#Commodore International
60 messages in this thread
What's the deal? I was just informed that commie was up 1 3/8 today!! Any
special news that can be pased along? Commie said that they don't remark upon
any Stock Market action. If anyone knows, I sure would like the line on it.
TSM
Could be speculation. Watch the stock, if it continues to go up at a steady
rate, something is happening!
John Chang
Observing Amiganoid
Scala, Inc.
John,
Speculation? I don't think so. Today CBU's activity was 20 times higher than
at any time in the last 2 months. The closing stock price was higher than it's
been since the June layoffs. Something happened, or is happening. Speculation
does not cause the stock to gain 25% in value in one day.
Steve:
Actually, it gained 48% in one day. 4.625/3.125 = 1.48. Also, 800+K
shares is a significant piece of stock.
Clint <Chaocity>
Clint,
Yeah, I blew the math … no excuse there.
But, in some of the other numbers, depending where online you get
them, there is some descrepancies. For instance, was that 800k+ the
number of transactions or total number of shares trades (I believe it
was transactions, as at 3:15 PM EST yesterday Rueter's reported that
numbers of shared traded up to that time was 5M+). At the forum
prompt if you type QUO CBU you'll be given the current stock price
along with a number it says is shares traded … I believe that isn't
the shares traded by the number of tranactions (the vast majority of
transactions are made in lots of 100 shares).
One rumor I am hearing that is interesting.. I do wish I could say it
came from a very reliable source–but I can't at this point. I heard
today that Nintendo may have bought a bit of Commodore. They may
well want CD32 and the marketshare Commodore has in Europe. Pure
speculation folks. Perhaps Nintendo got tired of the SEGA AD.
Well it sure would make good sense for the fact of CBU's prescence in
Europe. Not that I would particularly care for being owned by a GAME
company thou'!! 🙂 But like someone (I forget) said, there has to
be more than smoke and mirrors behind the big rally and the market
action.
I don't have any info at all … but I can't give any credence to the
Nintendo rumor. Nintendo recently signed a deal with Silicon
Graphics to use a chip set developed by SGI for a game machine to be
introduced in '95. I can't believe that they would want the CD32, a
totally incompatible machine with their current product line, for an
18-24 month time frame. -sja
You gotta admit though that the SGI + Nintendo deal is not going to
produce a machine that many outside of the United States would be
able to afford. Such a VR system described by Nintendo has got to
come in at the $700 range I would think. CD32 is a very inexpensive
platform and probably would have a wider appeal in Europe–a market
that Nintendo would like to get in. However, let me agree with you
on what point. There is no evidence whatsoever that this happened.
In fact, the more I think about it the less likely it seems to me as
well. Makes for good rumormongering though!
Whatever is inexpensive today is obsolete tommorow. Whatever would
"come in at the $700 range" today will be inexpensive tommorow. The
SGI+Nintendo box isn't supposed to de-vaporize until at least 1995. I
don't expend that Nintendo is interested in trying to find a market
for $700 boxes. (For that matter, I doubt 3do is either — I suspect
they know that their market may not take off until their prices come
down dramatically.)
Nintendo is saying they expect the Nintendo/SGI thingy to retail for
under $250
The figures in the paper this morning match the 826K reported by
QUO CBU rather than the 5 million. I think 5 million would be about
15-20% of all of the CBU stock available, which would be reported as
a takeover attempt rather than just a stock transaction. I'm going to
check today's numbers in a minute and see if the trend continues.
800K has to represent the number of shares traded. Commodore only has
33 million shares total. For 800K x 100 shares to have been traded,
that would be 80 million shares.
OK, guys we are just speculating… anyone wants to put together the
pieces and come up with a plausable list of clients who would be
interested in C=?
Ok. I admit it. I bought CBM yesterday. Hey, they gave me a 30
day no questions asked return privilege. <g>
Almost took you seriously there! ;-}
<g>
Haven't a clue. I think the QUO numbers were correct, but that
still indicates increased activity. Could be the quarterly report,
the "Street" interest in the game machines or Gould payed himself
enough to buy some stock back. <grin> There would be more activity
than there has been if it were a takeover bid, unless it's just
rumors in high places.
I guess we'll have to see what plays out on Wall Street in the next
couple of days. If it continues to go up 25% each day, someone is
going to get on top.
Well, it dropped back .375 yesterday, but the volume was still
high. About 5% of the total stock changed hands over the past few
days. If that gets up in the 20-25% range then I would think some
sort of takeover is in progress, though usually those are announced
in advance.
Thanks for the updates Clint! We have talked to several other Amiga
manufacturers. They are intrigued, however, they too are speculating
on why the stock is so active. Keep the observations coming!
John:
I try to keep an eye on what's happening with Commodore. I am an
eternal optimist, hoping that the Amiga market, even if small, will
remain healthy. That reminds me, I need to check today's figures.
<grin>
Clint <Chaocity>
Well to add to the speculation I heard a really juicy rumour from a
friend here in Hong kong, who heard it from a good source in Germany,
something along the lines of some dealers were getting notices that
the AAA chipset was going to be released in the next couple of weeks
in 4000's !! I personally think this is a bit far fetched ! I mean
according to the magazines the AAA has only been in Silicon for a
couple of months ! Still it adds to the rumour mill ;^) Is there any
German dealers in here that could varify this ? or is it all BS.
I had an interesting discussion with an amiga manufactuer today who
felt the stock jump was due to an article that appeared in USA Today
claiming that Commodore, Atari and 3D0 are about to be major
competitors to Ninetendo and SEGA.
His point was — the people that make investment decisions may not be
as well plugged in as we are. They may not realize the difficulty
each of these companies may face in bringing these products to market
and getting them on the shelves.
His point may well be true. Yet another bubble in Commodore stock.
Too bad, I rather liked the Nintendo rumor. 🙂
Hi Mark. I already put a message on here before stating that
Commodore being mentioned in USA Today was the reason for the stock
jump. You're right about investors often not being that clued in.
They may well have seen that Atari has shot up and held up pretty
well recently, but that Commodore still appeared "cheap". I saw that
C= is down to 3.5 again now. Another thing to remember, those that
bought on the day it shot up from around 3 to just over 4 could have
made a 30% profit in one day. That is, those that got in at the right
time may well have jumped out after making a bunch of money. Most
people are not in the stock market because they "care" about the
companies involved. That's one of my problems with the stock market
in general. There should be reward for holding onto stock. My vote
would be a progressive capital gains tax inversely proportional to
the length of time a stock is held.
Here's to still wishing!
Warmest Regards,
Observing Amiganoid
Scala, Inc.
The guy Jim Drew from Utilities Unlimited (Makers of Emplant)
released another press release-made-to-look-like-insider-posting.
Sort of like an info-mercial. Anyway, it hints at how they are
looking at making a 3D0 emulator, so that CD32 and possibly a CD
equiped Amiga can be 3D0 compliant.
Plausible list? Scala and Newtek.
Thank you for the complient. I'm afraid Scala's pockets are not that
deep! ;-}
There are many precedents where a David takes over a Goliath. Capital
Cities taking over ABC comes to mind. Viacom's bid for Paramount
(that hasn't been successful yet, but be in the future). So, you
never know. It is not always the deepest pockets that count.
Hmm, thank you for the different viewpoint. Since that broadens the
possibilities of who would be interested in a company, which according
to official communications, isn't for sale, who would be interested?
>Thank you for the complient. I'm afraid Scala's pockets are not that
>deep! ;-}
Oh man! I was hoping…
>Thank you for the complient. I'm afraid Scala's pockets are not that
>deep! ;-}
*YET!*
Warmest Regards,
John Chang
Aspiring Corporate Takeover Artist
Scala, Inc.
The rumors are running rampant! Not since Sony started sniffing
around has things got interesting! Is Sony back? We'll just have to
wait and see!
Sony comes back every 6 months or so… 🙂
I feel something in the air, but darned If I know what it is.
Any of the game companies could be it, but could we be overlooking
another type of company? (Course, that's assuming someone tries a
buyout, which I'm not certain of.)
Mark Manes mentioned that Nintendo was sniffing around. I think that
is entirely possible. Sega is doing well in Europe and of course,
the US. HP? Motorola? Arrgh, M-I-C-R-O-S-O-F-T!!!
Some other major companies that might need some really good
multimedia machines, ATT, ITT, Cable companies… I think were
probably hoping some big company well buy out C= and then the Amiga
will finally get the recognition it deserves, but, as they say, I'll
believe it when I see it. 😐
I always kinda hoped Kodak would take an interest in C=.
Kodak, hmmmm, that wouldn't be bad! 🙂
Unfortunately, I think they have to many ties with Phillips.
Bob Comer — Flying high and fast with my A1200HD'030 on Autopilot!
From Cheyenne, Wyoming U.S.A.
Kodak? Great film and document company. Not quiet sure how their
corporate structure sees the applications of multimedia. After all,
their Photo-CD technology was targeted at regular consumers. By any
measure, that market has flopped. However, in multimedia circles,
communications and DTP, it is a Godsend!
Kodak knows film is slowly dying and that they have to get into
digital imaging in a bigger way than Photo CD. They want to protect
their stake in industrial, scientific, and medical imaging. They also
have a super fast 4 meg video ram chip that lurks in their R&D lab.
Think how the Amiga technology might fit into their plans. They could
probably buy C= and soup up the Amiga faster and cheaper than
developing something else from scratch. Who says it has to be a
desktop computer? Why couldn't it evolve into a digital Carousel
Projector? Fun to think about. 🙂
I though NewTek was already working on a full non-linear digital
Toaster? ;-}
Amen to that brother! As we all know, the Amiga technology is proven,
has high performance and one of the better operating systems on the
PC market. Somehow, I am reminded of the film "Tucker" in this
situation.
"Sony" They have just this week-end had a big ad campaign for their
new 1/2 size of a CDRom disk, "MiniDisk"…."74 mins of recording
time" Is this product up and running over there??
Sometimes NZ is used as a first release area to test out new
products. Some more grist to the rumour mill. BTW I am a bit
suprised not to have seen anything about the CDRom rewritable
"Hard-Drive" disk that Pinnacle Micro have made/developed right under
Sony's very nose. There was a small article in the Business Week
Review late last month, a reprint from the Fortune Magazine.
Lots of talk my friend. No deliverables yet. We'll probably have
some interesting new toys by COMDEX.
I haven't seen the mini-disk yet, but from what I hear, it's not all
what it's cracked up to be… The sound quality isn't as good as
we've come to expect with CD's and DAT. The new minidisks use
compression to get that kind of storage, and with compression you get
loss of signal. (In this case anyway.) The only writable CDRom drives
that I've seen are HUGELY expensive for the storage that you get.
Robert, I was reading some (audio) trade magazines one of the
fellows gets at work that had a real good article on the mini-disks
and the compression formats. Yes, there is a lot of compression, but
the compression is tailored in such a manner as to maintain a minimum
S/N ratio for the human ear. I.E. At parts of the audio spectrum
where we have a poor audio response, they use a lot more compression
compared to the part of the spectrum where the human ear performs
much better.
Most people will not be able to tell the difference between CD and
mini-disc. Course, you will never convince the people that run green
felt markers on the outer edges of their CDs <grin>.
You ever bump your CD player when listening to it play a sound? You
won't have the problem of losing audio for a short time with the
mini-disc. It has a large buffer (4 mega-bits, I think) to avoid
audio dropouts. Should make portable and vehicle mini-disc players
very popular.
They were mentioned in a USA Today article (life section) on the resurgence of
the videogame market. Commodore was mentioned along with 3D0 and Atari as
threats to Nintendo and Sega. A cool picture of the Atari Jaguar was shown.
The Jaguar? What in the Nine Hells is that? Besides, does anyone take Atari
seriously anymore? From what I have seen, they have had more vaporware than
anyother company I know of!! Well, at least Commodore stock got a shot in the
arm. Not that I belive that it will do a whole lot. I think I have rrealized
a long time ago that Amiga was on a downward slide. :-<
Thanks for the info tho'
TSM
Ironically (or in a related action?), Atari was also reported yesterday as
the most active AMEX issue…
Does USA Today have that many investors reading? 🙂
*** jd
While I'm still quite skeptical about Atari's future, the smoke seems
to be clearing more and more each day. The Jaguar game machine from
Atari is apparently based on a proprietary set of 64 bit chips
developed by Atari, that will be built, along with the whole machine,
by IBM (yes, you heard me, IBM). Atari forged a deal for the first
$500 million worth of product to be built and distributed by IBM in
North Carolina, I believe. The Jaguar will apparently retail for
$249 with a CD add-on to follow for $200. It sounds incredible if
they can pull it off. Wall St. seems very interested. Atari's stock
has been on a very steep rise recently. What a fun industry this is
to watch!
It went up 1.5 today! No idea why though…
Steve
48% increase to near $5. The Philladelphia Inquirer mentioned rumors of a
take-over but reports no comment out of West Chester.
I don't care why it jumped 48%, but am real happy to have dumped all my
IRA money into C= stock at 3.5 recently.
Dale Larson
– An Amiga Software Engineer with less and less time on his hands.
Go Dale! You Indiana Jones of the NYSE! (Enter John Williams
fanfare…) ;-}
DAle- I suspect that Bill Gates secretly covets AmigaDos and the
proprietary chipset for use in a real Intel based operating system
(Chicago).
Michael
Where's the smile on that? I for one don't want usoft to touch ADos.
But, the Amiga would be marketed right… 🙂
Hey Bob, and all, IMHO MicroSoft is about as interested in C= as a fly
is in flypaper. Absolutely no respect by Mr. Gates and in fact outri
[D [D [Dght contempt, as he has stated publicly on several
occaisions, MS has NO intention to support or encourage the Amiga
Market. Seems more l ikely to me that someone like Sony or NewTek or
HP would be interested in C= Although NewTek's Screamer product does
in fact run NT internally for Multiprocessing of renders, or so I was
told by NewTekkers at a recent (Sept.) forum here in S.F. CA. What I
ck'd in here for was to ascertain the status of the Share Holder's
movement that had been gathering steam. Should be coming to a head
this month at the Annual ShareHolders Meeting, which will be in NYC
this year, instead of Gould's beloved Bahamas. Any feedback out
there?
Where'd you hear that the shareholder's meeting is going to be in NYC?
I haven't received any notification of meeting place or time…
Dale, Sorry to mislead you, I didn't hear NYC per se, only heard that it will
be in USA, not Bahamas…