Wall Street.

[gdjoslin]

WOW What a morning. i think I am going to check my Coffee can that is buried outside and see how it is doing.

[Dave]

I was expecting it to happen. Actually I thought it would be worse but then there still 4 hours of trading left.

[susanmaz]

I Haven't seen - and don't think I want to know. And my financial planner tells me that burying my retirement funds under the bed is not a good idea ! !

[Dave]

The DOW will probably go below 11,000. It is down over 400 points right now.

[lharry]

What are your thoughts about Merrill Lynch. I don't know if I should be worried or not - that's where my portfolio is. OUCH!!

[Dave]

Merrill Lynch should be okay. Looks like the market got crushed in the last half of trading today. 500 point decline in the Dow.

[Dave]

I don't know if I should be worried or not - that's where my portfolio is.

Bear in mind that managing a portfolio and owning stock in Merrill Lynch are two different things. If you own a lot of Merrill Lynch stock, you may be in trouble although their stock increased today because of BOA buying them out. If ML is simply managing your investments - such as a 401k - it is doubtful that a large percentage of your investment is in ML stock. Typically a portfolio is diversified enough to prevent a huge hit if XYZ company crashes.

[lharry]

Thanks! They are managing my portfolio - I don't have stock in ML. I had inherited the account, and I just don't know enough about all of it as I should. It just worried me when I heard that they were bought out.

I do hope the market will start on it's road to recovery soon though. It is looking pretty ugly right now!

[f-mattox]

Just think about how many more shares those 3rd quarter dividends are going to buy.

[Dwayne]

I had my eye on a stock buy today and chickened out. I'm going to wait for this mess to bottom out.

Dwayne