Columbus Day - Stock Market Open

The following article offers some history about Christopher Columbus and the Columbus Day holiday, as well as your regular business day planner. You may find it interesting that the stock market is open on Columbus Day. You will certainly find intriguing the argument that Christopher Columbus might have been Greek, from the island of Chios. What seems founded in legend (or diner history), actually has strong basis in fact. Please read on, and we offer reference to a more complete historical resource that details the origins of Christopher Columbus, the Greek.

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Columbus Day - Stock Market Open

America honors Christopher Columbus Monday, and the bond market is closed, as are banks, government offices and many businesses. Stock exchanges are closed in Argentina, Canada and Japan for various holidays Monday, including Thanksgiving in Canada. However, Wall Street and the stock market are open on Columbus Day.

It's not like the money men offer the honors of America's discovery to Leif Ericson, or that they dislike the renowned explorer Christopher Columbus. Rather, it's more likely due to an abundance of holidays and a need to manage money, like the responsible characters they hope to someday be, that keeps Wall Streeters checking in every second Monday in October.

Interestingly enough, this once was a non-religious holiday that the U.S. and Venezuela shared, along with much of the Americas, but Hugo Chavez changed all that in 2002 when he altered the holiday to the Day of Indigenous Resistance. In 2004, Chavez likely also sanctioned the toppling of a statue of Columbus in Caracas, and labeled good old Chris a colonial tyrant, oppressor and occupier, or something of the sort. It was not an original idea though, given only a year prior, Iraqis, with the aid of US marines, ripped down a giant statue of Saddam Hussein in Baghdad.

Columbus from The Greek's Ancestral Island?

Columbus is adored in my ancestral island of Chios, because legend has it (as do your history books) he ventured to the island while in service to the important Centurione, Di Negro and Spinola families of Genoa. They say that the son of an illiterate woolworker and cheese vendor raised a boy who could gain the confidence of Spanish royalty. I disagree. Legend seems to have fogged history in this case.

To this day, you can find Greeks in Chios with the same name. In fact, there is a rather convincing argument to be made that Columbus was not from Genoa, but from the Republic of Genoa as he himself claimed, which included Chios. The theory holds that Christopher was really a Byzantine Prince from the Paleologos Dynasty, which traces its roots back to the Royal House of David. The family fled Constantinople to the west and mixed with the royalty in France and Western Europe.

The argument makes sense, as why would Spanish royalty give three ships and great license to a woolworker's son from Genoa? If you travel to Chios, you will see the family name carved in ancient homes, above the doorways. The EU even placed a placard above one home, where it agrees Columbus at least lived. A recent book of historical research claims to unveil the mystery of Columbus, and is called, "A New Theory Clarifying the Identity of Christopher Columbus: A Byzantine Prince from Chios, Greece." It's worth a look in my view.

I know very well this sounds like something from "My Big Fat Greek Wedding." However, be careful, because the film's father character (and many Greek fathers) had a flawed understanding of important truth's. Be careful not to lose sight of the importance of Greece and Greeks because of the flaws of modern Greece and Greeks.

You know, since well before the formal research was undertaken, old Greeks in Chios have been telling tales of Columbus and their brotherhood with him. There's no arguing the fact that his close friends were Greeks. It is known that Columbus did not speak nor write Italian, but wrote into the margins of his favorite book in Greek.

It has been assumed that because a family was found in Genoa with the name Columbus, that the man with a mysteriously unknown background was from that family. However, it was overlooked that Columbus did not include anyone from this family in his will. Well, there is a family with the same name that traces to Chios, like many Genoese families. That's because Chios was under Genovese control (1261 - 1566) for a good part of its history. Forgive me, my Italian friends, but it looks to me that similarly to other borrowings of the Romans and Italians from the Greeks, so too do they seek ownership of Columbus.

Read the book, do the research and see if you can argue otherwise afterwards. And tell me why Columbus charted using Greek leagues, instead of Roman. Answer why he named places using Greek letters. Chios is renowned for its sailors in Greece, because 90% of its shipping families originate from it and its satellite islands. It is, therefore, a fitting origin for the seafaring Columbus.

The Business Day

With government offices closed, no economic releases of public origin are set for release Monday. However, New York Fed President Bill Dudley will address a bankers' breakfast today. Also, the FDA will keep busy, as it decides on an Alexza Pharmaceuticals (Nasdaq: ALXA) drug for bipolar disorder and Jazz Pharmaceuticals' (Nasdaq: JAZZ) medicine for fibromyalgia.

The Nobel Prize for Economics will be announced Monday!

Executives of the NYSE/Euronext (NYSE: NYX) and CBOE will take part in a meeting of the World Federation of Exchanges in Paris.

In corporate news, the IPO lockup period ends for shares of Golub Capital (Nasdaq: GBDC). Also, Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) introduces its mobile phone platform for Windows 7. The EPS schedule lists Global Payments (NYSE: GPN), POSCO (NYSE: PKX) and Zep, Inc. (NYSE: ZEP).



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