American Morning
Stock market emotional roller coaster
The recent Wall Street meltdown has everyone scratching their heads—and looking for answers. Some people think the answer may actually be found in the personality and emotions of the people doing the trading.
If you’ve ever seen Eddy Murphy’s movie “Trading Places” you’ve seen what happens on a trading floor when emotions go wild. “You idiot,” says the character Mortimer Duke to his trader as the trading floor erupts with emotion, “get in there and sell, sell!!”
An MIT professor agrees that personality and emotions of traders play a key role in explaining why people end up making bad trades and losing money.
Who should take a daily aspirin?
[cnn-photo-caption image=http://i.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2008/images/06/20/sanjay.gupta.cnn.jpg caption="CNN Chief Medical Correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta answers your questions."]
Asked by Sharon, Mays Landing, New Jersey:
“My husband’s doctor told him to take an aspirin a day. Should I be taking one too?”
Answer:
Thanks for the question Sharon. Aspirin is a medication we often get questions about, probably because an estimated one-third of Americans take it every day. The popular pain reliever is easily accessible, inexpensive, and available at your local pharmacy. It is commonly used to treat arthritis, headaches and fever among other minor pains. But what is often confusing is whether taking it every day can help prevent ailments– a heart attack or stroke.
Most daily users were most likely prescribed aspirin to lower their risk of cardiovascular disease. But it is important to note that not all people will benefit from this treatment, and in some cases, it can be dangerous.
The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force is a group of independent health experts who review effectiveness and offer usage guidelines for medical treatments and drugs. Last month, the USPSTF updated its 2002 recommendations of who could benefit from a daily aspirin regime.
What’s on Tap – Thursday April 16, 2009
Here are the big stories on the agenda today:
- A happy homecoming. The crew of the Maersk Alabama – the U.S.-flagged cargo ship hijacked by Somali pirates last week – arrived in the United States early Thursday. There were smiles and hugs and “welcome home’s.” Now the crew awaits their skipper, Captain Rich Phillips. He was detoured when the Navy was called to help another ship shake the pirates, but could be in the air any moment.
- President Obama heads to Mexico City today to meet with President Felipe Calderon, before traveling to Trinidad and Tobago for the fifth Summit of the Americas, with the border plagued by drug violence, and U.S. immigration reform on the shelf. Homeland security secretary Janet Napolitano is making her 2nd visit of the month to Mexico. She is meeting with government officials to discuss southwest border violence. We’ll ask her how the U.S. can assist and should respond. We are also continuing our special series “Drug Nation.” Today: Should we legalize pot? Many of you blog watchers say yes and the war on drugs is not working. We look at the pros and cons.
- Impulse Buying… and Selling: Can the personalities of stock traders be behind the wild swings in the markets the past few years? At least one researcher at MIT thinks the way traders react to bubbles and crashes has in part, magnified gains and losses.
- Beer Wars... FULL POST
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