meek-investor

There’s something very wrong when common sense is completely thrown out of the window. We all know that law can be an ass and lawyers an unbelievable pain in the aforesaid part of the anatomy, but this story takes the cake for the ultimate in nonsense. Only in the United States would something like this be even remotely comprehensible. Two Sprint employees who worked in their store in Denver were fired . Their crime ?? They were on their lunch break in the mall where their store was, when they saw a shoplifter from the neighbouring store being chased. They lent a hand and caught the shoplifter. This was their crime. Wait a minute. Would you not expect them to be publicly felicitated for being such being good samaritans ? You would expect a reward to be more appropriate than the sack. But sack is what they got. Why ? They violated company policy that prohibited store employees from chasing shoplifters outside the store. Wow !! My first and immediate conclusion was that Sprint was an ass...

If you ever listed the most undesirable inventions in the world, Power Point should feature somewhere at the top of the list. This blogger’s visceral antagonism to Power Point may be well known to long time readers – there’s a series of posts on this here . It was therefore with unbelieving incredulity that I read of Power Point’s infiltration into the US army in the New York Times’ report here . I had to rub my eyes a couple of times to believe what I was reading. But then on logical reflection, I should not have been surprised. Is there any organisation that the cursed Power Point has not infiltrated. Why should the military be impervious to its seductive powers. Human idiocy has not escaped any particular body of men. Al Qaeda’s true magic bullet to winning the war in Afghanistan is not the suicide bomber. Its not the Taliban. Its not the weapons smuggled in through Pakistan. Its not the opium that’s grown to finance the war. Its not the Tora Bora caves. Its actually nothing that th...

An old stale subject, but since I happened to read an article in the Financial Times on this , why not add to the zillion words already written on this comparison. Both are financial centres; both are dynamic and vibrant city states. They are the usual two choices for any company’s Asian headquarters. As a financial centre, after London and New York, Hong Kong is ranked third; Singapore fourth. They are wonderfully connected to the rest of the world. HKIA and Changi frequently trade places as the best airport in the world. They are two of the biggest seaports. Both are ex British colonies and truly international. Great places to live in. At a superficial glance, they seem to be clones of each other. So what are the differences ? Hong Kong is obviously numero uno for China. Singapore is a much more comfortable location for India. The standard of English is much better in Singapore than in Hong Kong – there are parts of Hong Kong where you could be totally lost without Cantonese. Hong Ko...

Every day morning, my one sure chore is this – open Blogger after dodging the net nanny and delete the couple of spam comments that my blog has attracted. Irritation has started to give a little way to intrigue - who are these guys and gals and what are they trying to do ?? These days common email services such as Hotmail, Yahoo and Google have pretty good spamguards; so the number of spam emails can be controlled. Of course the majority of emails in the world are spam – some 60-80% of all emails in the internet is spam ; says something about human nature doesn’t it. But Blogger, for some reason, doesn’t seem to have a spam guard. Presumably it views blogs like mine as virtually indistinguishable from the nonsense that is spam. One variety of spammers are the scamsters . Nigerians had a dominant market share in this market, but the business is now truly global. I would have thought anybody in this world will now delete messages titled- “Congratulations you have just won the lottery:”, ...

Too much cash. An envious position to be in, but there are a few companies in this predicament. What do you do with all that cash ? Apple is the best example of a company with a massive cash problem. Yesterday they announced results that blew the market away. But they also have a problem. Cash. Lots of it lying idle. Actually $42bn of it. Earning a princely return of 0.75% per annum. And they are likely to generate another $14bn of it this year. Microsoft is a long time hoarder of cash. At last count they had some $40bn. Google has $25bn, Intel $19bn. Its not all tech companies in this list. Exxon still has $11 bn after returning $26bn to shareholders last year. So what do you do if you have this problem ? You can put it in the bank, as most of these companies have done. And earn virtually nothing on it. A significant proportion of the value you generate for shareholders by running your business, is destroyed by the act of digging a hole in your backyard and burying the cash. Or you c...

“This house believes that GDP growth is a poor measure of improving living standards”. That’s the proposition in the live online debate being currently run by The Economist. You can access this debate here . At the time of writing this post 68% of the online voters agree with this proposition. It seems rather the in thing to agree with the proposition. You can plausibly argue that there’s more to life than GDP. Gross National Happiness, first conceived by Bhutan the world leader in this concept, sounds appealing. Climate Change, Civil society, reduction in inequality – all seem to be nice concepts equally important to “living standards”. You can almost visualize the wrinkling of the nose at GDP, a very base and mercenary measure. An opinionated blogger, such as this one, has a view, obviously ! And the view is largely based on the marvelous example of China. The answer in China would be very clear. There is only one measure. GDP. Or rather growth in GDP. Full stop. Nothing else matters...

Media executives around the globe are clamoring for new and alternative business models and industry associations everywhere are holding seminars and conferences on how to create and discover them. There is just one problem: They don’t know what business models are. When you cut through the rhetoric, you find that most executives are merely interested in finding new revenue streams. Even when you consider firms touted as having best practices in that regard, none have been very successful in establishing them. The reason is simple: The dominant thought about business models is highly limited and far too narrow to solve the contemporary challenges of media industries. Business models are not merely about the revenue streams. Instead, they establish the underlying business logic and elements. They involve the foundations upon which businesses built, such as companies’ competences, value created, products/services provided, customers served, relationships established with customers and pa...

A very nice piece from Lucy Kellaway in today’s Financial Times touched me. It touched me because it could be me she was writing about. Lucy is a brilliant journalist and her pieces in the FT are something I always read – she brings a down to earth realism, without the spin, that is very refreshing. This is a topic most readers of this blog will not relate to, for you are young and probably at the start of your careers. Some of you have progressed a bit and a double digit in the experience line is close or already there. Pause and think – is loyalty really an anachronism in today’s world. I have posted before on this topic here . But Lucy’s column prodded me to muse again on this old fashioned concept. All relationships in life have a certain degree of long termism to them. The majority of people on earth are loyal to their parents all through their lives. Ditto to their spouse. Ditto to their children. Just because there’s a prettier girl down the street (new exciting opportunity in ...

Last Friday was the deadline for tax submissions in the US. In recent years this has become a media event, thanks to the “ Tea Party Movement ”. This blog is not a political blog, even on a Sunday, so I will try not to comment on the politics of it. I can’t but resist drawing your attention to the sound intellectual basis for the “Party”, especially considering the towering genius in Sarah Palin who has been adopted/appropriated/self appointed as its mascot. But we shall let that pass lightly. Instead this post is on the Tea, in the Tea Party movement. I know the political advantages of claiming the legacy of the Boston Tea Party , but I am intrigued as to what kind of tea, if any, is drunk in Tea Party meetings, especially the sort where the N word is frequently used, and the vocabulary is limited to hoarse renderings of baby killer, shoot the pig etc etc. Anybody who’s been anywhere near the country knows what sort of tea is served and consumed in the bastion of the free world. This...

Should a life insurance company invest in the shares of fast food companies ? They have been accused of “dining” on fast food profits while preaching the gospel of healthy eating to their customers in a paper that was published yesterday by Harvard researchers. Only somebody from Harvard can do research on such a crucial, life critical (pun intended) and urgent issue facing the business world. Insurance companies are exhorting their customers to have healthy eating habits and not gorge on Big Mac and fries. And then what do they do ?? They invest in shares in McDonald’s. Terrible isn’t it ? Wrong. Insurance companies invest the moneys they receive from you as premium in the most profitable investment possible. If, McDonald’s is a damned good investment, then surely they must invest in it. Maximising returns from investment should be a key business priority. Right ? Wrong. Even if you forget the morality of it all, financially it’s a stupid thing to do. For if McDonald’s do well, more...

The Labour party in the UK has announced a “Cadbury Law” as part of its election manifesto. This was motivated by the aftermath of the Kraft takeover of Cadbury. It has many good and some bad features and can potentially be a model for takeover law in many countries. The broad proposals are as follows - M&A transactions have to be approved by a two thirds majority and not just a simple majority. - People (read hedge funds) who buy shares in the target after a bid is announced would be barred from voting - A “national interest test” is being considered to prevent foreign takeovers in vital industries” – defence, utility, infrastructure being thought of as “vital” In the red corner in fervent defense of these proposals are the Labour party, obviously, the Confederation of British Industry and Unite – the powerful Trade Union. In the blue corner, opposed vehemently to this are the Conservative Party, obviously, and the Association of British Insurers. Silent, but presumably in this ca...

Everybody, who’s anybody, is a management guru. Yours truly included. No wonder airport book shops are filled to the rafters with all sorts of business books. I’ve often wondered who reads all of them. Most of them are boring ego trips, or say the mind blowingly obvious in obscure jargon. This mini tirade has been triggered by a book review I read. The review introduces two pieces of jargon I had never heard of. Cultural - intelligence quotient , CQ for short (after all any self respecting jargon has to have an abbreviation) . And “glocal” presumably short for “globalised local”. This is all about how in this globalised world, you need to understand local cultures, know how to much to bow, know where to point your feet, and such stuff. I have been around a bit; so can’t resist appointing myself as a guru and expounding on this “culture thing”. Methinks, this is grossly over emphasised. Yes local culture is important but its nowhere near as important as its made out to be. Human beings ...

People get very worked up about their job titles. It seems to be a matter of life and death whether you are an Assistant General Vice President or a Deputy Senior Group Executive. On this gloomy Sunday, a typically dreary , foggy, day in Guangzhou, I decided to do a learned treatise on job titles . Some people lay great store on the words in their job titles. Vice President is a very commonly coveted title. In some banks I know, you join as a fresher with the title Vice President! But then how do you differentiate yourself from the hordes of vice presidents around ? (Its an interesting aside that in politics the least desirable post is that of the Vice President, but in business, it seems to be a coveted title). So you become a Senior Vice President or a Group Vice President or preferably a Group Executive Senior Vice President. Another fixation is “General”. You want to be a “General Manager”. As opposed to a “specific manager”, I presume. You can have the choice of Deputy, Chief, S...

A crying shame, it is. This blog is not meant to be political in nature and is (usually) not prone to hyperbolic hand wringing. This post does both, unashamedly. I just could not believe that the Digital Economy Bill was “passed”, or rather rushed through the British House of Commons. Actually what took place was the ‘Third reading”, which is not the same thing as passing. But we won’t get into quaint British parliamentary traditions where worthies have to yell “Hear Hear” when they actually are meaning &^%$ @#$. They effectively passed that bill. See the photo in this article to see how vigorously attended this debate was. I am not a British national; I do not live in the UK and have no business commenting on British policy or laws. But I am a self confessed Anglophile. I hold great fondness for all that is good and great in Her Majesty’s kingdom. That paragon of virtue, fair play and freedom, passes such a thing as the Digital Economy Bill - that is difficult to stomach. 95% of...

This blog started life a year and a bit ago with the very first post titled “What is 'American Goods' anyway ?" . Now I return back to the same theme after reading a news item that the Reserve Bank of India has declared both ICICI Bank and HDFC bank to be “foreign banks”. For those unfamiliar with the Indian banking environment, throughout the socialist days of the 70s and 80s India lived with a nationalized banking environment. Government owned banks were the only choice. While they had their strengths, technology and innovation were not among them. They were forced to give out buffalo loans to “poor farmers” and then write them off (collecting buffalo tails as proof of death). Two banks changed the landscape in just 5 years – ICICI Bank and HDFC Bank. Both were private banks and they revolutionised banking in India. Sure, they have their faults (many actually), but they were a completely different experience to the government banks. In no time they shot up to be market ...

Where there is a human need; there will be a business. Welcome to the highly specialized world of wedding photography. Not the Indian variety. The Indian wedding has now become a video occasion of the silliest sort. Bright lights are shone at all and sundry, and in the hot Indian clime, it is a virtual torture. Most people are unused to being videoed ; so they put on their most solemn expression and look fairly miserable – a smile is not to be seen within a million miles. I wonder who watches these videos ; I bet certainly not the bride and the groom. The market leaders, by far, in wedding photography are the Chinese. The whole wedding photography business is a fine art, unlike any other. Firstly wedding photography has been completely separated from the wedding itself – it could take place weeks before. These photos are always shot in fancy places – parks, beaches, gardens, whatever , depending on how much you can afford. Both the bride and groom are dressed in elaborate western costu...

This blogger is a complete, total, unabashed , fawning admirer of the British Broadcasting Corporation, affectionately called the Beeb in Her Majesty’s realm. There is simply no media organization in the world that comes anywhere close to the BBC. Period. Yes, the BBC is the most trusted news organization in the world. Yes, the BBC’s radio and TV programmes are produced with a professionalism that few can even aspire to match. Yes, the BBC is usually amazingly neutral and presents all sides of a picture that to really appreciate this, you only have to watch Fox News or China Television ! Yes the BBC is truly the only global media organization – CNN comes close, but still cannot match the BBC in global reach. The jewel in the BBC Crown, to my mind, is BBC World Service Radio . Not television, but radio. In the good old days, the crackling short wave transistor radio glued to ear was the only way to listen to it. Now, short wave transmissions, that virtually defined BBC World Service for...

Well, almost. You can sue me, but your chances of winning have considerably diminished. In a landmark ruling yesterday, the British Court of Appeals ruled in favour of the science writer Simon Singh in the libel case brought against him by the British Chiropractic Association (BCA). Simon Singh is a British science writer. In a column in The Guardian in April 2008, Simon Singh criticized the BCA making these comments “You might think that modern chiropractors restrict themselves to treating back problems, but in fact they still possess some quite wacky ideas. The fundamentalists argue that they can cure anything. And even the more moderate chiropractors have ideas above their station. The British Chiropractic Association claims that their members can help treat children with colic, sleeping and feeding problems, frequent ear infections, asthma and prolonged crying, even though there is not a jot of evidence. This organisation is the respectable face of the chiropractic profession and y...

On March 31st, The Business was down three members, with Alex Koll, Chris Garcia, and Bucky Sinister all working elsewhere. To address the lack of manpower, we invited all of the members of the about-to-conclude SF Comedians Fantasy League to perform. We welcomed Jeff Cleary, Joey Devine, Eliot Langford, Julien Rodriguez, Chris Remmers, and the great W. Kamau Bell, along with Businessman and host, Sean Keane. Some comics discussed basketball extensively, both their fantasy teams' generally woeful performances or the woeful performances of their favorite team, if that team was the Golden State Warriors. Joey Devine told a touching story about receiving the Most Inspirational Player Award at Tim Hardaway's basketball camp, an honor usually given to a kid with a disability or a fatal disease. Joey was neither; he was simply terrible at basketball, and prone to skipping wind sprints in order to sneak upstairs and eat hamburgers. Eliot Langford mentioned the disappointing Warrio...