The emergence of the cost leader position will bebad news for the many for-profit online universities that have arisen in recent years and for numerous non-selective residential universities.
"You're trying to second-guess politicians and as an investor, that's a really badposition to be in, " says Alec Letchfield, head of U.K. equities for HSBC Global Asset Management in London.
Despite its own culpability, the department initially said anyone following the bad instructions would be subject to penalties -- a position it quickly abandoned.