Date: Thu, 29 Apr 1999 20:08:38 -0500 (EST)
From: danceswithcarp <dcombs-AT-bloomington.in.us>
Subject: The Crash Cometh...




Man, I just don't get the american stock market.  Yesterday America
On-line stock dropped $10 to 143 bucks per share.  Why?  In response to
the news that AOL revenue and "membership" had soared to record heights
and that the PROFITS for the first 1/4 of 1999 was ELEVEN CENTS PER SHARE. 

Wow.  That's a profit rate of FORTY-FOUR CENTS per year which is almost
triple the rate of last year at this time, which was a quarterly rate of
FOUR CENTS PER SHARE.

Huh?   A stock that pays 44 cents a year is wirth $143?  Did I miss
something in basic economics?

And then I read that Amazon.Com stock is wirth in toto more than General
Motors, and that Amazon.Com has never posted a profit?  Shoot, I'm not
sure they own anything more than a warehouse.

How can this be?   What am I missing?  This doesn't even sound like a
house of cards.  It sounds more like a house of tissue paper.

Surely it will rain.



carp