A pile of dirt may not be worth much money. But a pile of dirt that was once beneath Yankee Stadium could potentially have more value. Especially if that dirt was packed into key chains and other corporate gift items and then sold at a big markup in sporting goods stores.

That was the pitch Mark Hayward used to convince a victim to give him $35,000 -- as an investment in this Yankee dirt scheme. As far as I can tell (the news report isn't really clear) Hayward never had the dirt in question. Eventually the victim got suspicious. And now Hayward is facing charges of first-degree larceny. Link: ctpost.com.

$16 Muffins — The legend of Out-Of-Control Government Expenditures is alive and well. Back in the 1980s, reports of the US government paying $400 for a hammer and $600 for a toilet sparked outrage. And now, late last month, came the news that the Justice Department had paid $16 a piece for muffins at a 2009 conference. But just as the hammer and toilet weren't really as expensive as they seemed, it turns out that the price of the muffins was an artifact of accounting. The $16 included the entire continental breakfast, service, and taxes. Of course, while the government may not be paying premium price for muffins, those bailouts to the bankers did seem a little steep.

On Monday (Sep 26) an "independent stock trader" named Alessio Rastani appeared on an interview with the BBC to discuss the Eurozone debt crisis. As the interview progressed, it became apparent that Rastani was far more blunt and cynical than most people from the financial community are when talking in public. For instance, in response to the question, "What would make investors more confident?" he came out with this:


Later in the interview he declared:


Watch the interview yourself:



His remarks and demeanor seemed so over the top, that people began to wonder whether he was hoaxing everyone by parodying the cutthroat morality of financial traders. Some people suspected that he was one of the Yes Men — pointing out that he bore a slight resemblance to Andy Bichlbaum of the Yes Men who had perpetrated the Dow Chemical Hoax during an interview with the BBC in 2004.

Rastani, when challenged, insisted he was real, and the Yes Men said he wasn't one of them. So it appears that Rastani wasn't trying to pull anyone's leg. He was voicing his genuine opinions.

Personally, when I watch the video I don't sense that he's being satirical. Traders tend to be slightly megalomaniacal, attracted to high-risk situations, and convinced that they're smarter than everyone else. He fits the personality type perfectly.

I think Rastani's interview demonstrates Poe's Law — as applied to the world of stock market trading. Poe's Law states: "it's difficult to distinguish between parodies of religious fundamentalism (or, more generally, parodies of any crackpot or extremist belief) and its genuine proponents." In other words, the financial community nowadays is full of crazies. When you listen to them you think, they've got to be joking! But no, they're totally for real.

Reusing your hotel towels: sensible behavior or scam? — Jill Hunter Pellettieri writes in Slate.com about how she hates those notices you now find in all the hotels asking you to re-use your towels in order to "Save Our Planet." Like her, I find them to be disingenuous. The real beneficiaries are the hotels, not the environment, because the hotels save lots of money on laundry costs, and they don't bother to pass those cost-savings along to the customers. [slate.com]

Worst April Fools? — An online brokerage, Zecco, pretended to give customers multi-million trading accounts on April 1st. Funny until customers began doing actual trades with the money. Lots of blogs were linking to this story, calling it the worst April Fool's ever. (I'm not sure about that. It's still not as bad as some on the official list.) But now the company is saying it was an accident, not a purposeful prank.

In response to the uproar over the millions of dollars in bonuses paid to the executives of AIG (you know, that company that would be bankrupt if not for the billions of dollars in loans it's taken from the US government), AIG management explains that it had no choice but to pay those bonuses because it was contractually obligated to do so. The Treasury Department, despite wagging its finger sternly at AIG, appears to accept that argument.

On salon.com Glenn Greenwald details why AIG's argument is transparently bogus. Contracts get renegotiated all the time when companies are in financial jeopardy. So what makes these contracts untouchable?

The truth must be that it's either a) a case of blatant cronyism, or b) the executives have some leverage that would make it more painful NOT to pay them than to pay them. (The latter argument is detailed here.)

What confuses me is the use of this word "bonus". Evidently these guys expect this money regardless of their own job performance or of how well the company does. In which case, shouldn't the payment be called "guaranteed compensation" or something similar? Calling it a bonus makes it seem analogous to the tip a waiter receives for good service.

The business magazine Forbes "absolutely denies" a rumor that it's being bought by a Russian private equity firm, Onexim.

The irony here is that it was Forbes, back in 1991, which published a hoax claiming that the Russian government, desperate for foreign currency, was selling the embalmed body of Vladimir Lenin to the highest bidder.

Times and fortunes have changed. It appears now the shoe is on the other foot.

Britain's Financial Services Authority has found a new group to blame for the financial crisis: naive traders spreading rumors. It cites one example of a trader who "spread a piece of 'hot news' to 10 to 12 of his friends over a messaging system without making clear that it was a rumour. One of his contacts then did not hesitate to spread the message on to 150 of his contacts."

To counter the problem, the FSA is urging companies to adopt policies "on how to deal with rumours and monitoring chat sessions, phone calls and emails from traders."

Good thing it's tackling this problem. And once it's succeeded in making the stockmarket perfectly sane and rational, perhaps it would consider cleaning up the internet as well.

This rumor is going around:


The news is sourced to iReport.com. If true, it would be another sign of the deepening financial crisis on Wall Street, but Bank of America doesn't have any info about this on their website, so my guess is that the rumor is false.

I stumbled across this site, weirdfragrances.com (I'm not linking directly to them, so I won't boost their google rank), that promises to send you a free sample of cologne. In return you simply provide them with your email and mailing address, and promise to later answer a few questions about the fragrance. You can choose from a variety of offbeat scents such as Grease Monkey, Burning Rubber, or Ash Tray.

Is it a legit offer? I would guess not.

First, it strikes me as odd that the site is registered anonymously through domains by proxy. Why would a legitimate company be trying to hide their identity?

Second, a quick google search reveals people posting on forums about how they submitted their info but never received anything except spam. So it appears to be a spam trap.

Media Agency Carat recently decided to lay off some of its employees. PowerPoint and Word documents somehow leaked out detailing how management planned to inform employees and clients of the decision. They offer an example of corporate b.s. at its finest. Details include:

• The agency wasn't going to be down-sizing. Instead, the documents repeatedly described the moves as a "right-sizing" of the agency.

• Clients were to be informed of the "staffing change" with this script: "Mary Smith will be moving off your business. Now that we understand your business better, we are replacing her with someone whom we feel will be a better partner for you."

• The remaining "critical talent," who might understandably be "questioning if this is the right place for them to build their careers" were to be reassured with this script, "The actions we had to take, although unfortunate, were necessary to right-size the company and ... bring in the skill sets we need to effectively service our business and future client needs."

Full details at AdAge.

Thieves used a hammer to break open a plexiglass box being used as a Drop-A-Note donation box in the Kentucky Theatre's lobby, and they stole the money inside. Unfortunately for the thieves, the money they took was fake. From kentucky.com:


The thieves were probably former convenience store clerks, fired for accepting too many George Bush and Santa Claus bills.