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To: pater tenebrarum who wrote (26135)	10/9/2000 10:49:42 PM
From: chic_hearne	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 436258

Re: ...albeit the possibility exists that individual parties (naked shorts) to the listed contracts may get into trouble... heinz, a co-worker of mine just went to ChiTown this weekend to visit a friend who is a derivatives trader there. The guy has made an absolute killing in the last few years. He's in his 20's still and is a millionaire many times over. I'm not sure exactly what options he deals with, but my co-worker thought they were mostly index options. In this latest downdraft, the guys boss quietly reccomended to all his traders that they immediately pay off all outstanding debt they have. He told them to pay off car and home loans if they could. His friend lost over $1 million in this latest downdraft. One day was $250,000 alone. As a contrarian, you may view this as a short term bottom, or a real bottom. Knowing that derivatives traders tend to be more in tune with things IMO, maybe they are just recognizing the risk they actually are taking should some big down really hit? IMO, one of the biggest risks facing many people is having big mortgages and other debt that could be paid off. If their gains go to shit, they are stuck with mountains of debt. This in turn will lead to many consumers making a lot of money that they can't spend on consumer goods because they will be stuck using everything to pay back debt. This in turn could be devastating to the economy if spending slows due to debt payback and worthless company stock options that evaporate. Stock options in particular, I think many tech clowns are living way beyond their means because they have X amount of unexercised options that are literally worth millions. They justify living $250K lifestyles while making less than $100K of salary because they can just exercise more options to pay for things. Look at the outstanding options in CSCO. Should they go to $10 a share, any clown that works for that company will be stuck with a pile of debt and worthless stock options. That's just one company and this exists with many other companies as well. When the panic selling starts, all will go, not just the likes of CSCO, etc. Liquidation means selling everything for a lot of people, not just tech.