Howard Gold writes for Marketwatch.com about why Barron’s columnist Alan Abelson, who died last week at the age of 87, was one of the greatest business journalists of all time.

Gold writes, “In a field not known for its humor (Allan Sloan being a notable exception), Abelson’s wit was dry and sly, and he had more varieties of sarcasm than Heinz had products. I suspect his was the best prose much of his Wall Street audience read all week, and many of them read him for pleasure as much as for work.

“But he also was a great editor who shaped business journalism during its Golden Age of the 1980s. That was the time of Michael Milken, leveraged buyouts, insider trading and the stock market crash of 1987.

“His edgy, analytical approach to business was similar to that of Jim Michaels, born four years earlier, who produced legendary journalism at Forbes and, like Abelson, trained what became the next generation of top business journalists.”

Read more here.

John Kostrzewa, the business editor of the Providence Journal, writes about the biggest legacy that Barron’s columnist Alan Abelson leaves the world of financial journalism.

Kostrzewa writes, “But in reading his obituary, here’s what caught my eye. He grew up in Queens and studied chemistry and English at City College of New York before earning a master’s degree in creative writing from the University of Iowa.

“He started as a copy boy at the New York Journal American in 1949 and became a reporter on the financial desk. He served as a stock market columnist before joining Barron’s in 1956 and was named managing editor in 1965. For years, he also wrote the influential Up & Down Wall Street column.

“The point is that Abelson had a well-rounded education and learned his beat and craft in slow, steady steps over decades. That’s in contrast to many of today’s financial bloggers who have a lot to say with little knowledge and experience to back it up. Abelson got it right, got it fast and got it all. That’s his legacy and all of us can learn from it.”

Read more here.

Brooke Southall of RIABiz.com writes about why readers of Barron’s will really miss columnist Alan Abelson, who died earlier this week.

Southall writes, “Often things happen on Fridays and his columns that appeared Saturday mornings always seemed to assimilate late-breaking reality —without the sense of last-minute appending. I often coughed up the five bucks for Barron’s just to read his column, or detoured to the Mill Valley library where the keep them neatly stacked.

“They say all humor is based on the inside joke. It helps explain why we laugh so much with our best friends. But a sage like Abelson knows enough about what you think — things that even you didn’t know you were thinking — that he can play off of that.

“In other words, Abelson, from a writer’s perspective, knew people and how we all operate — with help from the insanity of the mass psychology of crowds — a theater of the absurd every day.

“That his writing oozed with plays on that absurdity did not make him frivolous. Quite the opposite. It connected the world of business, finance, investments and the people who are behind it all. If the finance world has a lack, it’s one of human connection.”

Read more here.

The writer who critiqued Wall Street and companies the most during the last 30 years of the 20th century was Alan Abelson of Barron’s, whose death at age 87 was announced on Thursday.

While the stock market rose to new heights for most of the 1990s, Abelson criticized the run-up on almost a weekly basis. Unfortunately, many investors ignored his rants.

For example, he wrote this about IBM investors in December 1992: “By our crude reckoning, these hapless souls have lost something over $28 billion this year, and of course, neither the year not possibly the damage is over. Contrast that to the $16 billion estimated cost of Hurricane Andrew, and the case for an official designation of IBM as a disaster area seems unanswerably compelling.”

A critical word from Abelson punctured more than one financial bubble, and cause stocks to rise with a kind word. His reputation of discovering scams and finding the truth on Wall Street is legendary. After his “Up and Down Wall Street” column lauded SEEC, which developed software to maintain computer systems, the stock rose 52 percent in one day in November 1998. And after he criticized PMT Services Inc., in consecutive issues of Barron’s in 1996, the company put out a press release to dispute his assertions in an attempt to keep the stock from falling.

It didn’t work.

Even as far back as the 1970s, Abelson drew the ire of hedge funds before their operations and tactics became commonly known on Wall Street and to the investing public. Many hedge funds short stocks, meaning they believe they will fall in price, not rise. A lawsuit brought by a Technicare Corp. shareholder accused Abelson of providing tips to these short sellers in advance of negative articles about companies.

Abelson denied the charges, which were never proven. “Back in the 1960s, people used to threaten to punch me in the nose when I said something negative about a company,” responded Abelson. “Now we live in different times. The suit is obviously an attempt to keep me quiet.”

Keeping Abelson – and other critical watchers of Wall Street – quiet has been hard for anybody to accomplish. Their reporting on the financial markets has brought to light illegal dealings, dozens of shady stock propositions and countless scam artists. Their work is respected by the scrupulous operators on Wall Street for acting as a semi-regulatory body.

With their writing, they sometimes alert federal regulators at the Securities and Exchange Commission to potential transgressions. They sell newspapers and attract viewers to their media outlets. This reporting is what the quid pro quo should be for readers, viewers and listeners who often are investors.

I do not see anyone currently in business journalism who can skewer companies the way Abelson did. He will be missed.

Joshua Brown of The Reformed Broker writes Thursday about Barron’s columnist Alan Abelson, who has died at the age of 87.

Brown writes, “He was one of the greatest market commentators, financial writers and teachers in the history of Wall Street. There will be many eulogies for and remembrances of Alan this weekend, I am sure of it. So I’ll send you to his editor Ed Finn’s notice at Barron’s Online, but before that, below is one example (of thousands) of Mr. Abelson’s simultaneously biting and incandescent wit.

“This particular quote is from a January 2009 column of his, during the heat of the financial crisis and the socioeconomic and cultural upheaval that had brought the Democrats back to power. Here’s Abelson’s take on George W. Bush’s farewell address:

“His message was straightforward, consistent and clear: Thanks to his vigilance, this nation was spared a terrorist attack after 9/11. And so it was, for which we are all profoundly grateful. And only the most vehement Bush-basher would sniff that the real reason for the absence of an attack was that Mr. Bush did such a thorough number on the country all by himself that the terrorists figured, why bother?”

“There was more truth in Abelson’s curmudgeonly satire than you’ll find in all the research and rantings produced by the Wall Street machine that he covered so skeptically and humorously. He said what he thought and taught us all to think critically, especially when it counted – in times of wild-eyed, dangerous overconfidence.

“Rest in Peace, Alan, and thanks for being an early influence on a whippersnapper like me. You can’t imagine how much I’ve learned from your writing over the last fifteen years.”

Read more here.

Business journalism legend Alan Abelson, who worked for Barron’s for the past 57 years, has died.

Barron’s editor Ed Finn writes, “For many readers, there can be no substitute for Alan’s witty, wise and wonderfully written comments each week in Up and Down Wall Street. But Alan’s contributions to Barron’s, and to financial journalism, go beyond his marvelous column. During his career, Alan trained dozens of journalists to be skeptical, to be exacting, to help average investors, and to be on the lookout for Wall Street’s crooks. About 10 of these fine journalists still work at Barron’s, I’m happy to say. Others have gone on to do groundbreaking work at The New York Times, Bloomberg BusinessWeek, and numerous financial newsletters.

“One of the unique things about Alan was that his keen knowledge of Wall Street was matched by his love of artful writing. Before Alan began his newspaper career in 1947, he earned a bachelor’s degree in English and Chemistry from The City College of New York and a master’s degree from the prestigious Writers’ Workshop at the University of Iowa, which counts among its alumni Flannery O’Connor, Jane Smiley, and John Irving. In our view, Alan ranks among them.

“Alan arrived at Barron’s in 1956 and began writing his column in 1966.

“When Alan interviewed me for a job at Barron’s in 1993, he was 67. He had been Barron’s editor for a dozen years and its managing editor for 16 years before that. He told me he didn’t really want to manage people or edit stories anymore, but that he did enjoy writing his column. That’s when I came to Barron’s to manage and edit. Fortunately for me, for Barron’s and for our readers, Alan kept writing his column for the next 20 years, week in and week out, always with gracious prose, sharp insights and a hilarious sense of humor.”

Read more here.