The Post-Star from Glens Falls, New York • 27

Ems National International Classified D2 D3 D3-D10 The Post-Star Wednesday, September 23, 1987 Mil As big banks suffer, regionals begin to shine Keeping money close to home brings old-fashioned success Bank failures In number ot Insured banks Deposit Insurance fund In billions ot dollars 18.0.18-3 200 160 120 80 40 the second quarter of this year because of huge sums set aside to cope with possible international defaults. Except for that big one-time hit, said Burke, "Southeast had an excellent quarter." He's telling Robinson-Humphrey customers that the i Miami-based firm is an attractive stock at its current level around, $28 a share. Northern market analysts also are discovering Southeast. John Dessauer, a Massachusetts financial newsletter publisher with an enviable track record in stock selection, said Southeast Banking Corp. could sell for more than $50 a share "within 12 months." That's assuming a "worst case a national recession that spills over to Florida" doesn't occur.

Even that, Dessauer said, probably would knock the stock only into the low 20s. An added attraction the analyst sees is a possible takeover of Southeast at a premium price. "Southeast is still small enough to be acquired by a larger bank looking for participation in the growing and lucrative Florida market," Dessauer said in a recent report on the Miami firm. "If a takeover were to develop, the most likely price would be $40 to $42 a share." '1978 -80 '82 '84 '86 1980 '81 32 3 '84 "85 86 Projected Chlcsjo Titoun Graphic by Tim WUIamt; Soufc: US Fetral Dpo Corp. By James Russell Knight-Ridder MIAMI "3ank losses worst since Depression," the headline read.

But the story was stuck back on an inside page of the newspaper, largely because the editors knew that it was based on a government agency's compilation of figures announced piecemeal many weeks earlier. Some of the television networks' evening news shows trumpeted the report as though it were a fresh disclosure reflecting severe economic distress in the nation. Pesky foreign loans had caused the losses, and only because a lot of big banks finally had decided to recognize the long-standing bad debts on their profit-and-loss statements. For years, they had been sweeping the reality of the international debt crisis under the rug. Once the reluctant bankers bit the bullet and conceded that the loans to Third World countries were duds, red ink appeared on their financial 16.5 15.4 13.8 12.2 $11.0 strong mention of Florida.

This is where so much of the money is. Deposits in Florida banks and savings and loan associations have climbed steadily for years and now stand at about $160 billion. More than half of that money is in commercial banks in the state. One of Salem's long-standing choices among the regionals is Florida's Barnett Banks, which he called "the dominant bank in the Sunshine State and the best play on the future growth of Florida." He also likes SunTrust, which has a Business Beat Salem is one of Wall Street's most respected bank stock analysts. He has been negative on money center bank stocks for years, mainly because of their exposure to shaky foreign loans.

But he loves some of the regionals, partly because they shy away from heavy foreign lending. "I see potential for 40 percent gains in better quality bank stocks over the next six months," he said. When you talk about regional bank stocks, you can't avoid a frrtvCU X1 'Ml iv GoyU Grater ond Kevin Smith Iwfl I Do, State bar admits Glens Falls woman Julie Vick Stevenson, who is associated with the Glens Falls law firm of McPhillips, Fitzgerald, Meyer and McLenithan, was admitted to the New York State Bar August 25, at a session of the New York Supreme Court, Appellate Division, Third Department. Ms. Stevenson received her bachelor of arts, cum laude, from Brigham Young University in 1980 and juris doctorate, cum laude, from the J.

Reuben Clark Law School of Brigham Young University in 1983 where she was a member and articles editor of the Law Review. She was admitted to legal .1 practice in Virginia and Connecticut in 1984. Before moving to Glens 'Z Falls, Ms. Stevenson was associated with a Stamford, Conn, law firm. Ms.

Stevenson and her husband, Scott, an officer of American Marinas, and their two children, live in Glens Falls. Whitehall diner has apples, more By Sandy Mclntire I rN. rjWZK large stake in Florida through its Sun Banks. "This high performance super-regional is poised for continued superior results," Salem said. SunTrust is among a group of southeastern-state banking firms that analyst Jon Burke of Robinson-Humphrey Co.

in Atlanta calls super regionals. Others are Barnett, First Union, First Wachovia, NCNB. and Sovran. Their strong loan growth, he said, bodes well for them for the remainder of this year and through 1988 as well. Three of those seven SunTrust, First Union, and NCNB -have sizable presences in Florida even though they are based out-of-state.

While not in the super regional category, another big Florida banking group, Southeast, is drawing increasing attention from analysts as a stock with good potential. Once in Wall Street's doghouse, it has battled its way out through cost-cutting, management chances, and careful lending practices. The super regionals and Southeast all have suffered from foreign loan problems, but not nearly to the extent that the debt of Third World borrowers has affected the money center banks. Southeast reported a net loss of more than $43 million in A (TO .31 reasont. The firtt It that they're honeymoon in the Carribean at Foil.

The giveaway wot part of through the company. All purchases include a recent survey, warranty deed, with title insurance available, and loan applications are processed in a week or less, May said. Roads and underground utilities are provided and are covered by the purchase price. Tyneswood sites are fully approved by local, state and federal regulatory agencies, and protective covenants cover home size, color and architectural review when a buyer selects a contractor to build a home, May said. Timberland Consultants, Inc.

is a Properties of America company, one of the largest privately held land sales and marketing companies in the Northeast, with 15 sales offices from Maine to Virginia that handle planning, engineering and design of primary, vacation and recreational land. state for the record that this paragraph does not come with a guarantee. When you read the prospectus of a new commodities fund, the advisers' records always look sensational. A cynical Gruber thinks that the game is rigged. Sponsors, he believes, may take a manager who is currently snowing good returns in his private accounts and construct a public fund around him.

But the fund's performance won't be anything like that shown in the sales brochure. This question arises with funds like Shearson Lehman's new Select Advisors Futures Fund, to be run by 11 different managers. Their past performance, with private money, Is shown as a compounded 43 percent over the past six years. Now look at the records of the 10 other public funds sold by Shearson. From 1983 to 1986, six of them were losers, one dropping so much it fold statements.

When the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. summed up the bad news, the U.S. banking industry's combined loss for the April-May-June quarter was $10.6 billion. By far the bulk of the losses were attributable to big banks in what are popularly known in financial circles as "money centers." New York, Chicago, and San Francisco are prime examples. There is another world beyond those big bucks cities, however, and it is populated largely by bankers who like to keep their depositors' money close to home.

Banks outside the money centers are called "regionals." Some have become favored stocks in this period of concern about foreign loans. "Regionals still make money the old-fashioned way, taking deposits and making local loans," observed George Salem, banking analyst for Prudential-Bache Securities, explaining why he likes them as investments. The regionals, he said, "are one of the few highly regarded stock groups that has yet to participate fully in the 1987 bull market." as well as bags baskets of apples. Cooking apples also are for sale. One item the Goulbs hope will draw customers is their homemade pie.

They make lemon, apple, chocolate, pumpkin and butterscotch. The pie is sold in the diner by the slice, but with a day's notice, a whole pie of any kind can be ordered. Muffins also are baked at the diner. With the weather changing and the apples coming in, the Goulbs soon will be serving hot mulled cider as an alternative to coffee and sodas. They also hope to be able to offer soft-serve ice cream soon.

"We may try doing some apple specialties later on," Paddock said. New firm offers financial planning Joseph F. Davis has announced the formation of Capital Ideas, a company I engaged in com nrohoncivo rinan. f' i cial planning and implementation. With offices in Saratoga, the company specializes in in- Davit come and estate taxes, fee-only financial plans for individuals and business, and securities and real estate investment management.

Davis, a certified public accountant, has more than 20 years of financial experience. For the last 19 years he was employed by Stewart's Ice Cream most recently as vice president of finance. Printing company begins expansion For the third time in three years, QuadGraphics has broken ground to expand its Saratoga Springs printing facility. Increasing orders for magazine, catalog and newspaper free-standing insert work is credited for the $3.5 million expansion. An additional 8,000 square feet of mezzanine also will provide additional office and administrative space.

Jane Bryant Quinn business started to grow, to July 1985 and declared them a bust. Over that period, investors in the public funds lost money at an annual rate of minus 0.8 percent, By contrast, the 500 rose 16.9 percent. The Shearson Bond Index rose 12.3 percent. The professors found two worms in the apple: UdjLA getting married Saturday, the other that they'll be tpending their winnert of a giveaway by the I Do. I Do Bridalt Tux thop in Glent the ttore't grand opening in February.

(Rob Barendse photo) Store chain to recruit minorities FLORIDA, Y. (AP) Big Supermarkets, which operates 33 ShopRite supermarkets in New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania, has agreed to recruit more minorities for management positions and do more business with black-owned companies. The agreement, announced Monday, comes after two months of discussions with black leaders in Newburgh, Middletown and Yonkers. The black leaders say there is only one black manager in all of the stores, and no minorities in higher positions with the company. The discussions began after a boycott of ShopKite stores in Yonkers.

The Florida based company also agreed to set up a regional review committee of ShopRite officials and black leaders to monitor progress of the recruitment. The Rev. Saul Williams of Newburgh will serve as chairman of the committee. "Happy is not the word," Williams said of the agreement. "But I'm not disappointed.

It's not like anyone is giving us anything." ShopRite officials confirmed the agreement in a two-page statement. Spokeswoman Sharon Biscardi said the company will take the names of management candidates from a list provided by black leaders. ShopRite has also agreed to advertise in more minority publications. "We cannot just continue to occupy positions as stock boys," said the Rev. Darryl George of Yonkers, who spearheaded that community's boycott.

"We must also hold top-level management jobs in terms of running stores. Williams said black leaders are concerned about hiring practices of a number of companies in southeastern New York. He said they decided to approach ShopRite because of the company's size. ed. All but one of the surviving Shearson funds darted ahead during the first seven months of 1987, showing only that you can be a big winner in one time period and a big loser in another.

Hold it! Out of the Middle West gallops another professor Scott Irwin of Ohio State University to argue that although these funds may be bad, they're not impossible. He agrees that the expenses amount to highway robbery. But, contrary to Gruber, he'd bet on them during a strong inflationary trend if you had enough money to own a broad selection of the funds, picked the ones with lower costs, intended to hold for the long term and can live with a drop of 50 percent in a bad year. Otherwise, save your money by staying away. Jane Bryant Quinn is a syndicated columnist.

Correspondent WHITEHALL The Big Apple Diner, on Route 4 north of Whitehall, is open for business. Nancy and Dick Goulb and their partner, Lila Bartlett, are renting the building from the Vermont Ap-pie which is right behind the diner. The business, which opened pearlier this month, is managed by Shelley Paddock, who also doubles as the morning waitress and short-! order cook. The Goulbs serve a full menu of "breakfasts, lunches and dinners i'Z from 5 a.m. to 9 p.m., seven days a '-week.

"We will be open all year "long," Paddock said. "If business is Igood and there is a demand for it, we may even go to 24-hours-a-day 'on some days." In addition to serving food, the diner also doubles as an outlet for Vermont Apples. Gallons and gallons of apple cider are available, of Glen Falls are happy for two Michael May, the company's regional vice president. May said the wooded home sites, named Tyneswood, are unique to development projects in Queensbury because only the land is sold, with no home building required of the purchaser by the property's seller. "Tyneswood offers the Glens Falls market a new real estate buying option," May said.

"Having no building requirement is an ideal situation for the buyer who may never build, those interested in postponing building, and even for those who will soon build but don't want to be constrained by a time limitation on construction or by having to contract with the seller for home building." Tyneswood is located west of the Northway, and is bordered by West Mountain Road and Peggy Ann Road. Land parcels are sold directly to the buyer by Timberland Consultants, with financing available a manager's performance this year says almost nothing about how he or she will do next year. Naturally, the industry isn't taking this insult lying down. Morton Baratz, who tracks commodity funds in his newsletter, Managed Account Reports, agrees that the funds don't hedge inflation. But he argues that, of around 600 active managers, maybe 20 or 30 will predictably do well for their investors over the long term.

Among the funds with better advisers and open for investment, he lists Chartwell Partners (traded by the Fairfield Financial Group), Commonwealth International (Hickey Financial Services), Cornerstone Fund HI (Cresta Commodity, Sunrise Commodities and Computerized Commodity Advisory), Cornerstone IV (John W. Henry and Sunrise) and Systemtrend Limited (Richard J. Dennis, Orion and Tudor Investment). But let me Mistakes QuadGraphics originally broke ground for the plant in 1984. Another building was added in 1985, the year the plant opened, to accomodate finishing operations.

More than 300 technicians currently are employed at the facility. The new foot building will add a second pressroom to the operation, which currently houses four high-speed web offset presses. The addition will make room for five more presses, the first of which is scheduled to arrive in April. Developer offers Queensbury sites Timberland Consultants, a Capital District land developer, has acquired 65 acres of land in Queensbury and is offering parcels for sale as building sites, announced Costly mistakes. Portfolio managers don't buy commodities and hold them.

They trade furiously in the markets, trying to catch quick changes in trends and they're often wrong. Gruber found no evidence that commodity funds move with the consumer price index; some months they track the index, other months they don't. Kleptomaniacal fees. Counting management fees, performance fees and brokerage commissions, investors in the average commodity fund paid around 19 percent a year to have their money managed, as opposed to around 1 percent in stock- or bond-owning mutual funds. You might also pay a sales charge of 2 to 7 percent.

Even when a manager rides the price trends right, his costs can leave dollars sticking to his (and the broker's) fingers instead of yours. In various time periods, some funds do show sensational gains. But NEW YORK Two finance pro-fessors have planted a bomb under one of Wall Street's most sensa- tional investment stories and blown it up. Their target: limited partnerships that invest in commodities, a $900 1 million business that lately has been soaring on evidence of increased inflation. There are now around 110 I public commodity funds (also known I as futures funds) trading metals, agricultural products, foreign currencies and U.S financial futures.

Typically, it costs no more than $2,000 to $5,000 to buy in. As the salespeople explain it, these funds are an ideal hedge against inflation. But that happy assumption has just had a huge hole blasted in it by 'I spoilsports Edwin Elton and Martin I'Gruber of New York University. They studied the performance of all public commodity funds from July 1979, which is roughly when the.