Lastminute.com

It is reported that Lastminute dot com have "lower than expected losses"

Recent acquisitions have helped online travel agent Lastminute.com to unveil lower-than-expected losses for the last three months of 2004.

Lastminute is now one of the dotcom booms last survivors and struggling, I never could work out why the world was prepared to value it at around 800 million in the first place.

Profitability seems always to be "2 years from now", and never seems to materialise. They have consistently posted losses

However they have made several bricks and mortar acquisitions with funds, which makes them less reliant on the web.

I guess most of feel a bit aggrieved that I never made it to the stock market before the bubble burst!

This was followed by takeover speculation, this from the Telegraph on 12th Feb

Lastminute.com gathered pace, with the shares rising 2 to 115p on heavy volumes, as dealers speculated online travel agency group Expedia could be running its slide rule over the business.

And by 22nd Feb the BBC report an anonymous fax questioning Lastminutes finances

Online travel firm Lastminute.com is to ask the Financial Services Authority (FSA) to investigate an anonymous fax questioning its financial situation.

Shares in Lastminute.com closed higher on 10 February after the results were released, but lost about 5% of their value when the fax started to circulate in the City last week.

He (the Lastminute CEO) said the company was in no danger of running out of cash as the writer of the fax claimed.

Lastminute "suffered" from being the one that did more than anyone else to burst the dot com bubble. They were awash with money following their float, and have invested well to move away from reliance on a web site that was worth very little to start with.

However they still find it difficult to make money, have piled up large cumulative losses, and appear to be under active consideration by at least one company for a takeover.