The Motley Fool's CAPS investing service is another great way for investors to work together to beat the market. Among other features, CAPS lets users blog about their picks, investing strategy, market view, favorite rugby team, or whatever floats their boat.

As CAPS blogging catches on, players add more great content on a daily basis. I've dug through the past week's posts to find some of CAPS' best insights. With room for only six posts here, I can't possibly cover all of the great stuff in the CAPS blogosphere, so when you're done here, I highly recommend checking out some more.

The world of French trading
Jerome Kerviel may have grabbed the headlines with the massive losses that he racked up for Societe Generale, but his seemingly crazy actions may not be that unusual in the pressure cooker that is the Societe Generale trading floor. CAPS blogger raytoei has pulled some great quotes from a Wall Street Journal article that gives some insight into the environment that helped make Mr. Kerviel a trader willing to risk tens of billions of euro.

The worst CEO in American history?
At this point we all know the race is on for Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) to make a case for its proposed acquisition of Yahoo! (Nasdaq: YHOO). But how did Yahoo! get to this sorry state of being a beaten-down Internet company and the subject of a hostile takeover? CAPS All-Star TMFHollywoodDan thinks it's because the company once had the worst CEO known to man.

Microsoft spends some of its cash mountain
Another CAPS All-Star, iamamartin, looked at the Microsoft proposal from another angle. He thinks the market's reaction is giving the deal is more "doh" than "Yahoo!" (hey, it's not my pun). Further, he believes Microsoft was already underpriced because investors were all "Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) eyed" until now.

Mastercard, Western Union, and the Church of Satan doing well
Though most stocks have been in the red lately, not everything has been struggling. As weiwentg points out, Mastercard (NYSE: MA) has done quite well and Western Union (NYSE: WU), though not on the same pace as Mastercard, has been holding up as the rest of the market sells off. As for the Church of Satan (that's weiwentg's nickname for Procter & Gamble (NYSE: PG)), you'll have to tune into the blog for the explanation!

Inflation is very real
It seems one of the biggest ongoing debates right now is what will happen to price levels in the coming years. On the one hand, a current contraction of lending and a general slowdown in spending seems like it could portend deflationary pressures. On the other hand, there are many macro trends -- for instance the growing population and wealth in China -- that are continuing to push up global prices for things such as food and oil. EScroogeJr tackles the question in his blog, arguing that inflation is the danger we should be watching for.

Housing glimmers: the beginning of the end
CAPS blogger camistocks has dug up a recent report from Wachovia's (NYSE: WB) investment banking division. The bank's projection is that, although we aren't there yet, the housing market is starting the process of bottoming. Check out cami's blog for his analysis of this report.

And that's our round-up for this week. Be sure to check back next week for more great blogging action. In the meantime, why not head over to CAPS and add your two cents to the community pool?

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