2 Much$ 4 Gas? U R Not Alone

Tarun · May 9, 2002

Will driving to a cheaper gas station save me money?

Choosing a less expensive gas station is a money-saver. Or is it?

Now you can find out if it's worth driving to that less-expensive station.

First, enter your car's gas tank size and fuel efficiency. Then enter the distance you drive to each gas station and the price of gas there. The calculator will tell you if the drive costs more than the money you save on gas.

Compare two gas stations by answering the following:

What is capacity of your car's gas tank? gallons

How many miles does your car get per gallon?

(city driving) miles

Gas station 1

How far is it to your primary gas station? miles

What is the price of gas at your primary gas station? $

Gas station 2

How far is it to your secondary gas station? miles

What is the price of gas at your secondary gas station? $

Net savings from traveling for gas: $

--------------------------------

Above questionnaire appears on AOL today plus this:

Houston: >22% household budget spent on travel/gas

Highest of all US Metro Areas

Baltimore: <15% household budget spent on travel/gasoline

Lowest of all US Metro Areas

Connecticut & Georgia: Highest & Lowest Gasoline Tax

36 cents & 7.5 cents/gal respectively

Bay Area: 26% gas consumption increase over next 20 yrs

KC 2x> NYC: Kansas City-ers travel 2x as many miles by car as NYC-ers

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My humble opinion?

Not only in so-called 3rd World, but sadA sarvatra = everywhere:

Rice & beans r still the most economic, efficient source:

of all vital energy, including gas.

Tarun · July 22, 2002

SP: There r no more brahmaNas or xatriyas, only vaizyas & zudras, belly & legs.

And they r thinking themselves advanced. This is their condition.

Someday Capitalists will learn something about business, some day some thing.

Otherwise they can remain in ignorance till KalyavatAr arrives. Then they'll know.

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Dow Plunges 390; Stocks Continue Four-Month Rout

By Jonathan Fuerbringer - NY Times Business

Saturday, 20 July, 2002

Stocks continued their plunge yesterday in a four-month rout that has sent the major indexes below their lows of last September and to levels that, if they hold, will make this the worst year for the market since the 1970's.

The persistence of the decline has made it harder for companies to raise capital and has eroded the retirement accounts and stock portfolios of many Americans.

Some bad earnings projections and a criminal investigation of another company helped unsettle investors yesterday. The Dow Jones industrial average, which had been the strongest of the major indexes, fell 390 points, completing its worst two weeks since the 1987 crash with a loss of 14.5 percent. For the year, the Dow is down 20 percent, and the other major indexes are down far more.

Reports of accounting troubles at WorldCom, Xerox and other big companies have created an environment in which good news is ignored and slightly negative news is crippling. Congressional efforts to restore corporate accountability and President Bush's response appear not to have reassured investors anxious about the accuracy of financial results. Even positive comments about the economy from Alan Greenspan, the long-revered chairman of the Federal Reserve, seemed to provide little support to the stock market this week.

"There hasn't been any news in the last 12 weeks that has made anybody feel confident," said Thomas McManus, the equity strategist at Banc of America Securities. "There is nothing that has made people say there is a great opportunity here."

Where the market goes from here depends in large measure on the confidence of individual investors, who have come to believe in recent years that stocks are the best long-term investment and, therefore, they have ridden out past stock market declines and even bought when prices fell. But after two and a half years of losses and with their faith in corporate management waning, this belief could erode. Even a small shift would be bad for stocks.

Howard Freeland, a doctor in Baltimore, watched the market yesterday on his computer but did not look at his own portfolio. "I was afraid to look," he said. Dr. Freeland, 47, called yesterday's plunge an overreaction and compared it, in reverse, to the excesses of 1999 and early 2000.

"People didn't look at what true values were when prices were high back then, and I don't think people are looking at true values now that prices are significantly lower," he added. "It's herd mentality."

One sign of the blow to investor confidence can be seen in the money flowing out of stock mutual funds. According to AMG Data Services, there were net outflows of $11.4 billion from stock funds in the week ended Wednesday. That brought the outflow for July to $18.5 billion, after an $11.1 billion outflow in June. Many mutual funds have some cash on hand to handle redemptions, but if investors continue to pull money out of funds, they will have to sell more stocks to meet the demand.

Robert Adler, the president of AMG Data Services, said that the outflow, as a measure of active investor sentiment, was the worst since he began collecting mutual fund data in 1992. The outflows in the two weeks after Sept. 11 were $5.9 billion and $4.9 billion, respectively.

But he said he did not see investor panic because much of the money is not being reallocated to safe money market funds. Instead, some is going into funds that invest in foreign stocks as investors seek to take advantage of the falling dollar, which enhances any investment gains from abroad. Some more of this money is being moved into funds that invest in the highest-quality corporate bonds.

Paul D'arienzo, a stock exchange floor broker, said that small investors were afraid to be in the market. "Small investors aren't chipping in the $100 or $200 a month," he said, "and the market feels that."

Domestic stocks have shown weakness virtually across the board. The Standard & Poor's 500-stock index is now at its lowest level since June 1997 and is down 44.5 percent since its high in March 2000. The Dow Jones industrial average is at its lowest level since October 1998 and off 31.6 percent from its high in January 2000. The Nasdaq composite index has not been this low since May 1997 and is down 73.9 percent from its peak in March 2000.

Since President Bush came to Wall Street on July 9 to reassure Americans that corporate malfeasance would be taken seriously, the Dow has fallen 13.5 percent and the Nasdaq composite index 6.2 percent.

The Nasdaq composite and the S.& P. 500 have fallen in 15 of the last 18 weeks, and the Dow has been down in 14 of those weeks.

Yesterday, bad earnings news from several major companies added to the already sour atmosphere on Wall Street. The expiration of option contracts on stocks and the replacement of seven stocks in the S.& P. 500 index at the end of the day contributed to the volatility. A record 2.66 billion shares traded hands on the New York Stock Exchange.

The sickness in the United States market is affecting major stock indexes in Europe and Asia, which fell as much as 5 percent yesterday. The global market decline is fueling some fears, stock analysts suggested, that consumer confidence will be broken and that consumer spending will be reined in, which could undermine economic recoveries both here and abroad.

"The fact that global stock markets are falling is making some think that this is going to lead to an economic downturn," said Thomas M. Galvin, chief investment officer at Credit Suisse First Boston.

The dollar also weakened yesterday, with the euro rising to $1.01, its highest level since January 2000.

Mr. Galvin said that many investors appeared to be staying on the sidelines until mid-August. The Securities and Exchange Commission will then require senior executives of the nation's biggest companies to begin signing a pledge, under oath, about the accuracy of their corporate financial statements.

"I just think that people don't want to get blindsided," he said, so they will wait until they see if this financial-statement oath will produce a "rigorous period of financial restatements."

At the close of the market yesterday, the Dow was down 390.23 points, or 4.6 percent, at 8,019.26. The Dow's 20 percent decline for the year so far follows drops of 7.1 percent last year and 6.2 percent in 2000. The broader S.& P. 500-stock index lost 33.80 points, or 3.8 percent, to 847.76. The S.& P. is down 26.2 percent for the year, after declines of 13 percent last year and 10.1 percent in 2000.

The worst performer remains the Nasdaq, which contains many technology stocks and former highfliers. It dropped 37.80 points, or 2.8 percent, to 1,319.15. For the year, it has lost 32.4 percent, after plunges of 21.1 percent in 2001 and 39.3 percent in 2000.

Much of the negative news that weighed on stocks yesterday was parsed from otherwise positive company announcements.

Microsoft said late Thursday that its earnings were better than expected last quarter. But sales of its Xbox game systems were disappointing, and executives were not optimistic about the rest of 2002. Microsoft stock dropped 3 percent, to $49.56.

Sun Microsystems predicted a loss for this quarter, and its stock fell 26.7 percent, to $4.25. Pepsico, despite reporting an 11 percent increase in earnings, plunged 10.2 percent, to $36.20, after saying its sales rose less than expected.

The biggest drag on the Dow industrials was Johnson & Johnson, which fell 15.8 percent, to $41.85, after reports surfaced that the government was conducting a criminal investigation into its Puerto Rico plant where an anemia drug is made. The drug has been linked to serious illnesses in Europe and Canada.

AOL Time Warner fell sharply for a second day after announcing late Thursday a management reorganization that included the resignation of Robert W. Pittman, the chief operating officer. AOL's stock was off 7 percent, at $11.58. The company continues to suffer from doubts about its real financial health and accounting practices.

"You never know when it's going to be over," Dexter Williams, who works in risk management on Wall Street, said yesterday. "It's going to take a long time to restore investor confidence."

As investors moved out of stocks and into the bond market, bond prices rose and yields, which move in the opposite direction, fell. The yield on the Treasury's 10-year note dropped to 4.52 percent, from 4.61 percent Thursday, as the price rose 2232, to 1022332.

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