Amazon.com confesses its risks

jmage at panix.com jmage at panix.com
Thu Jan 6 15:30:32 PST 2000


Jordan appreciatively wrote:


>> our 'umble little bit to make markets more efficient.
>
>This is the funniest thing I've read this century!

It's not hard to keep a straight face in a brief, I don't know what would have happened if I had had to argue this stuff against someone with any wit. I opposed a cert petition in a case we had won in the 11th circuit claiming that the reliance requirement in securities fraud (i.e that the stock purchaser or her adviser etc actually read the false or misleading statement in the prospectus or press release or whatever) did not have to be met since markets were efficient, and therefore the false or misleading statement was "fraud on the market." When a bit later the Supremes (in the Basic decision) okayed this theory, I found prose from my brief opposing cert in the earlier case in an opinion. Law clerks...

But take the case Tom posted in the thread "Re: thegreatcrash.com press release"


>To make a long story short this high flying ipo raised 10.7 billion giving
>FreeMarkets a bigger market capitalization than steel/energy giant USX. The
>kicker is that Freemarkets has 300 employees and has been a money loser;
>not to
>mention that their plan is to "make markets" by acting as an auction house for
>industrial supplies and raw materials. This all sounds good until you get
>into
>the mechanics of things.
>
>GM had some sort of an arrangement/contract with FreeMarkets. GM claims that
>they told FreeMarkets that they were going to cancel this arrangement back in
>November prior to the big ipo. Since word of this hit the newswires a few
>days
>ago FreeMarkets stock has plunged roughly 130 points!
>
>I'm surprised about the Mellon-Scaife money behind this Freemarkets deal
>with or
>without the GM contract. Take a look at the stuff I posted from the
>Pittsburgh
>Post Gazette.

Anyone lucky enough to have lost some money in Freemarkets after the time GM claims that they had told FreeMarkets they were going to cancel should get *quickly* to a plaintiffs securities lawyer - probably all the good firms have already filed. First flash of regret in years that I am out of this game; imagine...suing "Freemarkets" and Mellon-Scaife in one swell foop and getting generously paid for it. And making markets more efficient at the same time! Speak of doing well by doing good...

john mage



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