The 5 Dumbest Things on Wall Street: May 21

CA's Name Game

What's in a name? Don't ask the newly rechristened CA Technologies (Stock Quote: CA). It obviously has no clue.

The software provider, formerly known as CA and before that as Computer Associates, unveiled the name change on Sunday at CA World 2010, the company's annual customer conference. The company, which altered the name five years ago following an accounting scandal, said the name change was designed with insights "from nearly 700 customers, partners and market thought leaders."

Are you kidding us? All that brainpower and that's the best they can do? Did any of those so-called "thought leaders" consider that calling the company CA Technologies is redundant?

Think about it. The "C" in the title stands for computer, so of course it's a technology company!

That's like calling an automated teller machine an "ATM Machine." It may be commonplace, but it is repetitive, unnecessary and, upon further review, quite silly.

CA plans to increase its marketing budget 50% this year to about $200 million to get the word out. Still, compared with changing the name entirely, CEO Bill McCracken says this is "a simpler approach."

No, Bill, it's a simpleton's approach.

Dumb-o-meter score: 75 — Dumb by any other name is still dumb.