Tom Taulli

With the winds of war in the Mideast and a plunging Nasdaq, it is hard to make a compelling case for a successful IPO market. In fact, there is a very good chance there will be no IPOs hitting market for at least a couple weeks. Already, the IPO market is coming under tremendous pressure. […]

When Texas was fighting for independence in the 1800s, the most memorable battle was at the Alamo. The Texans were heroic. But it was enough and after 13 days, the troops were decimated. But, of course, the Texans ultimately prevailed and the army commander Sam Houston declared, “Remember the Alamo!” In a way, I think […]

As I mentioned in Monday’s column, it is probably a good idea to stay away from buying Net companies before they announce their earnings. Even companies that show better-than-expected earnings are getting whacked. Of course, this was the case with Yahoo! yesterday. The stock fell 20 percent. The company generated $81 million in profits or […]

While getting his MBA at UCLA in 1996, Jim McDermott was working late so as to mail his resumes as fast as possible. But he ran out of stamps. Yep, this gave him the idea for Stamps.com . But lately, the company’s stock price has been approaching – well – the price of a stamp. […]

In 1982, Silicon Graphics was founded to build workstations that help develop high-end graphics. In fact, the systems were used to model the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park. But in the past few years, SGI has looked like a dinosaur itself. The stock performance has been dismal. The 52-week range is 3 1/16 – 13 1/2, […]

Want to learn a new buzzword? Well, this one is called eRM, which stands for e-business Relationship Management. One of the proponents of the concept is YOUcentric. What is eRM, really? Okay, first of all, you need to understand another buzzword: CRM or customer relationship management. Basically, CRM uses technology to help manage relationships between […]

Veeco has a history of growth. Look at last quarter’s results. Sales were $93.6 million, which was a 21% increase from the same period a year ago. Bookings were also vigorous, reaching $132.4 million (a 65% increase from last year). Then again, such growth is common in Veeco’s industry. The company is a leader in […]

Typically, on Monday’s I answer reader mail. However, I’m devoting today’s piece to many common questions in the past few weeks: What’s happening to Internet stocks? Simply put, Wall Street has become hypersensitive to any inkling of bad news. Unfortunately, with a slowing IPO market, higher interest rates, escalating energy prices, dot-com blow-ups and even […]

With high-tech issues getting pounded last week, IPOs were also affected. There were a mere eight IPOs last week. And those that did not launch last week will make another try this week. Although, it is always worth focusing on IPOs that have the ability to launch in the midst of adverse market conditions. It […]

With PC makers announcing poor results, investing in the sector seems dicey — if not insane. Such companies as Dell and Apple have been slashed by investors. It looks like an even bigger leap of faith to invest in PC suppliers, such as disk drive makers. The disk drive business is an extremely tough business, […]

Next week looks fairly light for the IPO market. But there a are a few deals that look interesting. Perhaps the hottest one will be MCE Companies. The company had its genesis in 1994, with the acquisition of Inmet Corporation. Basically, the vision was to roll-up companies that are strong providers of RF/microwave components and […]

In the past few months, Xerox has resembled a busted Internet IPO. Investors have fled the stock as if it were diseased. The 52-week range on the stock is $10-1/2 to $43-5/16. The market cap is $7.2 billion and the current stock price is $10-13/16. And there is good reason for the plunge. Basically, Xerox’s […]