dropped, the fundamentals are such that it will require many years
    of good profits for the company to be worth its stock price. Will the
    investors be patient enough to sustain it that long?
    
    NetScape seems like a one-product company, and that product is subject
    to a lot of competition. Do they have any other substantial products on
    the drawing board besides their Web utility?
    
    This IPO reminds me of the stock I bought into in the mid '80's, in a
    small company which later went bankrupt. It was a biotech venture to
    market a drug for a condition which had hitherto had no good ways to
    treat it, and it was headed by the director emeritus of my department
    at the hospital where I worked, a very well respected scientist and
    surgeon. But that was the company's only product; when its clinical
    trials came back negative, the company quickly tanked.
    
    Also, when I
    took the prospectus back to my Dad to ask if he wanted to also get in
    on the action, he pointed out that the three founders of the company
    were getting 80% of the stock at a couple cents per share (the total
    investment was $40K!); when the stock went to IPO, it was offered at
    $2.00, but (like Netscape) doubled in price before the opening bell.
    When it eventually hit $9 -- just before the clinical trial results
    came back -- one of the founders sold most of his stake, becoming an
    overnight multimillionaire. (not sure how he fares today, after the
    class action suit and the Congressional investigation :-o )
    
    Fortunately, I only lost a few hundred bucks in the deal. Still have
    the certificates, and I'm trying to think of something clever to do
    with them :-). but I'm glad I learned my lesson then, when I had less to
    lose!
    			Jim
    

Not only does Netscape only have one product, but currently, you
can get it for free.  Have they announced what they are planning on
doing with the money generated by the IPO?  Maybe they plan
on becoming another online service, which might fill the demand for
public access that isn't through a 'gateway' like aol.

Bart

    Actually they also sell (for real $$$) a server. They're giving the
    client away for free.
    
    I believe that in the end, Netscape will not amount to too much unless
    they really broaden their product set.
    
    Wim

    How about the companies that sell space on the WWW?  Are there
    any that are publicly traded?  People are rushing out there,
    and paying huge amounts of money.  Is there growth there?
    
    Bart
    

    	Interesting to read .11 after-the-fact.

    outstanding shares: 38.1 Million

    only 5 million shares initially available to the public

    James H. Clark, Chairman (Silicon Valley poineer)  9.7 M shares (25% shares)

    James Barksdale, CEO + President (previouly IBM salesman,
    	Federal Express Corp. C.O.O.,
	McCaw Cellular Corp. President + C.O.O.)
    	this guy has been around...
    		4.2 M shares (11% shares)

    L.John Doerr, Silicon Valley Venture Capitalist, 4.4 M shares (12% shares)

    Marc Andreessen, 24 year old programmer (the worker :-)) 1.0 M shares (2.7%)

    The stock just keeps on going up by 5 or more points almost everyday.
    It is at 95 today!  This is insane give the following results
    
    Latest quarter results (in millions)
    
         Date Filed     09/30/1995
         Revenue             $20.8
         Net Income           $1.4
         Shares               37.8
    
    Does the stock price make sense based on the PE and the market
    capitalization?
    
    - Vikas

    heard on the radio this morning that Netscape stock is splitting 2 for
    1.
    
    Mark

    
    
    
    re: .-1
    
    Three for one might be better :!)
    
    Symbol        : NSCP         Exchange    : NASDAQ
    Description   : NETSCAPE COMMUNICATIONS CORP COM             
    Last Traded at: 121.0000     Date/Time   : Nov 20  1:23:33
    $ Change      : 10.5000      % Change    : 9.50    
    
    Volume        : 1283000      # of Trades : 2348     
    Bid           : 121.0000     Ask         : 121.2500 
    Day Low       : 111.0000     Day High    : 122.2500 
    52 Week Low   : 45.7500      52 Week High: 121.7500 
    

    I guess all the institution investors who bought the IPO shares are 
    trying to hype up the prices before they bail out.   :-)
    
    Mike

    
    	Netscape up 15.25 for the day so far, Now up to 126. From the TV
    at lunchtime.
    
    
    Ron

> Netscape up 15.25 for the day so far, Now up to 126. From the TV at lunchtime.

	It had been up even over that earlier.  CNN HN reports that
	Goldman Sachs has given a strong [buy] recomendation for
	this stock.  I still find it had to believe!

	I also still find it interesting that the bid/ask spread is
	more than 1/8th of a point when the volume is up this high!
	NASDAQ market makers really are crooks!

Symbol        : NSCP         Exchange    : NASDAQ
Description   : NETSCAPE COMMUNICATIONS CORP COM             
Last Traded at: 125.2500     Date/Time   : Nov 28  1:57:42
$ Change      : 14.7500      % Change    : 13.35   

Volume        : 1472400      # of Trades : 2271     
Bid           : 125.0000     Ask         : 125.2500 
Day Low       : 118.2500     Day High    : 127.7500 
52 Week Low   : 45.7500      52 Week High: 125.2500 

    That continued volume is fascinating. 1 1/2 million shares chasing an
    open float of what, under 4 million shares. Even more amazing is that
    the market has put a total value of around $5B on this young company.
    
    There must also be some incredible short squeezes going on. I'd have to
    count myself among those thinking that there was _no_ way this stock
    was going to go any higher than [insert price here]. Maybe the tech.
    mutual funds aren't letting go of any of the shares they got at the 
    IPO yet. 
    
    Let's have a little fun. I'm guessing that, in short order, some of the
    more sane mutual fund managers are going to step back and unload
    Netscape, showing their customers a nice end-of-year gain. In fact,
    I'll go further out on a limb and say that a nasty downturn is in order
    for Netscape as it approaches $150. Anyone willing to take the other 
    side of this trade? I think it should be worth at least a large cheeze 
    pizza?
    
    Hey, I'm from Vegas. I've got to do something to keep away from all
    these casinos.
    
    -John-

    
    	Got to agrre with ya', John. When this baby (Netscape) collaspes
    its gonna make a free-fall look like a 1:1 glide path. When ever
    rampant speculation sets in, sit out. Tulip growers learned this in
    15th Century Holland, and  NSCP buyers are going to learn it in
    the 20th.
    
    	I can't think of anything worth 100 times SALES. This is
    ridiculous.
    
    	But I wouldn't short a running horse...
    
    		the Greyhawk

    
       Anyone know if there are any options (calls, puts, LEAPs)
       on Netscape?
    
       -Jerry
        (too chicken to short, but an out-of-the-money put would be nice)
    

	All the Internet stocks are crazy right now.  As the analysts
	say, there is only a handfull of them to fill a large demand.

	Stocks of REIT's were like this until alot more REITs started
	trading and then outpaced the demand.

	I would imagine supply of Internet stocks will increase
	and when it does that's when the bottom will fall out ....

    Did it really close at 171 ?

    Yep.

    They aren't people. They are lemmings. 

> Did it really close at 171 ?

	And still climbing today even as the NASDAQ is down 6pts right now ...
	Someone earlier back said NSCP has a PE of around 400.  From what I've
	heard its actually more like 4,000 ....

Symbol        : NSCP         Exchange    : NASDAQ
Description   : NETSCAPE COMMUNICATIONS CORP COM             
Last Traded at: 173.2500     Date/Time   : Dec 06  9:40:03
$ Change      : 2.2500       % Change    : 1.32    

Volume        : 90200        # of Trades : 203      
Bid           : 171.7500     Ask         : 172.2500 
Day Low       : 172.7500     Day High    : 174.0000 
52 Week Low   : 45.7500      52 Week High: 173.2500 

    In answer to a previous noter who asked about options, I checked with
    my broker (Schwab), who said that no options are being offered yet for
    Netscape. this might well have saved me from myself, as I was
    interested in picking up some PUT options with a strike price of 135 at
    the time I called (was it really just last Friday?). Such an option
    would already be out of the money by $38.
    
    I meant to ask Schwab what it takes to get an option listed. Maybe
    someone here could answer that. My guess would be that options
    (particularly standardized ones) only become available when enough
    people want to write them. You'd only write an option if you felt
    the stock was fairly stable and you wanted to earn a little extra
    income. I don't think "stable" describes Netscape!
    				Jim
    

    re: .39
    
    What is NSCP's projected earning for 1996? Does anybody have any idea?
    I also heard its P/E was in the 400 range. But, that was when their
    stock was around $120/share. It's now in the $160-170 range, I would
    think their P/E is at least at 500 or so. It's insane!!!
    
    Mike 

    I heard the same number on Bob Brinker's radio program last Sunday.  I
    guess with the run up this week, a P/E of 500-600 is probably in the
    ballpark.  
    
    This stock's for the people who like to go to Las Vegas or Atlantic
    City for a good time.  Whether it's investing is arguable. 

    
    	And the "house" makes a ton of money. This stock is going to be one
    of the great shorts of all time. The question is when????
    
    		the Greyhawk

> This stock is going to be one of the great shorts of all time.
> The question is when????

	NBR last night quoted a quote of an analyst who predicts that
	this group will correct back 80%.  Have you taken your huge
	QDEK profits yet?

    
    	Jeff -
    
    	Sold last week at $33.875, a mind-numbing increase of 553% from my
    average purchase prices over the past year. Since it was all in my and
    wife's IRAs, no taxes :-).
    
    	Left the funds all in cash, this market scares me silly right now.
    This maybe the one time in my entire life where I am actually living
    the saying "Discretion is the better part of valor".
    
    			the Greyhawk

    Just heard on the radio that Smith Barney is recommending selling NSCP.
    The stock is down by $19, now. This has also brought down other hi-tech
    stocks. I wonder who bought NSCP at $174/share?

>     Just heard on the radio that Smith Barney is recommending selling NSCP.
>     The stock is down by $19, now. This has also brought down other hi-tech
>     stocks. I wonder who bought NSCP at $174/share?

	See .44 (and other replies earlier today by me to some other
	topics in this conference).  The full story is that Smith Barney
	has downgraded the whole [pure Internet stock] group and predicts
	an 80% correction in that group. (of course you've always got to
	wonder if brokerage houses create self-furfilling proficies when
	they dole out their recomendations, etc)

    I found an answer to my previous question about when options can be
    offered on a stock. My Smith-Barney broker says that a certain amount
    of time must pass after the IPO before a stock becomes "marginable";
    before that, the stock cannot be used to show a balance in a margin
    account. Once it can be margined, standardized options be offered on
    the stock. He wasn't sure how much time was required after the IPO, but
    it was on the order of a couple months.
    
    			Jim
    

.40>  [...] You'd only write an option if you felt
.40>  the stock was fairly stable and you wanted to earn a little extra
.40>  income. I don't think "stable" describes Netscape!
    
    This is not the case, at least for the folks who do this for a living.
    Market-makers would simply charge as high a premium as they felt they'd
    need in order to make a profit. What they want from the market in order
    to participate is a liquid two-way market in the underlying stock.
    Trading > 1M shares a day ought to qualify on that score, even if it
    is on NASDAQ ("license to steal").
    
    You also need a fair number held in margin accounts so they can be
    borrowed in order to be shorted, as noted in .-1. This ought not be
    too difficult with all the institutional ownership.
    
    Maybe I'll ask the CBOE what the story is.
    
      John

    Monday (12-Feb-1996) Netscape options start trading on the Amex.
    I'm not certain yet, but odds are the ticker symbol will be NSQ.
    
      John

> Monday (12-Feb-1996) Netscape options start trading on the Amex.
> I'm not certain yet, but odds are the ticker symbol will be NSQ.

	Close, but no cigar (though the DBC Server headlines have been
	known to have typos before ...)

14:30  [NSCP]  *AS OF TODAY NETSCAPE IS TRADING OPTIONS. SYMBOL WILL BE NQY. 

    What happened to NSCP, did it go down or had a split? I haven't been
    following this stock. BTW, I was reading an article in Fortune
    magazine. The author didn't think Netscape will do well when the "big
    boys" started jumping into the Internet business. It'll be fun to
    watch...   
    
    Mike

> What happened to NSCP, did it go down or had a split?

	yes, it split.  52 week low/high reflect the split (tell tale
	sign of a split vs. losing 50%+ of it's value :-)

> The author didn't think Netscape will do well when the "big
> boys" started jumping into the Internet business....

	i said that from the start!  never mind the big boys, just
	more competition in general.  that's what happened to REIT
	(real estate investment trusts), there were few of them around
	so the demand was high for those few.  then the market got flooded
	with REIT's and prices dropped .....

Symbol: NSCP (NETSCAPE COMMUNICATIONS CORP COM) [NASDAQ]
Last Trade: 63 1/4, Change 1/2 (0.80%) at Feb 16  4:01:20
Bid & Ask:  63 1/4 & 63 1/2 (spread 1/4)
Low & High: 61 1/2 & 63 3/4 (spread 2 1/4)
52 Week Low & High: 22 7/8 & 87 (spread 64 1/8)
Volume/# of Trades: 376700 / 626 (601 shares/trade)

	So what's the deal with the new version of Netscape?  Some
	stock named Cybercash (ticker symbol lookup failed so I
	couldn't get the quote for here) closed up 50% today, NBR
	saying it was due to news that Netscapes new program has a flaw.
	NSCP didn't fair bad at all on the news however (it appears
	to only of lost an earlier gain looking at day high).  Awefully
	heaving trading volume (6X) however (at least compared to
	the volume on Feb. 16 posted in .-1) ....

Symbol: NSCP (NETSCAPE COMMUNICATIONS CORP COM) [NASDAQ]
Last Trade: 62, no change at Feb 22  4:01:29
Bid & Ask:  61 3/4 & 62 (spread 1/4)
Low & High: 61 1/2 & 66 (spread 4 1/2)
52 Week Low & High: 22 7/8 & 87 (spread 64 1/8)
Volume/# of Trades: 2000900 / 1743 (1147 shares/trade)

    From CNBC...
    Netscape is said to have a fix already.
    
    Cybercash is an IPO.
    Credit card transactions via Internet - if I remember correctly.

    John Murphy of CNBC thinks that it is going down further since it has
    broken key support levels.....
    
    Still time to play the puts on it for your aggressive traders out
    there......
    
    Ken

> Going Down EVEN MORE.....??

	Maybe the analyst see the news about AT&T getting into the
	Internet On-Line business not only bad news for the current
	crop of Internet providers (America On-Line, UUnet, ...), but
	also for Netscape?

    That was the word that I heard.
    
    All of the internet related stocks were getting hit hard today.

    What kind of rules must institutional investors live by ?  Netscape is
    an incredible money making opportunity for these guys.
    
    Lets say that Fidelity (or any big investor) got in on the Netscape IPO
    at $28 per share and rode it up to $160.  Now lets say they want to
    hold onto the shares they have, AND short some Netscape as well.
    
    The big investor shorts 1,000,000 shares when the price is $160.
    Next he sells off his 500,000 shares he bought at the IPO($28) for around
    $160.  He makes money on the sale, AND he makes money on the short side
    because his large sale drives down the price of the stock.
    
    Is it possible for them to play both sides of this stock ?  If so, us
    retail investors get whip sawed big time.
    
    

>   The big investor shorts 1,000,000 shares when the price is $160.
>   Next he sells off his 500,000 shares he bought at the IPO($28) for around
>   $160.  He makes money on the sale, AND he makes money on the short side
>   because his large sale drives down the price of the stock.
    
    How is it that he manages to do all this selling without driving down
    the price of the stock?
    
    How does he know the market won't continue to run even higher while
    he's short?
    
    If you can pick the top and bottom ahead of time, yes, you can cash in
    big time. It's a little tougher than that in the real world; witness
    the small fraction of funds that can actually outperform the market.
    Some of those unsuccessful funds are HUGE.
    
      John

    re -.1
    
    Interesting, due to the Fidelity Magellan/Jeff Vinik happenings
    of late.  Vinik was buying, and the price was going up, he was
    selling and the price was going down.  I wonder if he shorted
    Micron.  Hmm..
    
    
    Bart