Bill Martin and Matt Ragas Highlight the Following Stocks: TheStreet.com, FindWhat, Flextronics, Liberty Media, El Paso, and Vivendi Universal

Business Wire, March 5, 2003

Business Editors

CHICAGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--March 5, 2003

Generating profits is the object of the game, but the market and economic environments have proven to be very aggressive competitors of late. Pick Bill Martin and Matt Ragas for your team, and let this duo shed light on solid opportunities through several stock commentaries. Learn about TheStreet.com (NASDAQ:TSCM), FindWhat (NASDAQ:FWHT), Flextronics (NASDAQ:FLEX), Liberty Media (NYSE:L), El Paso (NYSE:EP) and Vivendi Universal (NYSE:V). Click here for the full story exclusively on Zacks.com: http://featuredexpert2bw.zacks.com/

Here are the highlights from the Featured Expert column:

TheStreet.com (NASDAQ:TSCM) founder and former hedge fund manager Jim Cramer stepped to the plate last Friday and purchased 7,500 additional shares of TSCM at $2.53-$2.55 per share. Like Cramer, Bill and Matt continue to believe that TSCM represents an excellent value at its current price.

In the wake of a few wild few weeks in the online search and pay-per-click business, Bill and Matt recently heard from a contact that there's a bit of buzz growing around the idea that FindWhat (NASDAQ:FWHT) could be the next company in this space to be put into "play." Bill and Matt think this is likely an early stage rumor. They think FWHT could make a tasty morsel for any number of buyers -- the company is solidly profitable and would be accretive to most buyers in the online space. They still hold a 2.86% position in FWHT, as they believe that FWHT's fundamentals and growth strategy are sound, and that there's still upside from these levels, albeit at higher risk levels.

Tech buyout fund Silver Lake Partners, the brainchild of famous tech investor/venture capitalist Roger McNamee, recently announced that it had made a $200 million investment in Flextronics (NASDAQ:FLEX), one of the world's largest contract manufacturers. The deal is a clear vote of confidence in FLEX's long term upside potential.

Liberty Media (NYSE:L) trading up nicely after announcing that it has decided to execute a Put agreement that would allow it to exit its joint ownership of the QVC shopping channel with Comcast. The two companies must now establish a fair market value for QVC within the next 30 days. The beauty of L is that L chairman John Malone is a proven value creator who has so many different L owned/controlled "chess pieces" to play with right now and move around the board to create significant new shareholder value.

In the face of continued liquidity pressures caused by its high debt load, El Paso (NYSE:EP) announced that it has completed nearly $450 million of additional assets sales, bringing its total year to date sales to $1.35 billion. El Paso aims to raise $3.4 billion via asset sales in 2003 in order to meet its short-term liquidity challenges and to de-lever its balance sheet. EP is still a highly risky company. The company definitely needs to de-lever its balance sheet via asset sales and debt refinancings, and that will be difficult to complete in the current environment. So far, so good.

The media world was buzzing this weekend with rumors about the future strategic plans of Vivendi Universal (NYSE:V), the French media and telecom giant which is a holding in the long term growth Tiger Woods model portfolio. Vivendi is slated to report its annual results on Thursday. Anyway you slice V's assets right now, under a sum of the parts analysis, this company remains significantly undervalued.

Get more of Bill and Matt's unique commentary on a daily basis, including additional stock suggestions to help you find profit, by clicking: http://featuredexpert3bw.zacks.com/

About Zacks Featured Experts

To be a successful investor you need professional advice. Experts who know what they're talking about and can help you achieve your financial goals in good markets...and especially in bad ones will help you improve your portfolio. That is why Zacks Investment Research has assembled the best investment experts in the business to offer their powerful advisory newsletters to you on all the major investment topics: Stocks, Mutual Funds, Bonds, Options, Futures etc.

Recommendations from Featured Experts Highlighted in FREE Investment Newsletter

The best way to tap into the powerful advice from these experts is through our free weekly e-mail newsletter, "Profit from the Pros". Each week we highlight several Featured Experts in this free e-mail newsletter. Get your free subscription to "Profit from the Pros" at: http://www.freeprofit1bw.zacks.com

About Zacks

Zacks.com is a property of Zacks Investment Research, Inc., which was formed in 1981 to compile, analyze, and distribute investment research to both institutional and individual investors. The guiding principle behind our work is the belief that investment experts, such as brokerage analysts and investment newsletter writers, have superior knowledge about how to invest successfully. Our goal is to unlock their profitable insights for our customers. And there is no better way to enjoy this investment success, than with a FREE subscription to "Profit from the Pros" weekly e-mail newsletter. For your free newsletter, visit http://www.freeprofitbw.zacks.com