I hope you weren’t long on cattle futures on the Merc.
It’s time had come. The confirmation of a single case of bovine spongiform encephalopathy in the state of Washington has sent the industry reeling. Why? Much ado about nothing, I think. The ignorant will tell you that you should stop eating beef. Those in the know will tell you that the market will stabilize around 75 to 80 cents…eventually.
Already a host of countries have given in to the same fear that has locked the markets limit-down today and probably through the first few days of 2004. What a Christmas present. It’s too bad that fear drives markets. If science and judgement drove prices, we’d see no change. I’m telling you, it’s time had come. I’m glad we’re finally getting it over with. Let’s pull the limits so the market can bottom out and I can go live with a long position and retire in 4 months.
Humans cannot get BSE, or “mad cow” disease. They can get a variant of a disease, Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease, that is similar, but only by eating brains, spinal cords and various other things not eaten by humans with a normal human’s diet. Yum.
On a lighter note, I’m playing in JC on Saturday night. Bring all your beef-eatin’ buddies. It’ll be a fun time.
