4-letter tickers are the new 4-letter words

What's in a name? Well, a name is often the first thing a person hears about you. So, for publicly traded companies, what's in a ticker symbol? A lot, apparently. Here's the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE)'s take on Nasdaq's petition to the SEC to be allowed to use 1, 2, and 3-letter ticker symbols on its exchange: (If you're wondering why this matters, it doesn't.)

"We will continue to assign one-, two- and three-letter symbols to NYSE listed companies," the NYSE said, "both to reinforce our brand distinction and to reassure the investing public of the superior quality and value of a NYSE listing."

I feel reassured. I think that while Sony is overvalued and losing piles of money by selling the PS3 at a fraction of its cost and selling huge quantities of tvs that it barely makes any profit on, its 3-letter ticker symbol (SNE) makes it a good investment. And I can't wait to get my hands on some Sprint Nextel stock. Their debt-leveraged return on equity of 1.18% (source: Yahoo! Finance) looks scary at first, as does their reputation for being the worst phone company in the world, but their stock symbol is only one letter! A lone, noble S. Like Superman. I'm the bull, so brand me with Sprint's S.

Backlog Bob