UP shareholders meeting (was: Look what the creeps at UP did.)

Hi Mark, I do notice there is no report of the monies they are making with this enterprise. They do list it as a specific item under Media on the site. If it's deserves a mention there I wonder why the vast income (and related expense) is not list!

You may end up being right on the meeting but that's not what I have heard.

Also of interest is the number of engines and cars between '98 and '02. Roughly 30K less freight cars but engine count the same. Interesting facts, a shrinking RR?

Locomotives 7,094 -- 7,083 Freight Cars: Covered Hoppers 30,602 -- 40,097 Box Cars 15,040 -- 23,263 Open-Top Hoppers 15,891 -- 20,324 Gondolas 14,793 -- 17,828 Other 14,551 -- 18,264

Actually, if you really want to embarrass UP management, you should ask them how they could possibly mess up their crew management so badly, why they don't have an effective operational risk management program, and why BNSF's stock consistently outperforms UP's stock.

That would be much more fun than criticizing the licensing agreements.

Of interest to home modelers who decorate their own rolling stock is that they are exempted from the UP licensing program. If you'd like to see a collection of GIF files which contain many of these UP logos, see the following page on UP's web site:

There are some more at

Ed in article snipped-for-privacy@corp.supernews.com, Jon Miller at snipped-for-privacy@inow.com wrote on 4/8/04 11:40 AM:

in article snipped-for-privacy@corp.supernews.com, Jon Miller at snipped-for-privacy@inow.com wrote on 4/8/04 11:40 AM:

They may not make enough to clear expenses on this program if there is are any full time employees dedicated to licensing administration and legal. Assuming that there were abuses of their logos in the past, or concern that they might all pass into the public domain without a licensing program, then if the license revenue just covers their costs, maybe it is justified from a business perspective. But it sure seems to annoy a lot of us, including the editorial writers for Model Railroading and Model Railroader.

Oh, well, I think we are stuck with it unless one or more of the model manufacturers cares to try to legally undo the licensing of especially the older, fallen flag logos. With Ups newer logos, they apparently have an absolute right to license them or to refuse to allow their use.

Ed.

the licensing of especially the older, fallen flag logos.< Actually they have _lost_ the cases on some of the fallen flag logos etc. but I'm not sure how many. I have seen two for sure. Also there are many manufactures who are just ignoring them. I not sure how to read that meaning I'm not sure how active UP has been going after them. Some have public stated to me their attitude is "see you in court" but when it really gets to that we will see. So far it seems UP is just ignoring the ones who are ignoring them.

Or you could do what the shareholders of our Channel Tunnel Company just did and vote the whole Board out. Keith Make friends in the hobby. Visit Garratt photos for the big steam lovers.

in article snipped-for-privacy@corp.supernews.com, Jon Miller at snipped-for-privacy@inow.com wrote on 4/8/04 12:44 PM:

They ignore the licensing program at their peril. "Willful infringement" of copyrights, trademarks, etc., is EXPENSIVE., like hundreds of thousands of dollars plus legal fees. As long as UP has a licensing program and/or wishes to preserve their rights of ownership, they are obligated to stop infringers when they know about them.

Don't be ridiculous. It's simple what's going on with all of the railroads. More and more, they lease freight cars. For example, let's take BNSF. They service a lot of grain elevators where I live. Sure, they own quite a few hoppers with their name on them, but they also lease a lot of them too. The grain trade is somewhat seasonal. Lots of demand to ship grain out in some months, then the elevators are emptied until the next harvest. If you own your own hoppers they will sit around on sidetracks for months. These things cost $40,000 apiece from what I've been told, so tens of thousands grain cars is a LOT of money sitting around. So, doesn't it make sense to lease cars when you need them? The fact that the number of UP engines has stayed the same should tell you they are pulling at least the same amount of freight. A case could be made that they are even gaining since the newer engines they have bought are even more powerful and can pull more cars. I think UP is very, very smart to get rid of rolling stock and just lease what they need, as they need. it. Right?

Kent in SD

Ton-miles is a far better indicator.

And be certain to vote against Directors 1 & 3. They've pillaged other companies its only a matter of time before they get this one too. Not to mention how #1 sold out the D&RGW name in favor of SP. Puke puke puke.....

How do you figure that? I own stock in both for over three years now and my account shows UP has far outperformed BNSF in both value and dividends.

Can't get blood out of a turnip which is why many business are incorporated. Sue a corporation that has nothing and you get nothing.

How do YOU figure that? BNSF has outperformed UP by about 2:1 over the past three years.

BNSF (NYSE:BNI) Price on April 9, 2001 = $29.10 per share Price on April 8, 2004 = $32.21 per share Dividends = 9 X $0.12 + 3 X $0.15 = $1.53 Change in value = $3.11 + $1.53 = 5.3% + 10.7% = 15.9%

UP (NYSE:UNP) Price on April 9, 2001 = $55.01 per share Price on April 8, 2004 = $57.05 per share Dividends = 6 X $0.20 + 3 X $0.23 + 2 x $0.30 = $2.49 Change in value = $2.04 + $2.49 = 3.7% + 4.5% = 8.2%

Look at the dividends you got for each dollar of stock - BNSF dividends are over twice what UP dividends will yield on a 'per dollar' of stock basis. You cannot compare 'share for share' as the two stocks are valued at a different dollar amount....

Jim Bernier

SleuthRaptorman wrote:

So for every $ I invest in BNSF I get 4.75 cents back in a dividend and for every $ I invest in UP I get ~4.40 cents back in a dividend.

Paul

Mark Mathu posted some numbers:

BNSF (NYSE:BNI) Price on April 8, 2004 = $32.21 per share Dividends = 9 X $0.12 + 3 X $0.15 = $1.53 Change in value = $3.11 + $1.53 = 5.3% + 10.7% = 15.9%

UP (NYSE:UNP) Price on April 8, 2004 = $57.05 per share Dividends = 6 X $0.20 + 3 X $0.23 + 2 x $0.30 = $2.49 Change in value = $2.04 + $2.49 = 3.7% + 4.5% = 8.2%

That's 1.53/32.21 or .0475 cents per $ invested in BNSF versus 2.49/57.05 or .044 cents per $ invested in UP.

That's not twice, it's 1.088:1.

Paul

Paul<

You are not looking at the cost of the stock, 32 vs 57 which is almost

2:1 right there.

That's a meaningless analysis. UP could split 4 for 1, would that make them a 4 times better investment? And then twice as good as BNSF? I think not since their dividend per share would, probably, get cut

4 for 1.

What is your return on investment? For every dollar invested what do you get back. BNSF is about 8% better than UP, based on Mark's numbers.

Tax free Muni's are a better deal than either of the Railroads.

Paul