Post by unlawflcombatnt on Apr 10, 2007 15:55:38 GMT -6
From today's latest post in naked capitalism, Wall Street's aversion to honest reporting of the news is questioned. The WSJ appears reluctant to report the truth when such reporting is bad for the stock market. Below is an excerpt from April 10th's post in naked capitalism.
"April 10, 2007
You Didn't Read it in the Journal: Profit Outlook Lousy
Is the Wall Street Journal averse to bad news? That may seem a bizarre question to ask about any news organization, since by definition, most news is bad news. But we've noted before that the Journal has seemed particularly loath to pick up on certain stories that were covered aggressively in the Financial Times, such as the pervasive cavalier attitude towards risk, the extraordinary use of leverage (and the growth of leverage-on-leverage, for example, via hedge fund of funds), and institutional investor pressure to reduce CEO pay.
We saw another instance today. The FT ran an eye-catching story on its front page, "US braces for sharp profits slowdown." We've seen nothing of this sort in the Journal, and we waited until a bit late in the day to see if the WSJ might pick up on this item. The closest we got was the daily market report, "Stocks Calm Before Earnings Storm."
Why would the Journal be loath to report downbeat news (and notice that what it seems to be avoiding isn't company-specific news, but more general stories its readership might be happier not seeing)? Is this example, they didn't report on a broad-based negative profits outlook, which could translate into lower stock prices (you would think that would be hard to miss). Admittedly, the FT's most definitive quote came from a perma-bear, but we have read plenty of posts on the web by professional investors that have been increasingly concerned about the profit outlook, so it has the signs of being a widespread concern.
Is this a manifestation of what we once termed the Tinkerbell Market, where the market is held aloft by belief, and participants conspire to stoke the faith? We hope not....."
The full article can be found at
naked capitalism
"April 10, 2007
You Didn't Read it in the Journal: Profit Outlook Lousy
Is the Wall Street Journal averse to bad news? That may seem a bizarre question to ask about any news organization, since by definition, most news is bad news. But we've noted before that the Journal has seemed particularly loath to pick up on certain stories that were covered aggressively in the Financial Times, such as the pervasive cavalier attitude towards risk, the extraordinary use of leverage (and the growth of leverage-on-leverage, for example, via hedge fund of funds), and institutional investor pressure to reduce CEO pay.
We saw another instance today. The FT ran an eye-catching story on its front page, "US braces for sharp profits slowdown." We've seen nothing of this sort in the Journal, and we waited until a bit late in the day to see if the WSJ might pick up on this item. The closest we got was the daily market report, "Stocks Calm Before Earnings Storm."
Why would the Journal be loath to report downbeat news (and notice that what it seems to be avoiding isn't company-specific news, but more general stories its readership might be happier not seeing)? Is this example, they didn't report on a broad-based negative profits outlook, which could translate into lower stock prices (you would think that would be hard to miss). Admittedly, the FT's most definitive quote came from a perma-bear, but we have read plenty of posts on the web by professional investors that have been increasingly concerned about the profit outlook, so it has the signs of being a widespread concern.
Is this a manifestation of what we once termed the Tinkerbell Market, where the market is held aloft by belief, and participants conspire to stoke the faith? We hope not....."
The full article can be found at
naked capitalism