I'm beginning to be of the opinion that, in addition to other hazards, part of the "price of admission" to holding OTC stocks is that when natural causes lead to a situation such as we're now in with IMES: (no volume, no direction in sight from Austin/El Segundo, and a surprise kick-a-sick-dog-in-the-ribs of a 10Q), that in addition to all these, what you get is a bunch of hyena-like market makers profiting off the corpse before it even dies. Yesterday saw a sharp move up that was in essence just killed by a sudden imposition of a ten-plus percent spread between bid and ask. If you add that to what it costs most people to buy per share, commission-wise, plus the climate of disinterest spurned by the news/lack of news, there was simply no reason to buy shares: Anyone buying at Ask: $1.21 when the market-maker's best bid is $1.09 would have that spread, plus the cost per share as an automatic vigorish. Given my choice, I'd go to a casino and put it on the pass line and have a twenty-times better shot at making money.
In a way, I don't blame them. They're sleazy people (if you're in the East Coast you get to meet them from time to time--they're like hopefuls for a repertory production of "Guys and Dolls"), but they make no claims otherwise: all they're doing is scalping percentages on weakness or strength, and they don't make a whole hell of a lot. It just doesn't feel very good to know that my money is part of the carcass they're ripping up right now.
Next time people like Kostech put out the "good word" on a company, I'm going to wait for the inevitable run-up, then fade the shit out of them. |
