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Non-Tech : Save The World Air Inc. (ZERO) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Arcane Lore who wrote (23)	7/16/2000 11:59:24 AM
From: Arcane Lore	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 445

From the NY Times "Investing Diary": Spinning a Stock With a Blue Pencil Just when you thought you'd seen everything in corporate spin tactics, along comes Save the World Air Inc. The company, based in Reno, Nev., claims to have a device that virtually eliminates toxic auto emissions. But the company's core business appears to have more to do with stock price propulsion, which it effects by the constant issuance of news releases. Many of them announce vital business developments like the rescheduling of an appearance by the company's chairman on a cable television program; others carry headlines like "Save the World Air Announces Another Successful Test of the Zero Emission Fuel Saving Device" (conducted by two fellows in the service department at a New York City car dealership, apparently). The release that broke new ground in spin, however, was issued on June 28. The company's public relations advisers took an unfavorable article that appeared three days earlier in The New York Times, got out their scissors and paste, and, having deleted all the skepticism, reissued it on the PR Newswire as if it were a rave review. It might have been merely another day in the endless saga of nutty stock promotions, but for the fact that some investors appear to have taken the selectively edited article as evidence that Save the World Air has a real product and real prospects. The stock rose to $14 on July 6, up from $5.125 when the full article appeared and just 10 cents last December. Since then, Bloomberg News has published two critical articles about Save the World Air and the claims it makes in news releases, taking some of the helium out of the stock's balloon. But gullible investors remain; last Friday, the stock jumped $2.125 to $6.875. -- GRETCHEN MORGENSON nytimes.com