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Politics : High Tolerance Plasticity -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: MetalTrader who wrote (7531)	9/7/2001 7:36:52 PM
From: chowder	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 23153

Hi MT! I'd like to see a system in place that gives a more accurate picture of a company's earnings. Too many games being played with the balance sheet for people like me who have a difficult time trying to interpret the mumbo jumbo. I've also seen many disagreements among people who know how to read a balance sheet, as to what the damn thing is saying. The advantage to TA for me is you can't hide volume. You can't hide whether the price is going up or down. You can misinterpret the psychology behind the numbers, but a trend is a trend, is a trend. Even Peter Lynch, that great fundamentalist, admits he looked at the charts to gauge the direction (trend) in which the stock was headed. In an age where perception seems to mean everything, it'd be nice to know exactly what a company earned or didn't earn. I tried pro-forma with my check book. It didn't work! At least the chart showed the correct trend, indicating the direction of the funds enclosed in said account. dabum

To: MetalTrader who wrote (7531)	9/10/2001 5:40:57 PM
From: Raymond Duray	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 23153

Hi MT, Thanks for the thoughtful reply to my post. More than I deserved, being a mere messenger. <bg> Re: The issue of accounting has become huge and is going to have to do one of two things. Either the most conservative procedures will be reinforced, or the reported results become largely irrelevant. Results will continue to be largely irrelevant to those who are more inclined to TA. With my penchant for history, I've been trying to locate some information regarding the denoument of previous bear markets. Jim Grant, of Grant's Interest Rate Observer was just interviewed on CNBC and he commented, astutely, that never before in the history of the bear markets have we had P/Es at bull market levels like they are today. The implications of this continuing excess are not clear, since it is unprecedented. You may find Grant's musings in an op/ed piece at the Gray Lady yesterday to be somewhat interesting, though perhaps not entirely useful: nytimes.com Best, Ray :) Note to KB - The Grant article contained the following which I think will tickle your Latin ear - The financial historian Max Winkler concluded his tale of the fantastic career of the swindler-financier Ivar Kreuger, the "Swedish match king," with the ancient epigram "Mundus vult decipi; ergo decipiatur": The world wants to be deceived; let it therefore be deceived. The Romans might have added, for financial context, that the world is most credulous during bull markets. Prosperity makes it gullible.