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To: pater tenebrarum who wrote (40767)	11/24/2000 4:03:31 PM
From: patron_anejo_por_favor	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 436258

HB, looks like ContraryInvestor has a better handle than you and I on the strike price and expiration of the "Greenspan Poot"!<G> contraryinvestor.com Out Of The Money...We have spoken to you many times of the "Greenspan put". The thought that Greenspan would ultimately save the financial markets at some point via the liquidity mechanism. Could it possibly be that the "strike price" of the put is a bit further "out of the money" than the consensus may have thought? It appears that the Fed is silently promoting the negative wealth effect. Of course, to a point. Banks are tightening credit. A lower stock market is erasing paper wealth as an initial deterrent to runaway demand. Don't get us wrong. We're not suggesting that Greenspan is all of a sudden a zealous convert to monetary discipline. What we are suggesting is that current market circumstances do allow the Fed to perceptually have their cake and eat it also. Perceptually, it's not the poor Fed's fault that oil prices are supposedly high. Greenspan didn't put an actual gun to BofA's head and force them to make loans into the telecom "space". Mr G. can't help it if companies are actually being forced to pay cash in lieu of stock options, given a currently uncooperative equity market. Possibly the Fed sees itself in a sweet spot of not having to be the direct (interest rate increases) bad guy for its hoped for slowdown in economic growth - the very thing the Fed needed to head off what appeared 6-9 months ago to be the beginning of rampant and blatant inflationary statistics. The recent Bob Woodward book on Greenspan intimates that Greenspan is one political animal. Is maintaining the tightening bias for now simply a triumph in politics? Maybe he's angling for a run at Dubya/Robotman in 2004?<GGG>