Caveat Lector: Stuffy Prose May Stifle Facts

The formal prose favored by many in the business media often proves comically bland, but it can also sap meaning, making the most dire reality sound tame and run-of-the-mill.

Take the unmitigated disaster that is IndyMac (IMB Quote), which has obvious implications for Washington Mutual (WM Quote), Downey Financial (DSL Quote) and, to a less fatal extent, Bank of America (BAC Quote), through its dopey purchase of Countrywide Financial (CFC Quote).

The same rot that hit Countrywide has set in at IndyMac, only worse. The mortgage lender has stopped accepting new loan applications, cannot raise one thin dime of the capital it desperately needs, is seeing a run on its bank, and this week got dumped with a new Wall Street analyst price target of ... 0. As in zippo. Goose egg. The big nothing.

They Just Don't Get IndyMac!

As all of these struggles lay siege on IndyMac and the stock continues its slide toward oblivion, some corners of the business media reacted to the news with an odd twist.

Take the Financial Times. Remember that run on the bank? Last weekend, terrified depositors scurried away $100 million of their deposits ... and that's before IndyMac's troubles and the stock price target of nothing received wide public notice early this week.

And how did the Financial Times capture all that horribleness in its headline? Why, it used IndyMac's own phraseology, which ironed out the horrible:

"IndyMac admits deposit run at 'elevated levels'"

Elevated blood pressure is more like it.

The Business Press Maven can't wait to get to the kicker. Remember the analysts and that price target of zero?