By Susan Milius
An ominously named creature of the deep that has come to signify the most predatory aspects of Wall Street turns out to be more of a dumpster-diving scavenger than a blood-sucking predator.
Vampyroteuthis infernalis came to broader attention in 2009 when Rolling Stone compared one investment bank to a “great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money.”
Webbing between the animal’s eight arms does flare out a bit like a funnel, but the vampire squid’s “blood funnel” is pure fantasy. But how V. infernalis, not a true squid but an oddball relative, feeds and what it does with its two long, distinctive filaments has been a puzzle.