The Five Dumbest Things on Wall Street This Week

1. Apple's Pie-Eyed Pumpers

Thanks to the intrepid research team at Piper Jaffray, there's now a scientific explanation why consumers claim they're helpless to resist the allure of Apple's (AAPL Quote) iPods, iPhones, iMacs or Steve Jobs' signature eyeblack mock turtlenecks.

Piper's mall-based research over the Thanksgiving holiday weekend indicates that Apple stores exert a "gravitational pull" on shoppers, or so declared Piper senior research analysts Gene Munster and Michael Olson. For fans of the statistical analysis, this magnetic force can be quantified.

"There is a 27% chance that a shopper walking within 25 feet of an Apple store entrance would actually enter the store," according to Munster and Olson's calculations.

To believe the analysts is to believe that the implications of these findings match those of the discovery of the Rosetta Stone, or maybe King Tut's tomb. "This gravitational pull highlights that consumers' future buying intentions could be shifting to Apple from PCs," the analysts wrote -- with no apparent sense of sarcasm. "If materialized, this shift should benefit Apple in 2008 and 2009."

But lest would-be Apple shareholders and consumers feel enabled by Munster and Olson's research conclusions, a few caveats must be noted.

First, the Piper analysts observe that "only a fraction of shoppers actually purchased anything from the Apple stores." This discovery suggests Apple's engineers have yet to complete the second stage of their diabolical plan for total control over the hearts and minds of consumers.

Second, this is the first year Piper's analytical team has done on-site research at Apple retail outlets. "We do not have comparative traffic data," Munster and Olson concede.

In other words, some analysts will use just about any excuse to reiterate a "buy" rating and justify a street-high $250 price target.

Dumb-o-meter score: 95. Munster and Olson are "senior" research analysts, raising the question of what the "junior" folks are up to at Piper Jaffray.

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