Oct. 24: My Deal With the Devil

The election is over. The baseball and golf
seasons are over. With injuries to Strahan and
Pennington, the local football season is over.
I have to find something else to write about.
How's this for an idea? I'll write about Gilder
stocks. But not the technology. When this
Harvard dropout listens to the technology, all
he hears is buzzing, all he gets is a headache.

Thanks to four good weeks in a row, the GTI is
threatening to end up in the black for 2004. It
is in the hole by 3.6%, with seven weeks to go.

The NASDAQ and S&P have both done much
better than that this year, up 4.1% and 6.5%,
respectively. But let's cut the GTI some slack.
In 2003, it was up 130%, compared to 50% for
the NASDAQ and 26% for the S&P. And for
the period from 1-1-97 on, the GTI has earned
some 10% per annum, compared to 6% each
for the two indexes.

The GTI stocks this year have been as divided
as John Edwards's two Americas. Looking
only at the 22 stocks that have been in the GTI
for the full year, seven are in the black, with an
average gain of 60%. The other fifteen are in
the red, with an average loss of 24%. When
they are good, Gilder stocks are very, very
good. When they are bad, they are horrid.

But let's celebrate the high flyers: SYNA,
KEYW, WIND, QCOM, EQIX, and LNOP.
I hope you own them in spades, dear reader.

As to the others, their time will come, unless
they go out of business first. Just remember,
though, one home run can make up for a lot
of outs. (I knew I'd get us back to baseball
sooner or later. Did I tell you the Red Sox
won the World Series?)

Returns for Week Ended November 12

Gilder Technology Index (GTI): + 3.7%
Nasdaq Composite Index (NSD): + 2.3%
S&P 500 Index (S&P): + 1.5%