August 21, 2000
MAINE STOCK TRENDS
Portland dot-com earns more green, but is still deep in the red
Copyright © 2000 Blethen Maine Newspapers Inc.
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Wall Street was looking for a loss of $ .84. Instead, I-many beat those estimates by $.12, but still finished in the red (remember, this is a dot-com company). The Street's consensus calls for further losses for the rest of this year as well as all of next year, too.
I-many went public at $9 per share last month and traded as high as $16 per share before dropping back to $12.375 just prior to announcing its second quarter results. The stock dropped by more than a third from that level after it released those Q2 numbers last week.
It is worth pointing out that I-many experienced its fifth consecutive quarter of record revenues. For the second quarter alone, the company saw its revenues jump 77% over the second quarter of 1999. It also announced the signing of a long-term agreement with Procter & Gamble to be exclusive provider of contract commerce solutions for the web and back office.
I-many is a leading provider of software and Internet-based solutions and related professional services that allow its clients to negotiate and manage complex contract purchasing arrangements, which facilitate business-to-business e-commerce.
Speaking of lower stock market capitalizations, troubles continue to grow at Lewiston's Acadia Group (ANHS-.625) which lost another 23% of its market value last week. Earlier this month, the company's CEO tendered his resignation after a short time in the job. For the third time this year, the company filed a late quarterly report with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
When the report, called a 10-Q, was filed on August 17, the company issued the dreaded warning that "operational and finance issues (that) may represent obstacles as related to the company's ability to continue as a going concern". The company is in default on both its line of credit as well as on a separate term note to its lender, Citizens Bank.
The company also referenced several actual or threatened lawsuits as a result of the company's failure to meet other obligations.
Fairchild Semiconductor (FCS-40.75) stock moved up more than 6 points last week. There wasn't any news to account for the move, but the stock has rallied from a low of 31.25 on August 3 up to 40.75. The stock is now trading above both its 50 and 200-day moving averages, which is encouraging. Investors should watch to see if the stock can now move above the July high of 42 and do so on strong volume. That would be considered bullish for the company, whose stock price peaked at 49.50 in late April.
IDEXX Labs (IDXX-27.31) is another stock that has rallied off its recent lows. On July 14, IDEXX stock traded as low as 20.50. Since then, IDEXX has announced two acquisitions and also announced that its directors have authorized an increase in the company's share repurchase to as many as 10 million shares. The company has already repurchased 5.1 million shares of its stock over the past year. A decisive move now in the stock price over 28 would lift it above the levels that were reached in May.
Although Delhaize America (DZA-14.94) doesn't have its headquarters here in Maine, the grocery chain that bought Maine grocer Hannaford Bros. Co. last month does have a significant number of Maine shareholders. On the week following the allocation of stock in the recent merger, Delhaize's stock price predictably moved to a new low. It is suspected that many of the former Hannaford shareholders who received Delhaize stock in the merger are selling.
Maine's two largest publicly traded companies, Banknorth Group (BKNG-16.25) and UnumProvident (UNM-20.56), each saw their stock price drop exactly 6.8% for the week ended August 18. There was no financial news to account for the decline in either stock.
Brad McCurtain is president of Maine Securities Corporation. Maine Securities Corporation is an investment firm specializing in Maine's securities. From time to time, the corporation, its employees, and its clients may buy, hold, and/or sell positions in companies mentioned herein. As a regulated securities broker/dealer, the company and its employees are required to abide by all securities regulations at all times when communicating with the public. Brad McCurtain may be reached at info@MaineSec.com. Web site: http://www.MaineSec.com