Reverse Spin: The Week In Review

That Bill Clinton. Apparently the president read somewhere that the market hates uncertainty, so as a new year’s present he gave investors something to be certain about: four more years of Alan Greenspan as Federal Reserve Board chairman.

Alas, it appeared to be the wrong kind of certainty.

Fearing four more years of higher interest rates (and seeing profits that might not be there to take for long), investors headed for the exits as if somebody had just shouted “Fire!,” sending the major indexes south like students in spring.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average bounced back some, but the Nasdaq composite kept skidding from Monday’s record close to well below the 4000 mark — a level it hadn’t seen for almost a month.

The tech slide wasn’t helped by Sony Corp. president Nobuyuki Idei, who said his company’s stock was overvalued by at least a fifth. Ouch. The Sony shock sent the entire Tokyo Exchange down.

Will any of this uncertainty help Mr. Clinton land a $10 million-a-year-job at Lazard Frères & Co. with his old buddy Vernon Jordan when he leaves the White House, as the Washingtonian magazine reported? Don’t be ridiculous. The story “is complete and utter nonsense,” White House spokesman Jake Siewert explained.

Attention, AmEx

In the take-home department, Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. reported quarterly profits had quadrupled to $301 million from the same quarter last year. CEO Richard Fuld couldn’t resist crowing that profits had increased tenfold in the five years since Lehman had slipped the surly bonds of American Express Co.

Bulgaria for sale?

Fidelity Investments must have something huge in mind. It has asked shareholders of Magellan, the world’s biggest mutual fund at nearly $100 billion, to allow it to invest as much as a quarter of its assets in a single company. The current limit is 5%. The Securities and Exchange Commission filing said the change would give the fund more flexibility.

Price unconscious

The SEC tsk-tsked at PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP after a yearlong independent study showed that more than half its 2,700 partners had invested in companies it audited. That’s a no-no, as everybody knows, and said the SEC, means “serious structural and cultural problems at the firm.”

Officials at the Big Five firm said all audits were on the up-and-up and they’re correcting the problems.

Some societe

The SEC also brought further bad news to dot-com investors when it alleged that Tokyo Joe, actually a New Yorker named Yun Soo Oh Park, 50, had defrauded investors on his website by selling stocks he was advising them to buy.

Mr. Park’s lawyer, former SEC official Ira Lee Sorkin, said his client did nothing wrong and “There are some very murky issues.”

The civil complaint charges that Mr. Park collected more than $1.1 million in fees for e-mailed stock tips from traders who paid him as much as $200 a month for advice as members of his Societe Anonyme. The SEC wants to get him off the Internet and to collect unspecified fines and penalties.

Big time at last

It’s official. America is here to stay. Rothschild Group, the current iteration of the bankroller of emperors and kings, has decided “to expand greatly our activities in North America.” Hey, some Rothschilds helped beat Napoleon, others make pretty good wine. Too bad they missed Ellis Island.