UAL Stock Plummets 99.9% After Bankruptcy Rumor, UA Denies

[Matt Molnar]

NEW YORK (Marke****ch) -- UAL Corp. (UAUA 8.97, -3.33, -27.1%) shares were halted Monday following rumors that the airline holding company was filing for bankruptcy, a rumor UAL said was completely untrue. An old news item on United Airlines seeking bankruptcy inadvertently resurfaced on a Web site, triggering a sell-off that wiped out 99% of the company's share price, CNBC reported. Shares of UAL last traded at a penny a share, down 99.9%.

At 1 cent a share, someone could have bought the whole company for under $2 million! Hopefully the SEC will be examining what happened here very carefully.

[T-Bird76]

Hmmmm this smells of insider trading.... Put a false story out there...let the stock tumble and buy it up cheap..this can't be on the level.

[Matt Molnar]

Update: It seems the rumor came about after the Florida Sun Sentinel posted an old Chicago Tribune story about United's 2002 bankruptcy on their website, and dated it today. Oops. This could have been a legitimate accident involving computer or human error, it could have been the work of hackers, or it could be an inside job. Very strange no matter what.