“Stanley Jacobs Image”
A city boy, named Kenny, moved to the country and bought a donkey from an
old farmer for $100. The farmer agreed to deliver the donkey the next
day. The next day the farmer drove up and said, “Sorry son, but I have some bad news, the donkey died.”
Kenny replied, “Well, then, just give me my money back.” The farmer said, “Can’t do
that. I went and spent it already.” Kenny said, “Ok, then, just unload
the donkey.” The farmer asked, “What ya gonna do with him?”
Kenny, “I’m going to raffle him off.”
Farmer, “You can’t raffle off a dead donkey.”
Kenny, “Sure I can. Watch me. I just won’t tell anybody he is dead.”
A month later the farmer met with Kenny and asked: “What happened with
that dead donkey?”
Kenny: “I raffled him off. I sold 500 tickets at 2 dollars each and
made a profit $898.”
Farmer: “Didn’t anyone complain?”
Kenny: “Just the guy who won. So I gave him his 2 dollars back.”
Kenny grew up and eventually became the chairman of Enron.
After starting strong on Tuesday, U.S. equities drifted lower the remainder
of the week eventually ending with modest losses.
Bankers were busy over
the long holiday weekend as several big deals were announced Tuesday.
Cingular agreed to pay $41 billion for AT&T Wireless, while North Fork
Bancorp and National City agreed to buy GreenPoint Financial and Provident
Financial, respectively.
Wednesday brought news of declining housing
starts for the first time in five months and stocks gave back much of
Tuesday’s gains.
On Thursday, strong earnings reports from the retail and
semiconductor sectors could not turn the markets around. Among the
companies posting positive results were Wal-Mart, Target, Applied
Materials and Nextel. Biogen and Elan shares were stronger on the week
after announcing they would seek earlier approval for their promising
multiple sclerosis drug, Antegren. Disney’s board rejected Comcast’s
unsolicited takeover offer as inadequate.
Looking ahead, the strength of
the consumer should come into better focus this week as numerous retailers
report results. Among those reporting are Lowe’s, Home Depot, JC Penney
and Kohl’s. Also worth watching will be speeches by Fed Chairman Greenspan
and several economic releases later in the week. Given the current
economic conditions and the continued flow of funds into equities, stocks
remain attractive for patient investors.
”Weekly Index Performance:”
*DJIA: 10619.03 (-8.82,-0.1 percent)
*S&P 500: 1144.11 (-1.70,-0.1 percent)
*S&P MidCap: 596.59 (-5.73,-1.0 percent)
*S&P SmallCap: 279.76 (-1.57,-0.6 percent)
*Nasdaq Comp: 2037.93 (-15.63,-0.8 percent)
*Russell 2000: 579.89 (-5.25,-0.9 percent)
”’Stanley Jacobs is a financial professional at 201 Merchant St., Suite 2200, in Honolulu, Hawaii. He can be reached by phone at (808)537-4591 ext 227. Jacobs is a registered representative of and offers securities through MML Investors Services, Inc. The supervisory office is in Springfield, Massachusetts, and its phone number is (413)737-8400.”’