“October: This is one of the peculiarly dangerous months to speculate in stocks. The others are July, January, September, April, November, May, March, June, December, August and February.” –Mark Twain
This one came from my email today. Originally titled, "How the bank bailout works," I thought it's more of a securitization joke given the pyramiding aspect of transactions involved, so I re-titled this accordingly:
Young Chuck moved to Texas and bought a Donkey from a farmer for $100.00. The farmer agreed to deliver the Donkey the next day.
The next day he drove up and said, "Sorry son, but I have some bad news, the donkey died."
Chuck replied, "Well, then just give me my money back." The farmer said, "Can't do that. I went and spent it already." Chuck said, "Ok, then, just bring me the dead donkey."
The farmer asked, "What ya gonna do with him?" Chuck said, "I'm going to raffle him off."
The farmer said, "You can't raffle off a dead donkey!" Chuck said, "Sure I can. Watch me. I just won't tell anybody he's dead."
A month later, the farmer met up with Chuck and asked, "What happened with that dead donkey?" Chuck said, "I raffled him off. I sold 500 tickets at two dollars a piece and made a profit of $998.00."
The farmer said, "Didn't anyone complain?" Chuck said, "Just the guy who won. So I gave him his two dollars back."
Chuck now works for Goldman Sachs.
Some years ago while Baron Rothschild and a nobleman friend were taking a pleasure trip along the Rhine, a young lad on the boat noticed the end of a silk handkerchief sticking out of Rothschild's pocket.
With visions of the fabulous value of a Rothschild handkerchief, he took the end of the handkerchief and gently tugged at it.
At this point, the nobleman turned to the Baron and whispered: "Baron, that boy beside you is taking your handkerchief."
"Let him alone," said the Baron. "We all had to start small."
