waterlily57

Top Three Singapore Banks by Assets

Overseas Union Bank Limited has been merged into United Overseas Bank Limited a very long time ago.

Hong Leong Bank should be a mention in the second tier banks.

Largest Gold Reserves by Country

Governments can pay for security to guard the bullion. So how does GLD guard its bullion?

Jim Rogers on the Next 10 Years

China is a country with innumerable dialects. The present government realized this early on and introduced Putonghua or Standard Chinese. The beneficiaries of this policy were the young people who soon found they could communicate orally all over China. They then realize that if they were to communicate internationally, they will have to master English. So really, it is the mainland Chinese who are diligently learning English for future use. If China wishes to claim Chinese as an international language, it is only for a matter of prestige and officiation and not for practical usage.

Top Ten Best Global Brands

KFC anyone?

Big Losses Are Hidden on China's Bank Balance Sheets

Just a bit off topic but the smallest of the Big Four is now considered as the Bank of Communications or BOCOM. Agricultural Bank has lost its stature even if its total assets is still number 4. BOCOM is 19% owned by HSBC.

How to Prepare for the Inevitable Correction

Well written. I too am having the same observations and strategies. Opting for a recovery of paper losses and realization into solid cash might be wiser than chasing uncertain profits.

Has the China Bear Left the Room?

The China Bear has been politely asked to leave the room until after October 1, the anniversary of the founding of the PRC.

Crisis: Blame the Accountants

In the NYT article it says "It is unfortunate that there are significant differences between the American and international rules on how to determine fair values of financial assets." It seems both sides have their own rules what is a fair value. How can an asset have two different values at the same time?

Is a Crash Impending?

There was deflation in Hong Kong after the 1997 Asian financial crisis.


On Aug 31 11:56 PM Tack wrote:

> So many people mesmerized into thinking the world, or even the U.S.,
> is ending and, in the process, setting themselves up for financial
> hardship as they bet on collapse and failure, and wallow in their
> cynicism, rather than making sensible evaluations of current realities
> and choosing appropriate investments.
>
> The folks who are betting on a deflationary collapse are the most
> out of touch with logic and history, blinded by the blaze of the
> 1930's, that they (95%, anyway) never lived through and, apparently,
> completely misinterpret, when it comes to monetary policies and their
> effects. The Great Depression was probably the last deflationary
> collapse in history, and, of course, was due to a disastrous reduction
> in the money supply, which saw the 1929 levels not again reached
> until 1939.
>
> While there have been myriad international economic disasters in
> the last 70 years, no economy in the world has suffered a deflationary
> collapse. Why is that? It's because all governments learned that
> fiat money supplies can be expanded ad infinitum. There may be inflation;
> there even may ultimately be loss of trust in the currency; the one
> thing there won't be is deflation.
>
> Even if one is not optimistic about the performance of corporations
> or the economy as a whole, everybody should be "optimistic" about
> the advance of prices. Currencies abide by the same rules as all
> other commodities: the more you print, the less value they enjoy
> relative to all other things. Hence, the nominal value of everything
> will advance.

Big Brother Google Is Watching You

It is also possible that some people are just using Google instead of using the browsers' bookmarks/favorites.

Will H1N1 Be an Asian Market Killer?

Maybe it has something to do with food. In Hong Kong they eat a lot of Western food. Same with Singapore vs Malaysia.

Are Camera Phones Killing the Digital Camera?

If consumers feel that mobile phones are apt to have a shorter product life cycle they would not be willing to pay extra for high quality camera features. If manufacturers sense this they would not want to increase the cost of the product. There are consumers who want a sexy phone and a sexy camera, two sexy little things versus just one in a camera-phone.

Berkshire Hathaway: Proof That the CDS Market Is Irrational

Someone should write an article on why CDS shouldn't be banned.

Berkshire Hathaway: Worst Year Ever, and CDS Too

Another thing is his operating model, if i may call it, is to use the insurance float to invest in equities. This postulates that the invested equities increase in value at a higher rate than the claims on insurance happening on long tail policies. This works well on property insurance. For example when a Katrina or an earthquake happens, the probability of that happening in a severe bear market is low. So he could sell a lot of stocks to pay for the claims, under that model.

Now, when you bet against the stock indices, you better not have a whole lot of reserves tied up in equities. Because you will get next to nothing by selling stocks to pay those claims. Maybe he will line up his reserves to include a lot of treasury bills, commodities, gold, etc when the derivatives are about to mature. Who knows?

Berkshire Hathaway: Worst Year Ever, and CDS Too

No one has asked who is on the other side of the bet. My guess is that they are funds (pension funds?) who want to insure against down markets in future years. These funds do not mind paying the premium, hence underperforming in the short term, but get insurance at the maturity date. To me, Buffet is just engaging in the futures market of equities. Not really CDS in nature. Currently he possesses the float to invest in. As someone said above, it is like the supercat insurance.

I am not totally agreeable to his idea and I don't see the global economic value of the whole thing. Just like gambling? I believe he is not explicit because he doesn't want imitators to come in too fast, not that there are many who can mimick at this time.

Also, he says he is totally responsible for the whole thing. Well, if he is younger, then he'll have a high probability of being around in 2019 to own up to that responsibility. As it is it is possible it will be the company who will own up to that responsibility.