On Thu, 2002-05-23 at 20:09, Eliran wrote: > > I don't think M$ have a money problem but they sure think of what they get of > it.
I believe you arw wrong. MS has a lot of cash money. Enough to last them a lifetime without revenues and it means absoloutly nothing. Here is why (obviously, if you make any important economical decision based on the following words, you are not only stupid, you are down right sucidal...) It is true that MS can survive without revenue more then a camel without water, BUT the 'no revenue' WILL show up on their balance sheet and the stock market watches that balance sheet very well. Even more then a regular company, much of MS strentgh is built on the preception of them being succeful. Their stock is worth real money because people know their stock is worth real money. It's the classic self profiling prophecy but for it to continue to work investor need to continue to believe in the bright MS future. Lowered renvenue is very problematic for MS even if they have more cash stashed away then the US goverment. Even worse (for MS), they pay lesser salaries in real money and reward workers (of the inner circle, those carrying the red tags) with handsome allowances of something that seems just as good: MS stock options. But again, MS stock options are a reqard only while the stock keep going UP. Not even mighty MS can continue to maintain an upward mobile stock price for long times with a continued drop in revenues. And when stock prices begin to fall, employees will begin to sell (because otherwise they will lose the value of their hard earned reward) and inner selling (selling of stocks and options of a company by employees) is looked upon VERY badly by investors. What this will cause is that when the revenues begin to suffer, stock prices will begin to drop. Stock price dropping will lower the MS cash pile (because some of it is in MS stocks) and the descent will be increase. At a certain point inner selling will begin and then its crash and burn time. This is the scenario that keeps Ballmer and friends (I guess Bill Gates is reach enough beyond carring) awake at night. All of this explains why a steady revenue stream is extremly important to MS even though they've got a pile of cash big enough to drown a horse in. Gilad. -- Gilad Ben-Yossef <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> http://benyossef.com "Hail Eris! All Hail Discordia!" ================================================================= To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word "unsubscribe" in the message body, e.g., run the command echo unsubscribe | mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
