Iridium will delay the launch of its global wireless satellite telephone and data service until at least November 1st, as the company works out the technical and marketing kinks. It appears from the Post article that most Iridium problems are caused by the complexity of the Iridium network. Even a minor software glitch appears to be capable of causing a disruption in the network. The article was written by Post staff writer Mike Mills and appears on page C3. Two reports - in The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times on September 10th concern SEC Chairman Arthur Levitt's announced goal of giving investors more information about the prices and trading of corporate bonds.
Investors have the right to know the prices at which bonds are being bought and sold.
Unlike stocks, which are generally traded through a centralized market, like the New York Stock Exchange or Nasdaq, most bonds are traded directly betwen two investors or through an intermediary, usually a securities firm. For most bonds, there is no mechanism for reporting prices to investors who are not involved in a particular transaction. This is true despite the fact that the dollar value of daily bond trading greatly exceeds the dollar volume of the three largest stock exchanges. According to the Times , Chairman Levitt said the S.E.C. found that high-quality pricing data is available for government bonds and that more information is becoming available about municipal bond pricing. But the corporate bond market is one of the last major markets inn the United States not to have some kind of electronic price disclosure.