The Five Dumbest Things on Wall Street This Week

3. SpongeBob Won't Be Quite So Spongy

Pfizer (PFE Quote) announced Tuesday that sales of the anti-impotence drug Viagra fell 25% in the U.S. in the first quarter. (Readers, insert your own childish double entendre here, comparing Viagra's decline to, uh, well, you know.)

Viagra Sales Less Virile Will the commercials go away then?

On a conference call with analysts, Pfizer exec Karen Katen expressed disappointment that, after the introduction of Viagra rivals Levitra and Cialis, the overall market for these drugs doesn't seem to be, um, enlarging. (Yes! We inserted our own childish double entendre here so you don't have to!)

But how realistic was Katen's hope? Think about all the advertising that Pfizer has run for Viagra over the past year. Think about the hundreds of millions of dollars in free publicity Viagra has gotten via late-night TV comics and infantile journalists. And think about how motivated its possible users must be.

By now, we would guess that every man in America who has the slightest interest in sex -- and every man's significant other -- already knows all about Viagra and has already decided whether or not to ask his or her doctor about it.

As far as we can figure out, the only way for Pfizer to expand the market for Viagra is to start advertising it on Nickelodeon.

4. What's It All Abatix, Alfie?

Investors wondering whether we're riding yet another bubble don't have to go much further than the recent history of Abatix (ABIX Quote).

It all started after the market closed last Wednesday night, when the construction tool distributor announced it would be the exclusive worldwide distributor of something called "RapidCool."

Pretty cool stuff, this RapidCool. As Abatix explained in a press release, "This unique, proprietary line of products actually removes heat from fire, metal, wood, skin and other surfaces -- fires are suppressed with less water and manpower; skin treated with the FDA approved RapidCool(TM) burn cream heals more quickly; trees and other combustibles treated with RapidCool(TM) refuse to ignite; expensive tool components in the industrial segment that are treated with RapidCool(TM) generally have an extended life."

Wow. Did you get that? RapidCool "removes heat from fire," whatever that means. It causes your skin to heal. It prevents forest fires. It extends the life of machinery.

We bet it cures erectile dysfunction, too, but whoever wrote the press release must have been forgotten to put that part in.

Which is our way of saying that the more claims that people make for a particular product, the louder the "danger, danger" alarm bells ring here at the Five Dumbest Things Research Lab.

But our siren turned out to be someone else's siren song. Abatix's stock more than tripled last Thursday, shooting from $5.31 to $16.70 on staggering volume.