TRANSCRIPT OF BOBO & PATTY IN CAHOOTS
by: sithlordbulldog
Long-Term Sentiment: Strong Sell 06/12/06 03:52 pm
Msg: 102435 of 102441
Credit goes to Jeff Matthews:
jeffmatthewsisnotmakingthisup.blogspot.com -prisoners-of.html
But until last week's earnings report and Byrne's weird explanation of his massive diamond play, it was that January 28th conference call and the apparently sham “question and answer” session Byrne conducted with "Bob O'Brien," a man who claimed to be a stranger, that stayed with me.
After being introduced by the conference call operator, O’Brien introduces himself to Byrne, saying his name “is not familiar” to Byrne, but he, O'Brien, is a shareholder who can explain the short-attack on Overstock and others.
(“Bob O’Brien” is not the real name of the Overstock conference caller—he uses a pseudonym, claiming fear of retribution from the shorts; more likely he fears prosecution for threatening the families of short-sellers through message board posts under his other pseudonym [“dirtydirtydeeds”] in which he lists wives, children and home addresses of those who offended him).
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Byrne likewise pretends not to know "O'Brien" even though two men had been in contact for several months prior to that call, according to Bryne's own message board posting two weeks later:
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2/15/05 "Obrien called me for the first time
shortly after the October conference call.
He talked about all of this…"
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Isn't that something? The CEO of a public company pretending he didn't know a guy during a long conference call with investors.
But it gets better: as the January 28th transcript shows, the two men continue with a ten or fifteen minute back-and-forth in which "Bob O’Brien" describes a paranoid conspiracy theory which Byrne pretends to be hearing for the first time:
"O’Brien" (to Byrne):
“I don’t even know if you know this, but Overstock has been listed on 5 different German exchanges. They’re in Frankfurt, in Berlin, Munich—you’ve got one other one. I am just going to guess that you didn’t call and ask for that.”
Byrne (to "O'Brien")
“It’s news to me.”
Towards the end of their little one-act play, Byrne furthers the apparently deliberate deception that he knew nothing of what “O’Brien” was saying:
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Byrne (to "O'Brien"):
“You know a heck of a lot more about it. I buy toasters and sell toasters….I don’t know any of the stuff you are talking about but it is interesting stuff.”
However, one month after these exchanges, on February 28th, Byrne himself wrote on his message board:
“By December of 2004 we found ourselves listed on five exchanges in Germany and one in Australia. Someone had gone to all the trouble to get us listed on these exchanges…”
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