A little warning to investors everywhere that "cooking the books," in order to prop up the stock market averages with imaginary money --pretty common on Wall Street, I hear-- can kill the chefs and poison everyone expecting dinner ... Brazil Stocks Plunge SAO PAULO, Brazil (AP) -- The largest stock exchange index in South America plunged Thursday to its lowest level of the year amid concerns that a key Supreme Court decision could dig a hole in Brazil's public coffers. The Sao Paulo Stock Exchange's Bovespa Index dropped 5 percent to close at 15,500 points, the index's largest point loss and second-largest percentage loss of the year. The biggest percentage fall was on Jan. 4, when it dropped 6.4 percent. The court was expected to rule late Thursday whether the government must compensate workers for alleged losses incurred from four failed economic stabilization plans. The decision could cost the government $40 billion if it loses. But the ruling was delayed a month when one of the 11 court judges asked for more time to analyze the information available. The three judges that had already voted gave the government a partial defeat. They said the government arbitrarily reduced workers' investments when implementing the plans in 1989 and 1990. According to the judges, the government failed to adjust workers' savings and investments by 20 percent and 45 percent, respectively, those years.
