My post yesterday was going to include a tirade against the financial industry, but Jon Stewart said it much better than I can.
My post yesterday was going to include a tirade against the financial industry, but Jon Stewart said it much better than I can.
John Stewart is the master of righteous indignation, and while his anger is legitimate, the illegal & immoral manipulation of individual stock issues has precious little to do with the meltdown of the credit markets.
Also, it should be stated, CNBC is a joke. It’s on the TV’s throughout Wall Street trading floors because it runs the stock ticker and the index prices all day long, so it’s easy to glance up at the screen and see where the DJIA is trading or whatever. It’s almost always running with the sound off.
The people who trade based on what Jim Cramer tells them are as informed as the people who vote based on what Rush Limbaugh tells them. And the advice is the same: if you’re serious, do better research, because neither Cramer nor Limbaugh are going to give you your money/vote back if you’re disappointed in the result.
I think Jon Stewart’s point (no “h”, Brian, he’s Jewish) is that Cramer’s thestreet.com shenanigans are indicative of the casino mentality that very much had something to do with the meltdown.
And I’d agree with you that CNBC is a joke. So is Rush Limbaugh. The problem is that they can be very influential jokes. You might not listen to a word of it, but they’re definitely speaking from your professional culture.
Don’t confuse trader bravado (of which there is plenty) with a casino mentality. The folks who actually model securities for a living look & act much more like the Revenge of the Nerds guys than like Jim Cramer. Trust me – I’ve met more than my share of them.
As for CNBC & the professional culture of financial markets, I’d argue that it’s a televised recreation of that culture, which looks & sound slike the real thing, but is very different indeed. Most of the people I work with would dread being on television to talk about the markets.