The Five Dumbest Things on Wall Street This Week

Stock quotes in this article: SJM , SCHW , BAC , FCX , PD , CYBX , YHOO  

5. Raspberry Jam

J.M. Smucker (SJM Quote) will say just about anything to preserve its dignity.

The Orrsville, Ohio, jelly giant jarred Wall Street last Friday with a sticky second-quarter earnings report. The company behind Smucker's, Jif and Crisco missed sales and profit estimates, citing rising oil, wheat and fruit costs.

Worse yet, sales and earnings actually dropped from a year ago. For the second quarter ended Oct. 31, net income slid to $45.5 million from $46.4 million last year. Sales slipped to $605 million from $606 million a year earlier.

Yet despite the declines, co-CEO Tim Smucker's summary verged on the syrupy.

"Despite escalating raw-material costs," he said in a press release last Friday morning, "we delivered earnings growth consistent with our sales growth."

Way to lay it on thick, guys.

Dumb-o-Meter score: 68. At least they don't hate peanut butter.

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In our award-winning effort to enrich the reader experience, the Five Dumbest Things Lab now scores each item using our proprietary Dumb-o-Meter. This cutting-edge technology employs a finely calibrated, 100-point scale measuring sheer Dumbness, as calculated via a closely guarded secret formula.

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