CBS MarketWatch's Calandra Quits Over Informal SEC Probe Thursday, January 22, 2004 04:36 PM ET The Wall Street Journal Online
Financial-news publisher MarketWatch.com Inc. (MKTW, news) said Thom Calandra, the writer of a stock-picking subscription newsletter, has resigned in the face of internal and Securities and Exchange Commission inquiries into his trading activities.
Larry Kramer, MarketWatch's chairman and chief executive, said in an interview that Mr. Calandra submitted his resignation Thursday rather than submit documents about his trading. Mr. Kramer said the company had set a deadline of Thursday for receiving the documents, which it requested last month in response to the SEC's informal inquiry.
The SEC has asked MarketWatch, based in San Francisco, for information about the company's policies for its editorial staff's equity trading, as well as any internal communications specifically about Mr. Calandra's trading, Mr. Kramer said. He added that the company is fully cooperating with the SEC inquiry, which the company said in a statement began in October 2002.........
By Thom Calandra, CBS MarketWatch Last Update: 4:22 PM ET Mar 13, 2000 FTMarketWatch.com Thom's biography
SAN FRANCISCO (CBS.MW) -- It's still a small investor's game, for good or bad. Even with the world's stock markets taking it on the chin Monday, it's still happy-hunting grounds for investors in the tiniest of companies.
As one Wall Street analyst was brave enough to point out the other day: "Over-the-counter Bulletin Board volume has grown exponentially in recent months. We attribute the gains to the persistent influx of online traders and the widening of speculative fever." That was Internet brokerage analyst Greg Smith at Chase Hambrecht & Quist. Daily volumes for the high-flying bulletin-board stocks, which some folks call the penny-stock market, are running 1.1 billion shares a day vs. 323 million shares a day in 1999, Smith said in his report.
Folks, that's why small is big these days. Most Wall Street investment banks -- and many of the traditional financial publications -- are loath to tell you about the micro-cap stocks. That's because the big brokers and market makers don't make any money off companies whose shares trade for 50 cents apiece.
Smith, in his report, said total over-the-counter bulletin-board share volume is up 366 percent from a year ago. That's a robust market.
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Another tiny stock, Winners Internet Network (WINR: news, msgs), was up 16 percent Monday afternoon. The Florida company, which owns stakes in European Internet service providers and is developing on-line transaction processing systems, will list its bulletin-board stock on Germany's Hamburg Stock Exchange. The Hamburg exchange will start spotlighting bulletin-board stocks. Winners Internet Network shares are up about 11-fold since early December.
Small is big, even in a rocky market.
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Thom Calandra is CBS MarketWatch's editor-in-chief. Thom appears regularly on "CBS MarketWatch Weekend," which airs weekly on CBS television.
The day before the article, WINR had a high of 4.375 the day of the article, WINR had a high of 5.00 The day after the article, WINR had a high of 7.875 One month after the article, WINR had a high of 2.75