In corresponding with Mr French he felt that there might be some confusion about seasonal workers or a shifting of forces depending on the work load. This seems reasonable. In any event I did not want to leave this uncorrected and if I simply put a note in the original story as an update fewer readers would have seen it.

The discussion did raise certain questions once again about the importance of your sources. We all have mused about the various ways journalists characterize their news sources. How many times have we heard the phrase "a reliable source said" like there would be occasions when one might use a questionable source and still report it.

Funny thing is many times a source is of questionable veracity. As one example, I would think this might be true of almost any source in congress, so the true reliability of the source relies on the judgment of the journalist and perhaps their desire to make headlines. If readers start to question that judgment then the credibility of the reporter, and what is reported, deteriorates.

Getting back to the issue of layoffs, I wonder what percentage of a public company's employees must be laid off before it becomes worthy of a press release or if there are any SEC guidelines? For a company as large as UPS even a 1% reduction in staffing is many thousands of jobs even if it is not material to the particular company.

My initial post noted that UPS was trading at $52.77. Today's closing price was $55.18. I still think UPS is worth a look by investors. It may not bounce like some of the more downtrodden stocks that sank over the last year, but on a risk versus reward basis I think UPS remains a good bet. When I was making selections for my Chasing Value: 9 picks for 2009 -- APC, GE, ISRG, WFC and more it was a contender. It only missed the cut because it simply was not being offered at the deep discount the others were so my buy order did not trigger. If the market dips again that situation may change.

Sheldon Liber is the CEO of a small private investment company and the principal for design and research at an architecture & planning firm. He writes the columns Chasing Value and Serious Money. Disclosure: I owned shares of UPS until about six months ago. I am considering reacquiring it now.