Dog on the Loose. (Wall Street West).

On Wall Street they are calling it "WOOF" - that's the trading symbol for what is now VCA Antech Inc., the West Los Angeles-based nationwide chain of veterinarian shops. It's VCXs second public incarnation. (Who says dogs don't go to heaven?) VCA was a public company doing the industry roll-up thing, but getting little respect on Wall Street. So, in September of 2000, VCA was taken private by a group that included the West Los Angeles LBO shop Leonard Green & Partners. They paid $500 million for the animal hospital and lab outfit.

Proof that Wall Street is nothing if not a lot of U-turns, VCA went public again in November, hitting the macadam at $10 a share, which has since appreciated to $12 in trading last week. WOOF's market capitalization is now $420 million.

No less than four Wall Street brokerages (including underwriters Goldman Sachs and CS First Boston) yelped out "buy" signals on WOOF on Dec. 17, the earliest date allowable under SEC rules pertaining to IPOs. Goldman Sachs predicted VCA Antech will earn 63 cents a share in 2002, or about $21 million.

But one Los Angeles-based trader last week suggested VCA is a lot of bark to the bite. The company ran up a huge debt load - about $370 million - in its 1990s buying binge, and that burden is still on the books. "If this is such a great company, why didn't the private investors who own it, just keep it?" asked the trader.

Contributing columnist Benjamin Mark Cole writes about the local investment community for the Los Angeles Business Journal. His new book is "The Pied Pipers of Wall Street: How Analysts Sell You Down the River," published by Bloomberg Press.