The Best Performers In the wake of the tech bloodbath, scads of highfliers--Microsoft among them--fell off the list. Their replacements show there's plenty of life left in the old economy
With a bear market in full cry, uncertainty about the economy rampant, and much of Corporate America deep in hunker-down mode, Dennis Kozlowski might be expected to be a tad less ebullient. But the supremely self-assured chief executive at Tyco International Ltd. (TYC
), who masterminded $9 billion worth of acquisitions last year and then stunned analysts in March by announcing he would spend another $9 billion to buy commercial-finance giant CIT Group (CIT
), looks on the carnage as a call to action. ``This is a good environment for Tyco,'' says the veteran dealmaker. ``There will be more opportunities than there were when the economy was booming.''
Naively upbeat? Hardly. The 25-year Tyco veteran frets that ``we're dancing on the edge of a recession.'' But, after helping build the conglomerate from a $20 million-a-year corporate also-ran into a $30 billion-a-year industrial giant, Kozlowski knows how to navigate rough waters. Readying Tyco for tougher times, he recently rejiggered the company's balance sheet to minimize short-term high-interest debt. He has set aside an arsenal of cash. And he's ready to squeeze manufacturing costs in such vulnerable areas as electronics while relying on prosaic but lucrative markets such as home-security services and disposable medical products to generate strong sales growth. All the while, says the street-smart Newark (N.J.) native, ``we're focusing on expanding our market share and growing our business.'' Shareholders have certainly profited from the Tyco chief's go-get-'em style. In the past three years, the company's stock has returned 117%, including a 44% return in the past year alone, while Tyco's earnings on a latest-12-months basis have climbed 149%, to $4.8 billion, as sales rose 27%, to $30.3 billion.
SOARING OIL PRICES. Along with a healthy rise in profit margins and return on equity, Tyco's impressive showing placed the manufacturer atop BusinessWeek's fifth annual performance ranking of companies in the Standard & Poor's 500-stock index (for a video interview with S&P's David Blitzer on how the S&P 500 is put together, click here). After moving up from No. 23 on our list last year, Tyco leads a diverse bunch of companies that have managed, despite the parlous times, to thrive (click here for a video roundtable on this year's top performers).
Indeed, a look at many of the top performers shows there's plenty of life left in the Old Economy. This year's BW 50 is heavily populated by companies that produce familiar products or services, from electricity to pain relievers, but excel by operating in novel ways. Whether they are fresh faces, such as the Silicon Valley-based utility Calpine Corp. (CPN
), or household names such as Merck & Co. (MRK
), these outfits have leveraged their tried-and-true products into healthy growth and even brighter promise. They're riding high just as New Economy darlings, from networking giant Cisco Systems Inc. (CSCO
) (now No. 66) to Microsoft Corp. (MSFT
)--the list's leader for the last three years and now a disappointing No. 91--have dropped out of the BW 50, reflecting the newfound skepticism about Techdom and the retrenchment in the PC market. Microsoft lost a stunning 34% for its shareholders last year.
In fact, just 15 companies from the technology and telecom worlds made the list this year. A year ago, with the tech frenzy at its height, fully 24 of the top 50 hailed from these groups. Over the past year, all 24 watched their stock prices drop by double-digit rates. Five also suffered earnings declines. Conversely, not one fuel company broke onto the roster last year; this year, as oil prices soared, nine made the list. And only six banks or financial-services firms showed up in the top 50 in 2000. The tally this year: 11, reflecting the strong market for initial public offerings for much of last year. All in all, 37 members of the Class of '01 are newcomers, marking the highest turnover since the list was created in 1997. Six of these--No. 3 Calpine and No. 4 Dynegy Inc. (DYN
), for example--weren't eligible a year ago because they were added to the S&P 500 only in the past year.
Hardy Perennials
These five companies made the BW 50 every year since its start in 1997.
Company (2001 Rank)
Growth in Net Income, 1996-2000
MORGAN STANLEY DEAN WITTER (42)
403 *
EMC (12)
291
TELLABS (43)
290
SUN MICROSYSTEMS (29)
146
MERCK (30)
104
* Based on Dean Witter earnings only for 1996
Data: BusinessWeek
As our ranking so starkly shows, no one is guaranteed a safe haven in today's tumultuous economy--but there's still plenty of room for the swift, the smart, and the lucky to thrive. And many of 2001's fast climbers traveled far in the past year. Most dramatic case in point: Anadarko Petroleum Corp. (APC
), ranking 372 among the S&P 500 by our performance criteria a year ago, soared to the No. 2 spot in this year's tally. While just plumb lucky to have natural-gas prices skyrocket, Anadarko Chief Executive Officer Robert J. Allison Jr. was superbly positioned to take advantage of those high prices thanks to a series of savvy acquisitions, including last year's $4.4 billion purchase of rival Union Pacific Resources (UNP
). Already the world's largest independent exploration-and-production company and the most active driller in North America, Anadarko is still out shopping. In February, the company agreed to buy Canadian natural-gas powerhouse Berkley Petroleum Corp. for $1.1 billion. Crows Allison: ``Natural gas is and will continue to be in tremendous demand in North America.''
Aggressiveness comes naturally to the outfits that make up the BW 50, but they've also won their place in the sun by demonstrating tremendous consistency. While our list sizes up short-term winners, it gives pride of place to companies whose successes endure. It's not just a tally of those that boast the biggest revenues or the hottest stocks, but rather it targets outfits that perform at the top of the pack for both one-year and three-year periods, making their marks through growth in sales, profits, and return to shareholders. We also look at net margins and return on equity to see which companies make the most of their operations, and we weight the results for sales volume. The upshot: a list that shows who's driving their top and bottom lines hardest and providing the best payback for shareholders.
SMART MOVES. And which companies are the most consistent of the consistent? Only five have made the BW 50 each year since we started the list in 1997--EMC (EMC
) (No. 12 this year), Sun Microsystems (SUNW
) (No. 29), Merck (MRK
) (No. 30), Morgan Stanley Dean Witter (MWD
) (No. 42), and Tellabs (TLAB
) (No. 43). Scratch the surface of each and you'll find managers who keep their eyes trained on what their companies do best. Whether it's drugs, particular kinds of computers, financial services, or telecommunications gear, these companies seldom depart from their tightly scripted missions.
At its heart, the BW 50 is a growth-stock list and last year, of course, was a bad time to be a growth stock. So the roster wasn't immune to the whipsawing taking place in the economy and the markets. As a measure of just how iffy the investment art has become, investors who plowed money into all top 50 in the Class of 2000 would have lost dearly. Last year's BW 50 plunged 25% in the 12 months ended Feb. 28, the cut-off date for most of the figures used in the rankings. Meanwhile, the Dow Jones industrial average rose 4.5% during that period and the S&P 500 overall lost 8%. Of course, market players could have done far worse, too: the tech-heavy Nasdaq composite index saw 53% of its value vanish. Since the end of February, things haven't gotten any better: Last year's BW 50 lost another 8.3% as of March 19. To begin tracking this year's BW 50, consult BusinessWeek Online for daily updates or turn to the Figures of the Week page in the back of the magazine each week.
The techs that endured on the BW 50 did so by making some smart moves. Oracle (ORCL
) CEO Lawrence J. Ellison, for instance, was able to deliver a 363% total return to shareholders over the past three years by rebuilding his company's software to make it more Net-friendly and by carefully slimming down his organization. Last year's result: a 15% rise in sales to $10.7 billion and a 372% rise in profits--largely due to a one-time sale of company stock--to $6.8 billion. Oracle finished at No. 10, down from No. 4 last year.
Other stalwarts have used mergers to build their reach. AOL Time Warner (AOL
) (No. 38), for instance, is betting that its newfound breadth will let it bridge the New and Old Economies and--unlike so many all-but-forgotten dot-coms--it is making money at it. Time Warner's embrace of the ``golden franchise'' that CEO Gerald M. Levin saw in America Online Inc. is making for a refreshingly new corporate animal. This consumer powerhouse boasts a staggering 130 million subscriptions through AOL, HBO, Time, and Time Warner Cable, and its smart use of the Net is driving more expansion. AOL is now the company's top generator of subscribers for Time publications. ``It's not a media company anymore,'' Levin says. ``It's truly a one-of-a-kind company.'' The merger took effect in January, so the company's ranking is based on America Online's financial performance.
TIMELY EXPANSION. Still other merged powerhouses on the list have proven to be elephants that can dance. Consider Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM
), which skipped from No. 150 last year to No. 44 today. The world's biggest oil company combines titanic strength and reach with operating grace. Shareholders have enjoyed a nearly 36% return over the past three years on this $211-billion-a-year operation, while seeing it garner an extraordinary $16 billion in profits last year. No doubt, soaring oil prices are the principal reason Exxon Mobil has been flush lately. But it wouldn't have done nearly so well had it not downsized during much of the '90s to hone its profitability, and then launched a timely expansion effort. CEO Lee R. Raymond is now ramping up capital spending to cash in on hefty oil prices.
Keeping the growth coming in the face of uncontrollable factors--whether oil and gas prices or the financial markets--will be a Herculean challenge for many of this year's stars. The savviest outfits are all too aware of the need to structure themselves to manage for the unpredictable. Companies such as Dynegy Inc., a wholesale marketer of natural gas and electricity, have a natural edge over most of the plain-vanilla energy-producing companies. Dynegy can thrive whether prices move up or down because its business turns on buying and selling commodities while using complex financial derivatives to manage risk. ``Our earnings aren't as much dependent on the absolute price of the commodity as they are on volatility,'' says Dynegy CEO Chuck Watson. ``When there's a lot of confusion or a lot of uncertainty about market supply and demand, we've positioned Dynegy [to be] the preferred supplier in the country.'' And he doesn't apologize for profiting on the current shortage of electricity, a trend he says he prepared his company for five years ago. ``You're supposed to be rewarded for seeing gaps in the market and filling those gaps,'' Watson says.
Indeed, the best managers know that feasts are almost inevitably followed by famine and they prepare accordingly. For some, that means reining in their natural appetites for expansion and keeping financial discipline in mind. Consider Amerada Hess Corp. (AHC
), No. 18. Late last year, CEO John B. Hess quit the bidding for the British oil-and-gas firm Lasmo when the auction grew too rich, letting it go to Italy's Eni for $4 billion. He'd rather go for smaller fry that can promise him a bigger return, such as LLOG Exploration Co., which Hess agreed on Feb. 20 to acquire for $750 million. While planning more deals to build his midsize oil-and-gas outfit into an international force, Hess argues that those who succeed in the business will avoid the temptation to overpay for reserves. ``Energy has turned the corner in improving its financial performance,'' the CEO argues. ``Certainly, it's been helped by a higher commodity-price environment that should last a couple years, but also by some major changes in financial discipline. We're much more selective about how we invest.''
PLUCK AND INNOVATION. The companies destined for still more robust growth are those that can cash in on current--and potentially fleeting--advantages while laying the groundwork for less happy times. CEO Peter Cartwright, of the San Jose (Calif.)-based electricity supplier Calpine, has vaulted to prominence because his company is working overtime to meet its home state power needs--but he's also looking far beyond California. The $2.3 billion-a-year supplier has managed to reward shareholders with a dazzling 2,142% return over the past three years as it grew into a national wholesaler of power. Cartwright has been busy building a nationwide grid of gas-fired power plants to sell energy to utilities and municipalities across the country. He figures he can ride the deregulation wave in electricity by building gas turbines that are efficient and don't sully the environment. ``The whole idea of deregulation is to lower the cost of electricity and reduce pollution,'' Cartwright says. ``Our goal is not to be opportunistic and get in and get these high prices. It's to be the lowest-cost energy provider.''
Even in industries that lagged, there were the occasional stars, companies that thrived by their own pluck and innovation. Just look at retailing, which faced a challenging year in 2000 as consumers began cutting back. Bed Bath & Beyond Inc. (BBBY
) managed to buck the industry trend, climbing aboard the list at No. 49. Profiting from the robust homebuilding market, the chain has grown like topsy, expanding from 191 stores in May, 1999, to 312 today--a faster pace than that of Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT
) or Home Depot Inc. (HD
) The key to its success is its ability to meet the needs of local markets. Instead of serving up cookie-cutter stores, BB&B tries to give each location its own look and allows store managers to do their own ordering. ``We've always been an unconventional retailer,'' says Warren Eisenberg, the chain's 70-year-old co-CEO. ``Most companies build a prototype store and from then on everything they build is all laid out the same. We don't have a prototype store and don't want one. We opened 70 stores last year, some 20,000 square feet and some 90,000 square feet. Each store has its own personality.''
This year's stars have shown that managing well often means managing flexibly, being able to ratchet down when changed economic conditions call for it. Just how well the Class of 2001 does in lackluster times--and how much their internal processes can adapt--will go far in determining whether they'll reappear on future BW 50 lists. Few credit-card companies, for example, are inclined to cut back on their ruthlessly competitive offers of credit even to hard-pressed consumers. But those that manage to thrive will have systems in place to protect them from unacceptably high losses. Providian Financial Corp. (PVN
), for instance, caters to high-risk credit-card users and it soared from No. 76 last year to No. 6, largely by keeping its cardholders from running up unmanageable balances. CEO Shailesh J. Mehta, a statistics whiz with a doctorate in computer science, has deployed sophisticated models that dictate just how much risk is acceptable among his 16 million customers. He's now paying close attention to a delinquency rate that climbed from 6.7% to 7.5% in the last three months of 2000. Providian staffers are carefully noting when customers suddenly start taking cash advances or use their accounts too liberally, and they can freeze or lower lines of credit swiftly. ``That approach works whatever kind of economic environment you're in,'' says Providian Chief Financial Officer David J. Petrini.
REFINANCING BOOM. Another alternative, of course, is to build upon your strengths and expand into new but related areas. Capital One Financial (COF
) (No. 21) is busy getting Europeans and South Africans hooked on credit cards. And it's pushing to broaden its car-loan business. ``If we play our cards right--and the pun is intended--we can leverage our success in credit cards to ride this marketing method into many new industries,'' says President Nigel W. Morris.
Most financial-services managers are expecting that, despite their best efforts, growth is bound to slow this year. But they're anticipating that Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan will keep cutting interest rates--moves that will particularly help some lenders. Household International, the second-mortgage powerhouse that leaped from No. 62 on last year's list to No. 34, stands ready to gain big from homeowner refinancing. ``Lower interest rates will help us if the economy gets much worse,'' says Household CEO William F. Aldinger.
For the big financial supermarkets that have surged into this year's BW 50, the slower-growth environment could be especially problematic. Companies such as FleetBoston Financial (FBF
) (No. 15) are contending with the twin threats of declining markets and souring loans. That's partly why FleetBoston sold $1.3 billion worth of problem loans last year for less than $1 billion. Fleet must also deal with a slowdown in high-tech initial public offerings at its Robertson Stephens investment bank.
As they scout around for ways to keep the good times rolling, some companies will shun the diversification and acquisition routes. More than ever, tough times will mean sticking to their knitting. Merck, for instance, has lately stood outside the pack in pharmaceuticals by eschewing big purchases or mergers. Instead, the company is relying on its own labs to churn out blockbuster drugs. As such big sellers as the hypertension drug Vasotec have gone off patent, for example, Merck has been able to turn to novel medicines such as the arthritis pain reliever Vioxx, expected this year to top $3 billion in sales. In all, the company's labs have created 15 new medicines in the past six years that have helped to drive sales up to $40.4 billion while giving shareholders a three-year return of 32%. Merck now spends $2.8 billion a year on research and development. ``We knew we were on the right track'' without major acquisitions, says Merck CEO Raymond V. Gilmartin. ``We don't think there's a scale advantage once you get beyond a particular size.''
In some cases, getting jilted by a prospective acquirer has turned out to be healthy. Alza Corp. (AZA
), the boutique drug-delivery-system outfit, was supposed to be swallowed up by Abbott Laboratories (ABT
) in 1999 but was left standing at the altar after the merger ran into regulatory problems. Spurred by that disappointment, the company stepped up its introduction of new products--including a few new pharmaceuticals--that helped vault it from lowly No. 280 on our list in 2000 to No. 27 now. By developing such products as Concerta--a popular new controlled-release form of methylphenidate, the drug used in Ritalin--along with drug-delivery systems such as the NicoDerm patch, Alza pushed its sales up 24% last year to $989 million and has racked up a 110% return for shareholders over the past three years.
''FOCUSED STRATEGY.'' Home run products can drive smaller players to stardom. Consider Forest Laboratories Inc. (FRX
), which soared to No. 14 on our list this year. The specialty drugmaker boosted its sales by 41% to $1.1 billion, chiefly on the strength of Celexa, an antidepressant that is giving megadrug Prozac some competition. While claiming Celexa has advantages over its rivals, such as a lower incidence of sexual dysfunction, Forest CEO Howard Solomon also priced his drug at a 20% discount to rivals--a persuasive approach in today's managed-care milieu. Says Solomon: ``We can't sell as many products as the largest companies, but we can sell them just as effectively.''
Naturally, it helps to have effective distribution. That's why Cardinal Health Inc. (CAH
), one of the nation's biggest drug wholesalers, has thrived. The $34-billion-a-year company rocketed from No. 164 last year to No. 25 this year partly by bolstering its already powerful hand with acquisitions, such as the recently finalized $2.2-billion purchase of Bindley Western Industries Inc. The deal plays to Cardinal's knack for efficiently absorbing other outfits. ``We have a focused strategy,'' argues Cardinal Chairman and CEO Robert D. Walter. ``We don't wander around.''
Indeed, for many of the winners on our list, focus is the be-all and end-all. Consider the tech outfits that survived to join this exclusive group. True, their glorious ride in the stock market has come a cropper lately, but they still managed to outperform. EMC slipped seven notches from No. 5 on last year's BW 50 list and it has lost money for shareholders in the past year, but it has still delivered a total return to investors of some 336% over the past three years. How so? Competitors may try to make everything from PCs and computer workstations to servers and software, says CEO Joseph M. Tucci, but EMC makes nothing but information-storage gear. ``If you looked at what is our secret weapon, I think it is focus,'' says Tucci. ``This is all we do.''
BASHING RIVALS. Sun Microsystems, which like EMC has never missed a year on the BW 50, is focused on a larger goal: to sell all the technologies required to make ``WebTone'' as ubiquitous as ``dial tone.'' Sun raised its sales 45% to $19.2 billion last year by churning out innovative big-server computers built around CEO Scott G. McNealy's finely honed vision that software and computing will be delivered by the Net from sprawling server farms. That single-minded concentration on so-called WebTone computing enabled Sun to withstand recent stumbles by PC makers, which have seen so much of their market suddenly dry up. It helps, too, that McNealy balances his public visioneering about the Net with a very old-fashioned emphasis on execution. As McNealy has remarked: ``We don't compete. We bash our competitors.''
Perhaps even more important, these BW 50 repeat performers master another difficult skill. They anticipate the market's needs and meet customer demands precisely. Tellabs Inc., for example, was able to boost its sales 46% last year to $3.4 billion because it tailored its complex data-, video-, and voice-transmission gear precisely to the orders laid down by telecommunications customers such as Sprint Corp. With such tight customer relations, it was no surprise last summer when Richard Notebaert, formerly CEO of longtime customer Ameritech Corp., took over as chief of Tellabs. And he has taken his new employer's service sensibility to heart, trying to meet with at least two customers each week. He also has embraced the Tellabs approach of crafting products on the fly to meet customer requirements. ``If that's what they want,'' says Notebaert, ``then that's what we're going to do.''
Some tech stars--especially those that earned their exalted spots by doing deals--must now prove their financial engineering was worthwhile. SBC Communications Inc. (SBC
) (No. 36) climbed on our list through its purchase of Ameritech, while Verizon (VZ
) (No. 26) is the product of a Bell Atlantic-GTE merger. Will they reappear next year? If so, it will be because their efforts in such tough markets as long distance and data service pay off. SBC has already warned that it won't see the same growth as last year. Yet it's preparing for bigger long-term gains by becoming the nation's largest supplier of digital subscriber lines--technology that will be driven by the growth of the Net. ``We believe strongly that high-speed services will fuel our business,'' says Ross K. Ireland, SBC's senior executive vice-president for technology. At the same time, SBC is counting on an Old Economy mainstay--some $30 billion in annual revenue from its core voice service---to keep the coffers filled.
What business is really all about is meeting customer needs, staying innovative, and producing new ways to grow. While all companies set out to do this, those that make our list meet that challenge so well that they leave rivals in the dust. Doing so will be harder than ever if the economy continues to slacken. To make the BW 50, the bar is always high. Clearing it becomes all the more difficult when the earth is shifting under your feet.
S&P 500 Total Return
The best and worst in shareholder returns
TOP TEN (1-year)
Percent Increase
HEALTHSOUTH
226.6
REEBOK INTERNATIONAL
220.0
ALLIED WASTE INDUSTRIES
187.1
EOG RESOURCES
187.1
MANOR CARE
186.9
TENET HEALTHCARE
163.7
PHILIP MORRIS
156.0
LOEWS
147.6
CARDINAL HEALTH
143.1
WASHINGTON MUTUAL
140.0
BOTTOM TEN (1-year)
Percent Decrease
BROADVISION
-91.4
CONEXANT SYSTEMS
-87.5
YAHOO
-85.1
NOVELL
-82.0
JDS UNIPHASE
-79.7
LUCENT TECHNOLOGIES
-78.9
QLOGIC
-76.0
CITRIX SYSTEMS
-75.3
BROADCOM
-75.0
GATEWAY
-75.0
TOP TEN (3-year)
Percent Increase
CALPINE
2142.4
APPLIED MICRO CIRCUITS
1041.2
QUALCOMM
780.0
NETWORK APPLIANCE
706.7
VERITAS SOFTWARE
670.7
QLOGIC
645.1
MERCURY INTERACTIVE
575.9
AOL TIME WARNER
480.4
AMGEN
442.6
SCIENTIFIC-ATLANTA
438.9
BOTTOM TEN (3-year)
Percent Decrease
XEROX
-85.3
J.C. PENNEY
-73.1
CONSECO
-68.6
AMERICAN GREETINGS
-68.1
HERCULES
-67.6
MCDERMOTT INTERNATIONAL
-66.1
CENDANT
-65.1
DANA
-64.6
QUINTILES TRANSNATIONAL
-63.2
THOMAS & BETTS
-62.5
Data: Compustat, provided by Standard & Poor's Institutional Market Services
S&P 500 Sales
The best and worst in sales performance
TOP TEN (1-year)
Percent Increase
JDS UNIPHASE
291
BROADVISION
258
ONEOK
222
ANADARKO PETROLEUM
221
CALPINE
178
APPLIED MICRO CIRCUITS
158
GLOBAL CROSSING
154
ENRON
151
DUKE ENERGY
127
SIEBEL SYSTEMS
121
BOTTOM TEN (1-year)
Percent Decrease
QUALCOMM
-33
MCDERMOTT INTERNATIONAL
-29
CSX
-21
CABLETRON SYSTEMS
-18
NOVELL
-16
BRIGGS & STRATTON
-13
CENDANT
-13
PACCAR
-12
NAVISTAR INTERNATIONAL
-12
PARAMETRIC TECHNOLOGY
-12
TOP TEN (3-year)
Percent Increase
BROADCOM
204.8
GLOBAL CROSSING
198.9
JDS UNIPHASE
166.3
YAHOO
153.1
BROADVISION
145.9
KING PHARMACEUTICALS
141.7
SPRINT PCS GROUP
127.5
VERITAS SOFTWARE
121.2
DEVON ENERGY
117.0
ANADARKO PETROLEUM
112.8
BOTTOM TEN (3-year)
Percent Decrease
McDERMOTT INTERNATIONAL
-18.8
TEKTRONIX
-17.9
RALSTON PURINA
-17.1
THERMO ELECTRON
-16.9
DELUXE
-14.8
ALLEGHENY TECHNOLOGIES
-14.2
HALLIBURTON
-11.9
HOMESTAKE MINING
-10.0
TRICON GLOBAL RESTAURANTS
-9.7
CONSOLIDATED STORES
-9.5
Data: Compustat, provided by Standard & Poor's Institutional Market Services
S&P 500 Earnings Growth...
...And Decline
TOP TEN (1-year)
Percent Increase
BURLINGTON RESOURCES
67400
INCO
2253
ANADARKO PETROLEUM
1816
CABLETRON SYSTEMS
1129
STRYKER
1039
DUPONT
957
AUTODESK
851
REEBOK INTERNATIONAL
632
UNOCAL
540
EASTMAN CHEMICAL
531
TOP TEN (3-year)
Average Annual Increase
AMERADA HESS
444.7
EASTMAN KODAK
443.1
TYCO INTERNATIONAL
362.1
INTUIT
307.9
DOW JONES
303.8
MILLIPORE
247.6
AOL TIME WARNER
211.1
ITT INDUSTRIES
200.0
NCR
192.2
WORLDCOM
173.4
BOTTOM TEN (12-Mo. Loss)
Millions of Dollars
NORTEL NETWORKS
-$3470.0
JDS UNIPHASE
-$2571.7
SPRINT PCS GROUP
-$1868.0
GLOBAL CROSSING
-$1307.8
CONSECO
-$1130.9
AMERICAN HOME PRODUCTS
-$901.0
BARRICK GOLD
-$766.0
NEXTEL COMMUNICATIONS
-$711.0
BROADCOM
-$693.4
VERITAS SOFTWARE
-$619.8
Data: Compustat, provided by Standard & Poor's Institutional Market Services
S&P 500 Net Margin
TOP TEN (2000)
Percent
ORACLE
63.3
AMBAC FINANCIAL GROUP
59.2
MBIA
50.0
MGIC INVESTMENT
48.8
XILINX
43.2
LINEAR TECHNOLOGY
43.0
MICROSOFT
41.9
ALTERA
36.1
BIOGEN
36.0
MAXIM INTEGRATED PRODUCTS
32.6
BOTTOM TEN (2000)
Percent
JDS UNIPHASE
-97.8
BROADCOM
-61.3
APPLIED MICRO CIRCUITS
-59.7
BARRICK GOLD
-57.6
VERITAS SOFTWARE
-51.3
BROADVISION
-38.5
GLOBAL CROSSING
-34.5
SPRINT PCS GROUP
-29.5
CONEXANT SYSTEMS
-22.4
CONSECO
-13.6
Data: Compustat, provided by Standard & Poor's Institutional Market Services
S&P 500 Return on Equity
TOP TEN (2000)
Percent
UST
194.4
ORACLE
138.0
QUAKER OATS
100.5
MAYTAG
90.7
EQUIFAX
74.3
RALSTON PURINA
67.5
COLGATE-PALMOLIVE
66.2
KELLOGG
65.5
DELUXE
64.5
STILWELL FINANCIAL
60.2
BOTTOM TEN (2000)
Percent
SPRINT PCS GROUP
-99.5
NEXTEL COMMUNS.
-45.4
AVAYA
-35.5
CONSECO
-26.1
WINN-DIXIE STORES
-25.8
BARRICK GOLD
-25.3
VERITAS SOFTWARE
-20.8
BROADVISION
-15.8
CONEXANT SYSTEMS
-15.3
NORTEL NETWORKS
-14.8
Data: Compustat, provided by Standard & Poor's Institutional Market Services
By Joseph Weber in Chicago, with Stephanie Anderson-Forest in Dallas, William C. Symonds in Boston, Nanette Byrnes in New York, and bureau reports
Copyright 2001 , by The McGraw-Hill Companies Inc. All rights reserved.
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SMART MOVES. And which companies are the most consistent of the consistent? Only five have made the BW 50 each year since we started the list in 1997--EMC (