I offered this note to the still bullish longs on FBP's Yahoo! Finance message board today:

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Of Human Bondage

Long before Somerset Maugham borrowed that phrase, it was the title of the fourth book in the philosopher Baruch Spinoza's Ethics. That book was about how people are often bound and imprisoned by their emotions.

I get the sense that describes some of the longs here. Emotions such as hope and pride bind you to FBP as it drops.

As Bud Fox said in Wall Street, "never get emotional about a stock".

If you genuinely think that FBP at its current price offers the best trade off of risk versus reward from among the thousands of stocks available for you to own or short, then by all means, pile in here.

But if you don't think that's the case, then you ought to consider limiting your risk by reducing your stake here.

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Incidentally, FBP filed an 8-K today announcing that one of its EVPs, Mr. Randolfo Rivera-Sanfeliz, has hit the bricks ( http://biz.yahoo.com/e... ).

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