Posted on 07/24/2002 3:38:20 PM PDT by Dog Gone
LOS ANGELES (CBS.MW) - If only this were the bottom.
If only all the lies, the scandals, and the stock-pumping, option-dumping crimes against the small investor and the pain that they caused could just magically disappear with the sound of those two lovely words: buying opportunity.
It happened for a brief moment Wednesday. For a moment that whiff of greed from the summer of '99, like a familiar smell that conjures up a childhood memory, wafted over Wall Street. And when the buying was done and the Dow ($INDU: news, chart, profile) and the S&P 500 ($SPX: news, chart, profile) had seen their biggest one-day rallies since the wake of the 1987 stock market crash, the bulls rejoiced.
If ever investors needed a rally like this, now is the time. Nine straight weeks of gloom and doom have taken their toll, and a little blow-off was needed. But while this might trigger even more buying over the short term and perhaps a rally for a few weeks or more, as investors frantically try to get in on what they think is the bottom, this market's got further to fall.
There is still work to do, in Washington and on Wall Street, to clean up the excesses of the last bull market and punish the culprits who abused our trust. To ignore that now and just start thinking of which tech stocks to buy again will only make the next downturn more painful.
In the end, this amazing rally will go down as one of the biggest "dead cat bounces" of all time, a massive relief rally from a market that just couldn't be any deader.
But it sure feels good while it lasts.
Harvey Pitt's long strange trip
I've changed my mind about Harvey Pitt.
Anyone with the audacity to demand a raise and a promotion at a time when half the country is seeking his dismissal is OK in my book.
That Pitt could shrug off a rising chorus of calls to oust him from his position as head of the Securities and Exchange Commission as an unwarranted attack by a bunch of out-of-touch liberals is one thing. But to actually seek promotion of his position to cabinet status in the Bush administration - along with Treasury Secretary and Attorney General - is hubris unlike any we've seen in Washington since Hillary Clinton said she would fix the health care system.
Of course, Bush's team quickly distanced itself from the idea, which would do nothing but drag the tar of from the corporate accounting scandals right through the White House front door and into the main hall. And Pitt will still be ousted before this is all over. But you have to admire the guy for trying.
I remember meeting Pitt back in the late 1980s, when he was an attorney for infamous insider trader Ivan Boesky. In a small chat with reporters at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology campus in Cambridge, Pitt made it clear that he thought the press didn't have the slightest idea what the Boesky charges were all about.
It was that confidence, or arrogance, that carried him to the height of his profession on the private side, but which is killing him now on the public side. A raise? He'll be lucky if he ever gets a call from Bush again. And if he does, watch out.
But still, you've got to admire his chutzpah.
Slap a few more handcuffs on some corporate wrongdoers, Harvey. Then we can talk.
Meow.
Nice words to hear, but it still hurt to have Johnson and Johnson and 3M shorted today. >sigh<
I'd no idea they were targeting small investors. I thought that most or all investors were taking a bath. But if they are targeting a small minority we must label this what it truly is... hate investing and hate marketing.
If they are targeting "small" investors, then they must be targeting mutual funds since this is where most small investors have their equities. Perhaps there are seperate funds for the wealthy and for the rest of us. (/sarcasm)
We won't reach the bottom until people stop asking if we have reached the bottom.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.