Boring Portfolio Report
Tuesday, March 19, 1996

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

(ANN ARBOR, Mar 19) -- The only significant movement in the Borefolio today occurred for Lam Research. Following a nice multi-day run-up, Lam succumbed to, uh, profit-taking and lost two points. As Lam-holders know, this kind of volatility is just part of the routine. No biggie.

Tomorrow morning is the post-earnings conference call with Texas Industries, and I'm sure I'll have much to say about that here tomorrow night. Today, though, I'd like to report on my talk with folks at Green Tree Financial, another of the Borefolio holdings.

Green Tree shed $3/8 today to close at a bid of $31 7/8. Today's loss adds to GNT's retreat from the $36 range over the past couple of weeks. Initially, GNT got smacked along with other interest-sensitive stocks in the one-day market meltdown that occurred on Friday, March 8. Then this past Friday night, GNT announced that their CFO, John Brink, had resigned "to pursue other interests." According to the Wall Street Journal, Green Tree "declined to elaborate on the 50-year-old executive's departure after 10 years with the company. Reached at his home, Mr. Brink also declined to comment."

Not surprisingly, some GNT shareholders got a bit concerned about this, wondering if some kind of financial mess-up was involved. I tried yesterday and today to get a comment from the company, with no more luck than WSJ had. Then, about 30 minutes before my evening deadline, I succeeded. Bottom line: everything is just fine at Green Tree.

The basic story is this: for folks who have toiled up there in St. Paul since the early days of the company, Green Tree has indeed been a money tree. At age 50, Brink now finds himself with more cash than he knows what to do with, and so he decided it was time to move on to other things. The company assured me that Green Tree's financial roots are healthy and that the team Brink developed there can handle the situation just fine until a new CFO is hired.

The company spokesman went on to describe the talent pools they had brought over from ITT and Household Financial in recent years--all top folks. He also spoke enthusiastically about the terrific growth Green Tree is seeing in everything from its core business in commercial and retail lending in the manufactured homes segment to its new expansion into home improvement lending to contractors and individual homeowners. Green Tree is even branching out into a branded credit card operation, in partnership with Menard's, a major home improvement company in the Midwest.

So the Wall Street Journal may not have the story, but we here in Fooldom do. As for the Borefolio, I continue to be quite satisfied to have Green Tree gracing our grounds. And speaking of home improvements, I intend to improve our little home with a new purchase tomorrow.

Today's Moves

BGP   +   1/8
GNT   -   3/8
LRCX  -2
PMSI  ---
TXI   -   5/8