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To: Maurice Winn who wrote (40047)	9/8/1999 8:52:00 AM
From: limtex	Respond to of 152472

MW- Good point you made there Caxton! Subtle, but good! Here's why Indonesia is killing East Timorese, from CNN news: <...East Timor's largely Roman Catholic residents voted last week for independence from the overwhelmingly Muslim Indonesia, which invaded the territory in 1975 after Portugal abandoned it. East Timor was a Portuguese colony for centuries.> MW how much would you like to bet that so long as it remains Moslems killing Christians nobody is going to lift a finger to help the Christians? Further bet - the US and Europeans will carry on selling arms to Indonesia as if nothing was happening. Best regards, L

To: Maurice Winn who wrote (40047)	9/8/1999 9:28:00 AM
From: Jon Koplik	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 152472

Off topic - somewhat "wacko" WSJ piece about fears of 55 days after peak in S&P 500, and also fears of the "mini" Y2K thing (9/9/99). September 8, 1999 Heard on the Street This Week's Nines, Fives Cause Shivers for Traders By SUSAN PULLIAM Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL Wall Street isn't waiting for Halloween, it seems, to get spooked. Some traders are getting rattled just thinking about Thursday. There is the date, 9/9/99, which has been the source of some Y2K-type worries about whether older computers will be able to read the date and correctly process trades. Then there is this tidbit, from more superstitious traders: Thursday is notable because it marks the 55th calendar day following the peak in the Standard & Poor's 500-stock index on July 16. In both 1987 and 1929, the stock market crashed 55 days after the market's peak. Hear the chains rattling yet? Most Y2K specialists and Wall Street firms say they don't believe Thursday's date will pose a problem for their mainframe computers. And most investors dismiss the talk about "55 days" as nothing more than jabberwocky. But the fact such talk is even being repeated in trading circles is a good indication of how jumpy investors are lately. The Federal Reserve's recent increase in interest rates, coupled with an all-time low in market "breadth" -- that is, there recently have been many more losing than winning stocks -- has been enough to make some investors' skin crawl. And uncertainty in the stock market can at times be a breeding ground for magical thinking among investors, some market watchers say. "When people are not sure of what's happening because the available evidence is conflicting and difficult to read they say, 'Well, give me something else,' " says Robert Farrell, senior investment advisor and former chief technical analyst at Merrill Lynch. "A handy point like [the 55-day mark] is as good as anything." The concerns about 9/9/99 have been around for a while. And Tuesday, rumors circulated in some Asian markets about some Japanese banks doing less trading because of the potential risk. But officials at Merrill Lynch and PaineWebber say they have the issue under control. Says a spokesman for Merrill Lynch: "We are aware of the nines-date issue, and have incorporated it into our Y2K testing" procedures. Officials at PaineWebber also say that they have dealt with any problem related to the nine issue as part of their Y2K "remediation." A spokesman for Charles Schwab, the nation's largest online brokerage firm, says he even believes the nine-scare could fall in the category of "urban myth," like the one about crocodiles living in the sewers in New York City. "In the course of very, very thorough scouring of data, we never found any code which would have been affected by this particular date change," the Schwab spokesman says. He added that the date "09/09/99" also would be unlikely to trigger an end-of-program command; if anything, the number would be 99/99/99. Even the dean of Y2K worrywarts, Ed Yardeni of Deutsche Banc Alex Brown, won't lose sleep tonight. "I can't imagine anything easier than writing a program to" take care of the problem, he says. "None of the same issues as Y2K are raised by 9/9/99." The 9/9/99 scare is rooted in a form of code used by some older mainframe computers that used a series of nines to mark the end of a file within a program. The fear is that older computers could misread Thursday's date as an instruction to shut down. By comparison, Y2K preparations involve, among other things, different operating systems and applications, and making sure that data exchanges work, Mr. Yardeni notes. And what about the 55-day mark since the S&P peaked at 1418.8 on July 16? For starters, the theory might not even hold up: After all, the Dow Jones Industrial Average subsequently peaked on Aug. 25 at 11326. What is more, 55 isn't even a "fibonacci" number, named after the Italian mathematician who derived a theory holding that a pattern of numbers can predict future events. "We can always put together things that fit into a spooky scenario," says Merrill's Mr. Farrell, who, by the way, is a technician who subscribes to the idea that "there is a rhythm in markets." He says, "I don't put much credence into the 55-day theory, even though I am a technician." Insistent on finding something to be spooked about? Mr. Farrell, like Mr. Yardeni, is pretty worried about what Y2K will mean for the markets later this year. Mr. Farrell frets more about adverse behavior related to Y2K than a massive computer disruption itself. "People may hoard more cash or make fewer purchases. Market makers in the bond world are saying they will hold less inventory. Banks may be making fewer loans going into the end of the year. Companies may be holding less inventory," he says. And that could be enough to make even the bravest investor want to hide under the covers. Copyright ¸ 1999 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved.