The Five Dumbest Things on Wall Street This Week

Several folks nominated B.B., but top honors go to the two entrants who most persuasively argued his case. "He's the ultimate outsider with no ties to the old boys club," writes Chazz56. "While he lacks an extensive financial background, he is media savvy, and his presence at the head of the exchange would be a step up in credibility from the current exchange administration." Our other winner, who begs anonymity, writes that the minister has "the credentials of working for an administration that was big on internal monitoring and discipline."

2. Timing Is Everything

Apparently, Edgar Bronfman believes Vivendi Universal V is in too many different businesses.

Now he tells us.

Bronfman, you may recall, a few years ago bought the Universal movie studio and theme parks. Then he bought a record company. Then he merged them with a French utility company led by Jean-Marie Messier to create Vivendi Universal.

You remember how it all ended: badly. Vivendi Universal nearly ran out of cash the next year. Since then, Vivendi Universal's new chairman, Jean-Rene Fourtou, has been unwinding the empire that Messier created. Notably, Fourtou has recently agreed in principle to combine the company's Vivendi Universal Entertainment subsidiary with General Electric's GE NBC to create an even newer entertainment conglomerate.

On the Chopping Block Bronfman whittles down Vivendi's Universal's assets.

Earlier this week, Bronfman evidently told the French newspaper Liberation, "It seems to me that after the sale of Vivendi Universal Entertainment, the diversity of Vivendi's assets constitutes a problem for investors interested in the stock," according to Reuters' account.

Wow. You know, we don't remember Bronfman raising this issue back when Vivendi Universal bought the Houghton Mifflin publishing company. Or when Vivendi Universal bought U.S.A. Networks. Or when it made a big investment in the EchoStar DISH satellite company.

But now that Vivendi Universal has sold off assets like Houghton Mifflin and the EchoStar stake, leaving it with a French entertainment company, a French phone company, a Moroccan phone company and -- temporarily -- VUE, apparently the company is spread too thin.

Maybe something got lost in translation. At least we hope so.