Bear Stearns, the once-upon-a-time glorious New York investment firm that became the notorious victim of an old-fashioned Wall Streets panic selling last week, isn’t worth more than a tiny stake in Facebook, or a fourth of the networking web site Bebo that was recently sold to AOL for a hefty $850 million.

In other words, the venerable 85-year-old investment firm, whose stock was trading last week above $60, and a year ago at more than $150, is now worth almost 60 times less than Facebook, based on the networking web site's alleged $15 billion valuation.

The destruction of billions of dollars worth of value in a few days shows how vulnerable even the biggest companies are to the current economic recession.

Bear Stearns' apocalyptic tale is another reminder that in our roller-coaster economy nothing is certain, and the real value of companies may be virtually nothing.

A humbling lesson for Facebook and other young, fast growing companies ...