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March 07, 2005

There's an informative Consumer Reports article that reports the results of tracking various investment advisories that come either as newsletters or spam. There is great advice there, especially this tidbit:

Our advice: Whenever newsletter mailings have disclosure boxes saying the content includes paid promotions of company stock, toss them immediately. (Also toss any unsolicited stock-touting newsletters or e-mails.)

Most of the stock tip spams I've seen over the years are not only unsolicited, but also unidentified. The return address is bogus and there is no pointer to any Web site. And yet most of them feel compelled to include disclaimers. Thus, the following disclaimer on today's stock tip spam was particularly amusing:

This Profile is not in any way affiliated with the featured company. We were compensated 3000 dollars to distribute this report. This report is for entertainment and advertising purposes only and should not be used as investment advice.

Now there is some good advice.