The Five Dumbest Things on Wall Street This Week

1. Time to Make Fun of the Doughnuts!

An ongoing Securities and Exchange Commission investigation. Falling same-store sales. An unexpected loss. Face it: As each week progresses at Krispy Kreme (KKD Quote), there's less dough and more hole.

Things got so bad this week that the doughnut retailer -- which Monday reported third-quarter results that were worse than already-lowered expectations -- wouldn't even take questions from analysts on its conference call.

Instead, the company invited investors to submit questions via email, then later posted a Q&A text on its Web site.

Of course, the A to many of the Q's in the Q&A is basically, "We're not going to tell you." But of the ones that Krispy Kreme answers, our favorite is KKD's analysis of what's gone wrong at its troubled franchisees and joint ventures. In general, says the company, the problem is "(i) operational processes that have not evolved from high opening sales levels to ongoing and sustainable sales levels; (ii) markets that have not aggressively developed all sales channel opportunities; and (iii) overcapacity relative to off premises potential." ...