Boring Portfolio Report
Thursday, February 15, 1996

(FOOL GLOBAL WIRE)
by Greg Markus (MF Boring)

(Feb 15)--When I arrived in Ann Arbor many years ago, one of the first local anomalies I discovered was Mo-town's TV weather guy, Sonny Elliot. Sonny would say things like, "Tomorrow should start out clear in the morning, becoming cooler in the afternoon--altogether a 'clooler' kind of day."

That more or less describes the Borefolio today: "clooler." As in "better than the S&P 500, not as good as the NASDAQ"--although we're operating here with one hand tied behind our backs, so to speak, since the port is only a bit more than half-invested. That will change next week.

At any rate, this morning our four stocks were perking up nicely. It even looked like Kulicke and Soffa might shake off its chronic funk. As the day wore on, however, the wire services decided to re-replay K&S's advisory about second quarter order delays. (Don't ask why. Some things in life remain forever mysterious.) Naturally, KLIC clocked *another* loss, this time for a quarter-point. But do we get upset? No way, Jorge. This is a $35 stock, easy. We're cool. Clool, even.

There was a news rehash on Potash, as well. This time, though, the repetition had a more salutary effect, and POT popped $1 5/8 to close at $77 1/2, bid. The story on the wires consisted of an interview with Todd Hinrichs of Chicago-based Everen Securities. Hinrichs said that PCS's "per-share earnings beat his expectations by about 3 cents and industry consensus by 1 cent. PCS should continue see 'robust' earnings growth in 1996, 'driven by higher sales volumes and higher fertilizer prices,' he said." And so do I.

Green Tree shed $3/4 today. Actually GNT was down over a full point at mid-day, before recovering somewhat. No news, but possibly interest-rate related activity. No biggie.

Oh, yes: Texas Industries rose $1 1/8, to close at $61 5/8, bid. Getting boring, isn't it? Precisely.

Today's Moves

GNT   -   3/4
KLIC  -   1/4
POT   +1  5/8
TXI   +1  1/8