Gee, if Buffett were really thinking about this, I’m sure Mr. “I hate derivatives and I don’t understand them and I don’t want to have anything to do with them” would release the info to the NY Times, ummm, let’s say about 1/2 hour before the trading day closed, so that his cost would rise 7-8%. Sounds about right, eh? And I guess he’d also do this to the one specific company most immersed in not-yet-marked-to-market and impossible-to-mark-to-market subprime issues...because he doesn’t give a rat’s patootie about valuations, does he?
BSC needs to get its stock pumped up for the end of the quarter and releases a rumor. Period. That’s a 100x more likely explanation in my humble opinion. They did this to HOV about 2-3 weeks ago, releasaed a rumor that WB was interested in buying HOV out. Yeah, sure.
Exactly. It allows the institutional holders of BSC to unload at a better price.
It’s only a sheer coincidence that this rumor comes out two days before the end of the quarter. [/sarc]