_________________________________________________________________

            B R E A K F A S T   W I T H   T H E   F O O L
                      Monday, December 4, 2000

benjamin.rogers@enron.com
_________________________________________________________________

REGISTER TO BECOME A FOOL -- GET FREE STUFF!
http://www.fool.com/m.asp?i=225164
_________________________________________________________________


 Sponsored By: InvestorPlace.com
 A billion Chinese are clamoring to get on the Internet. When
 the floodgates open, 3 stocks will skyrocket. Find out their
 names in a JUST-RELEASED FREE REPORT from #1 stock picker:
 http://www.lnksrv.com/m.asp?i=225165


"Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes." --
Oscar Wilde


PEPSI FINALLY WINS QUAKER
PepsiCo will wed Quaker for $13.4 billion in stock.

By Tom Jacobs

Ending weeks of maneuvering and speculation, PepsiCo (NYSE: PEP)
has agreed to buy Quaker Oats (NYSE: OAT) for $13.4 billion in
stock. Pepsi matched its deal of one month ago of 2.3 shares per
Quaker share, valuing Quaker at $97.46 per share, based on
Pepsi's Friday close at $42.38. Quaker ended Friday at $88.63.

The deal follows weeks of machinations that began with a
rejected Pepsi bid for Quaker, followed by interest from
Coca-Cola (NYSE: KO) and France's Groupe Danone (NYSE: DA) --
reportedly at a price more than $14 billion. With the departure
of Coke and Groupe Danone from negotiations, attention returned
to Pepsi,whose original lower offer now looked darn good to
almost-left-at-the-altar Quaker.
http://www.fool.com/m.asp?i=225166
http://www.fool.com/m.asp?i=225167

The pact creates a food and beverage powerhouse with $25 billion
in revenues and an expected $80 billion market cap. The deal
gives Pepsi three key advantages: 1) Pepsi swigs Quaker Oats'
Gatorade sports drink, which is tops in its market and carries a
huge distribution and warehouse system that Pepsi hopes will
increase efficiency and reach for its Tropicana brand; 2)
Quaker's fruit, oatmeal, and granola bar and other snack
products will spice Pepsi's Frito-Lay and other snack foods; 3)
highly profitable Quaker brands such as Quaker Oatmeal, Life and
Cap'n Crunch Cereals, Rice-A-Roni ("the San Francisco treat!"),
and Aunt Jemima syrup provide hefty free cash flow.

Pepsi's CEO and Chairman Robert Enrico had planned to retire,
and will now speed up his move. Current President Steve
Reinemund will become CEO, and Enrico will remain on the board
as vice chairman. Quaker's CEO Robert Morrison, credited with
Quaker's turnaround, committed to stay on for 18 months and will
join Enrico on the board as a vice chairman. Indra Nooyi,
Pepsi's CFO, becomes president, increasing the ranks of
big-company top-level women executives.

The fianc,s agreed to two price conditions: If Pepsi stock drops
under $40 for 10 days in the month before closing, valuing
Quaker at $92 a share, Quaker may walk unless Pepsi commits to
$92 a share. On the flip side, Pepsi pays no more than $105 a
share, even if its stock climbs over $45.65 a share. Pepsi will
issue 315 million shares to pay for the purchase, which the
parties expect to be completed in the first half of 2001 --
depending on antitrust scrutiny.
_________________________________________________________________

NEWS TO GO

Bloomberg reports the network storage giant EMC (NYSE: EMC) will
introduce a product, code-named Chameleon, to compete against
Network Appliance (Nasdaq: NTAP) in the small to medium-size
business market for network attached storage (NAS). EMC already
competes in the market for large corporation NAS, and holds 30%
of the overall NAS market compared to Network Appliance's 40%,
according to information technology market researcher IDC. IDC
estimates that the NAS market will reach $7 billion by 2003. EMC
closed Friday at $78.25, off a 52-week high of $103.94, while
Network Appliance finished at $53.94, from a 52-week top of
$152.75.

Barron's reported in its December 4 edition that eBay (Nasdaq:
EBAY) was in talks to buy uBid, a unit of CMGI (Nasdaq: CMGI).
Reuters reported that an eBay source denied the story, though
eBay declined official comment. According to Barron's, UBid
plans to pop the champagne this week on a new
consumer-to-consumer auction site, Auction Exchange, to compete
with eBay. UBid has 1.5 million registered users, and its
current online auction site sells mostly refurbished and
closed-out consumer electronics.

Bad news keeps copying at Xerox (NYSE: XRX). After Moody
downgraded Xerox debt to junk-bond status on Friday, the company
announced it would lay off 200 production workers -- the first
time in more than a year that the company has fired union
workers. The laid-off employees must work until December 22 but
will receive pay and benefits through January 26. This action
follows November's decision to pink-slip 350 white-collar U.S.
workers, and both are separate from last March's decision to lay
off 5,200 workers by April 2001. Xerox shares closed Friday at
$6.25, down 56.3 cents, or 8%.

Swiss drug giant Novartis (NYSE: NVS) announced positive Phase
II results from its developmental leukemia drug, Glivec.
Leukemia involves uncontrolled proliferation of white blood
cells. Glivec selectively targets a key protein involved in
leukemia, and Novartis hopes the drug will be used instead of
painful bone marrow transplants or more toxic alpha interferon
treatment. Significant response rates varied according to the
disease stage, and ranged from 33% to 78%, with 30% showing
normal blood counts. Glivec is still several years from the
pharmacy shelves because it faces larger Phase III studies and
application to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for
marketing approval.
_________________________________________________________________

EDITORS' PICK

Todd Lebor provides investors a list of sources for information
on the wireless industry, along with his assessment of each
one's credibility.
http://www.fool.com/m.asp?i=225168
_______________________________________________________________

-News & Commentary
 http://www.fool.com/m.asp?i=225169

-Fool Community
 http://www.fool.com/m.asp?i=225170

-Post of the Day
 http://www.fool.com/m.asp?i=225171

-Latest Fribble
 http://www.fool.com/m.asp?i=225172

-Latest Market Numbers
 http://www.fool.com/m.asp?i=225173
____________________________________________________________

My Portfolio: http://www.fool.com/m.asp?i=225174
My Discussion Boards: http://www.fool.com/m.asp?i=225175
My Fool: http://www.fool.com/m.asp?i=225176
Fool.com Home: http://www.fool.com/m.asp?i=225177
My E-Mail Settings: http://www.fool.com/m.asp?i=225178


 Sponsored By: InvestorPlace.com
 A billion Chinese are clamoring to get on the Internet. When
 the floodgates open, 3 stocks will skyrocket. Find out their
 names in a JUST-RELEASED FREE REPORT from #1 stock picker:
 http://www.lnksrv.com/m.asp?i=225179


17 STOCK IDEAS, ONE REPORT
 Don't miss our best-selling research product, Industry
 Focus 2001. Available in electronic download or hard copy.
http://www.lnksrv.com/m.asp?i=225180

ATTENTION, BIOTECH INVESTORS: NEW INVESTING GUIDE
  Learn to analyze the potential of biotech companies
  with our new biotech investing guide.
http://www.lnksrv.com/m.asp?i=225181

FOOL DIRECT E-MAIL SERVICES
 Need to change your address or unsubscribe? You
 can also temporarily suspend mail delivery. Click here:
http://www.fool.com/community/freemail/freemaillogin.asp?email=benjamin.rogers
@enron.com>

Have ideas about how we can improve the Fool Direct or new
e-mail products you'd like to see? Try our discussion board:
http://www.fool.com/m.asp?i=225182
____________________________________________________
(c) Copyright 2000, The Motley Fool. All rights reserved. This
material is for personal use only. Republication and
redissemination, including posting to news groups, is expressly
prohibited without the prior written consent of The Motley Fool.


.





MsgId: 
msg-3033-2000-12-04_9-21-37-3369786_2_Plain_MessageAddress.msg-09:26:27(12-04-
2000)
X-Version: mailer-sender-master,v 1.84
X-Version: mailer-sender-daemon,v 1.84
Message-Recipient: benjamin.rogers@enron.com