Things have changed. Time has changed. From CBS Market Watch: Broadcom loss widens, CEO resigns By Mike Tarsala, CBS.MarketWatch.com Last Update: 4:45 PM ET Jan. 23, 2003 IRVINE, Calif. (CBS.MW) -- Communications-chip manufacturer Broadcom posted a net loss of $1.76 billion, wider than its loss a year ago, and also revealed late Thursday that Chief Executive Henry Nicholas had resigned for "personal family issues," according to a spokesman. http://www.marketwatch.com/news/yho...o&guid={BD25DAB1-2EB6-48EC-B6AF-3BDA18D17EEA}
I did not read this all. But when I used to trade the qqqs we were happy if we only got slipped for 25cents b/c we were almost surely going to make 40 cents to a dollar on a particular type of trade. It was all about the entry. At that time on some days the bid ask spread in the naz pit was 10 dollars or 1000 dollars wide per contract (now the minis are 50 cents wide) and no guarantee that you could get a fill at either the bid or the ask. At the time I was trying to figure out if I should send my orders to the amex specialist or the cme. No island, no arca.
I started trading out of the the university library at the end of 99 with less than 5K ! if only I had had more money (and a good market scanner!)... I could see plenty of other guys staring at their Datek streamers like me the whole day and post on message boards, girls would just check their portfolios. I think it was so easy to start and make money right away. I remember planning to find the next biotech or wireless hot stocks and ride them to the stratosphere... Do you guys remember when Costello (btw what ever happened to him I don't see him any more?) would mention a stock and it would take off 10 points the next 5 minutes. I once bought ATHM at 22 and sold at 26 on one of his comments...
In Feb 2000 I bought some XLA (Jon Markman over at MSN had been talking about it quite a bit), it was featured in Gilder's tech newsletter that night, and it went up 70 pts the next day. I couldn't believe it. I kept comparing notes with a friend of mine who had RMBS, as to who's stock was doing better, and truth be told it really didn't matter as they were both going thru the stratosphere. He was smarter, tho, as he sold half his holding in Rambus somewhere above $400, and I held onto XLA far too long, just knowing it was gonna make me a million bucks. It peaked somewhere just above $100 (adjusted for all splits) and last I checked it was selling for around 55 cents.
That ties into one of my best trades during this period. I used to scan in the morning for stocks that had made big moves to find out what news was moving the stocks. I found one called NERX that had already moved several dollars on news that they had cured 3 kinds of cancer in mice. Costello hadn't mentioned it yet, and I figured if/when he did the stock would take off even further. I bought 3000 shares at 32. He mentioned the stock and news 10 minutes later, and it took off to 64 in less than 8 minutes. I dumped out around 50. BTW, I think Costello insisted on getting off the NAZ beat after getting death threats from disgruntled traders/investors when the bubble burst and they blamed him (fairly or unfairly) for their misfortunes.
I'm totally astonished nobody has brought up the current .com craziness. Check out SINA NTES SOHU, or whatever other company you know who ends their name in .com The last few months or so has been bonkers! I find it strange that this is going on again. I guess it's a bit more muted this time around with 1000% gains taking months rather than days. Still interesting though. I bet the companies who removed the .com from the end of their names are regretting that decision these days. I'm enjoying the thread. Banker
IMHO: Not really. BVSN, ITWO, ARTG, Ariba, etc. did not really go up a lot in the past 12 months. Only China dot com that are profitable have sky rocketed in the past one year. SOHU is above the September 2000 level.