Re: [LUAU] NOV€LL/SuSE

[Jim Thompson]

On Apr 4, 2006, at 8:52 PM, Hawaii Linux Institute wrote:

> This week's BusinessWeek has a top 20 ranking of the cash position  
> (cash as % of market cap) for the largest 500 companies in the US.   
> Guess who ranks No. 1?
>
> NOV€LL
>
> At 58% ($1.69B/$2.92B), Nov€ll's cash position is not only at the  
> top but is way above everyone else.  Wayne


Novell is planning to spend some $400M of that to "buy back" its stock.

http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D8GPDNE82.htm? 
campaign_id=apn_tech_down&chan=tc

Typically companies "buying back" their stock are viewed with  
suspicion by Wall Street.   (Is there no better way to increase  
shareholder value?)

Sun's market cap is $17.69B and has $2.45B in "cash and cash  
equivalents"
http://www.google.com/finance?q=SUNW
http://www.google.com/finance?fstype=bi&cid=543040

Apple's market cap is $51.91B and has $8.7B in liquid assets
http://www.google.com/finance?q=AAPL

Microsoft:  Market cap: $285B, and $34M in "cash and short term  
investments".
http://www.google.com/finance?q=MSFT
http://www.google.com/finance?fstype=bi&cid=358464

Microsoft more >cash< sitting in the bank ($4B) than Novell's total  
market cap.