October 1, 2003 TASER International, Inc. (TASR)
O.K. sports-fans, the bulls are running (Does it sound like Pamplona?). The Dow is up about 130 or so points and the NASDAQ up 30 or so. I have a Buck Rogers stock for you...or is it more like a stock out of a Tom Clancey novel? Anyhow, take a look at TASER International (TASR). This stock has had a couple of hiccups in the last five years but it is doing quite well overall....currently, as I write TASR is trading at $29.25 up $2.97 or 11.30% on the day.

According to money.cnn.com, TASR "...develops, assembles and markets less-lethal, conducted energy weapons primarily for use in the law enforcement and corrections market." Now is this a COOL stock or what?

On July 21, 2003, TASR reported results for the second quarter of 2003, for the period ending June 30, 2003. The results were not shocking (yuck yuck), but they generated some punch: Net sales were $4.2 million a 53% increase over the $2.7 million reported in the second quarter of 2002. Net income increased 330% to $347,000 as compared to $81,000 reported last year.

Morningstar.com shows a rapid increase in revenue from nil in 1998, $2 million in 1999, $3 million in 2000, $7 million in 2001, $10 million in 2002 and extrapolating the current quarter should get us somewhere north of $16 million for 2003.

Unfortunately, free cash flow has NOT turned positive with $0 in 2000, and ($1) million in 2001 and 2002.

This small company has a clean balance sheet per Morningstar with $2.8 million in cash, more than enough to cover the $1.4 million in current liabilities and $100,000 in long-term debt. In addition, Morningstar reports $4.0 million in other current assets.

This is NOT a cheap stock. As the company is just becoming profitable, the p/e is steep at 61.1, the PEG ratio is at 2.24 and price/sales is 6.04. The market cap of this Micro-cap company is only $81.65 million. There are only 2.84 million shares outstanding and 2.00 million of them that float. Of the float there are 944,000 shares out short as of 8/8/03 representing 47.20% of the float (!) or 6.695 trading days. This is a set-up for a short-squeeze and we may be witnessing this in motion today.
No dividend is paid.

If you are looking for a fast-growing, yet profitable company, this may be it for you. If I wasn't back up to my ears in margin (lol), then I might be buying a few shares as well. So zap your portfolio with this stock...."Ka-POWWW"...as they would say in those old Batman T.V. shows....

Bob

P.S. I edited this post on 10/4/03, corrected title which read September 1, 2003...(oops) Nothing else changed.