lessons of history

donkey years ago, watso bought a few shares in a property developer called mainline corporation. two weeks later, the ehadline news was that mainline had gone under, which at the time was the biggest company collapse in australia's history. the collapse of mainline, occurred when money was tight etc etc - at the time property developers were mauled, and were seeling at fractions of their earlier peaks. watso snapped up leighton holdings at 18c - which he subseqently sold at 30c - mmm that would have been a good one to sit on as dividends , share issues etc would have made watso a wealty man

the moral of the story - some companies will collapse in the present financial circumstances, and others will be dragged down with them - and some of them will overcome their problems. gosh, in watso's younger days, he would probably have taken a punt on mfs - as there is real potential to make a risky dollar or two.

on the surface mfs would seem to be a safer punt than centro - and that is not to say that centro will not survive - as nothing is certain