living in the states (accurate to the end of 2002)...

if you had bought 1,000 dollars worth of nortel stock one year ago, it would now be worth 49 dollars.

with enron, you would have 16.50 dollars left.

with worldcom, you would have less than 5 dollars left.

if you had bought 1,000 dollars worth of budweiser (the beer, not the stock) one year ago, drank all the beer, then turned in the cans for its 10 cent deposit, you would have 214 dollars.

based on the above, current investment advice is to blow it all on booze and drink heavily.