I was reading the headlines this morning with Google News, and I noticed that the Walt Disney Company was listed as a top story. I clicked on the lead to see what Disney was doing that was newsworthy. As I skimmed the headlines, one caught my attention. It reads
"Shares of The Walt Disney Company today lose -3.06%"Is this what the author really means? Would this have looked a little "off" to you if you had read the headline without me first directing you there? Is it a big deal?
At first sight I wouldn't think anything of it but now that I think about it, it doesn't make that much sense. If you really think about it its like subtracting a negative percent...so wouldn't that be adding? But I don't think that most people would think much about it.
ReplyDeleteYeah, that's what I though too.
ReplyDeleteI think that a better way to phrase it would we "Shares of Disney are now worth 96.64% of what they were before at 'X' time." But it seems too wordy; So, to save characters, they just put down A negative percent, instead of high positive percent. It's easier for most people to see that -4% is not much, but it might take a few seconds longer to understand 96%. Since all news groups are competing to get the most attention by delivering the news fastest, they use negative percents.
ReplyDeleteTo me, it didnt seem like a big deal at first glance, but after thinking about it. It's really not a big loss and doesnt really make sense. At first glance it does seem a little off. They worded it in a much more harder way then needed, they could have just done it in positive integers..
ReplyDeleteThanks for all the comments this week!
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