I love reading financial news. Not that I have millions invested in shares or oil futures, but the fact that it’s funny, always changing, uncertain and sometimes, stupid.
One day, you will read that the “professional columnist” is predicting that the credit crisis is coming to an end. But the next page title is that the bourse has dived 3% in a day! On the other page, you will see that a company has announced its quarterly result and that revenue has dropped and some analysts recommends that you sell or buy their shares. And under that news, you will find advertisement that tells you 10 reason why you should put more money into shares, real estate, superannuation/EPF/social security etc.
Fast forward 3 days, the paper might read “biggest recovery in history, bourse up 5%!” Suddenly, ecomists suggest that the econmoy is all well, that consumer spending are up, and that oil price will dropped pretty soon and food cost will ease out soon. But then, there are also companies failing to meet shareholders earnings, collected big debt when the economy took a downturn and the stories goes on.
The media played its part really well: to feed our needs of obtaining news that has been filtered and to persuade us to think in the same way as they do. Humans are greedy but are also in fear of losing, and when it comes to money, there’s just so many stories that can be reported and made-up.
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