Business Notes GLITCHES

When an automated-teller machine refused to return her bank card, Diana Collier did not think much of it. But when two check-guarantee cards also failed to work, she thought something might be fishy. She was right: her $60 eel-skin wallet had apparently demagnetized her cards.

Collier, 25, of Pittsburg, Calif., is not the only victim of trendy eel-skin accessories. John McCosker, director of San Francisco's Steinhart Aquarium, has received numerous inquiries about a possible connection between eel skin and malfunctioning bank and credit cards, and he believes there may be one. The skins come from the slithery saltwater hagfish, also known as the slime eel. McCosker surmises that the problem is caused by either a metallic left over from the tanning process or some residual goo secreted by the skin. Others say the magnetic clasps on some wallets are the culprits. Whatever the case, some banks are dispensing vinyl card covers to ward off the attack of the anti-capitalist eels.