With blood on the street and one flagging financial institution after another gasping for dear life, a quote from the Movie “Wall Street” bears remembering:
In the last seven deals that I’ve been involved with, there were 2.5 million stockholders who have made a pretax profit of 12 billion dollars. Thank you. I am not a destroyer of companies. I am a liberator of them! The point is, ladies and gentleman, that greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right, greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of its forms; greed for life, for money, for love, knowledge has marked the upward surge of mankind.
-Gordon Gekko
Judging by the turmoil this weekend, apparently greed is not so good after all.