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Article: PLUMMETING ASIAN FORTUNES ALSO PINCH PET BEETLE MARKET.(News)
- Article from:
- Seattle Post-Intelligencer
- Article date:
- April 19, 1999
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1999 Seattle Post-Intelligencer. All rights reserved. Reproduced with the permission of the Dialog Corporation by Gale Group. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Yumiko Tanuma held the quarter-inch-long beetle in her hand, tried not to think of it as an overgrown cockroach and stroked it gently.
``It's kind of cute,'' she pronounced, smiling tenderly as it waved its pincers.
It should be cute, considering its price. The beetle sells for the equivalent of about $300 at the Tobu Department Store where Tanuma works.
The sad thing for Japan's many beetle owners, though, is that five or 10 years ago it might have sold for $6,000 or more. The plunge in beetle prices has been catastrophic and has wiped out the value of used bugs that were once worth more than used cars.
Everybody knows about the ...