CRYING IS ON-RONA JARI HAI

2022-01-28T21:56:00.005+05:30

This is a series of my thoughts that the author in me pens out via keyboard !!!

You may follow me all over the Internet because that's where I LIVE !!!

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2022-01-28T21:53:00.001+05:30

This is a series of my thoughts that the author in me pens out via keyboard !!!

You may follow me all over the Internet because that's where I LIVE !!!

Radio URL: https://radiopanipoori.com/chart/archives-rjn/

YouTube URL: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCnbtyCzVZsFcgG2LJbXFXzg

Twitter URL: https://twitter.com/smartsitesh

Instagram URL: https://instagram.com/smartsitesh

Facebook URL: https://www.facebook.com/YeAadmi

LinkedIn URL: https://www.linkedin.com/in/smartsitesh/

Blog URL: http://smartsitesh.blogspot.com/

Website: www.smartsitesh.com

2020-08-07T16:53:00.000+05:30

!!Talent is Latent!!

Ms. Priyadarshini G Roy - Actor, Singer, Dancer, Model, Writer, Producer, Quadruple Pageant Queen joins "YeAadmi" from

Los Angeles, Hollywood on his show Ruk Jana Nahi and shares her journey, ambition and ammunition of skills

Listen to her compositions in #English #Italian #Hindi #Bengali and you will be squarely entertained this weekend onward

Bake your Saturday and Sunday by tuning in and drooling out

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2016-05-07T16:08:00.000+05:30

समय की बात

समय समय की बात है

क्या समय ही जज़्बात है ?

समय का सच या सच का समय

कब होता है – कब नहीं होता

किसे पता है – जब होता है

संसार समय का सार है

आज ख़ास जो कल बेकार है

इस दिव्य रूप में तुम्हारा होना

शाश्वत, प्रतिदिन मेरा साक्षात्कार है

एक मिलन से शुरू ज़िन्दगी

प्रत्येक मिलन की श्रृंखला है

कितनो से मिला और मिलना है

खुद से मिलना याद रखना है

तुम हो तो हम हैं

हम हैं तो हम सब

ख़ुशी का सबब है एक साथ

हम सब के होने का मतलब

चार में बटी या चार में जुडी

चार से छह और दस होंगे

हथकड़ी बन जाएगी कड़ी

जब सीने में अपने होंगे

समय समय की बात है

क्या समय ही जज़्बात है ?

साजन जो सज्जन मिले

प्रीत को रखियो संभाल

अंखियों की गर्माहट से

दिल रोज़ टटोल डाल

दिन कोई कैसा भी हो

रात सोई हो सवेरा हो

रात दिन हम लड़ जुडें

मन में ना अँधेरा हो

मार्च – २०१४ प्रतिलिप्याधिकार

2016-01-11T11:14:00.002+05:30

जनाब - मोहतरमा / Ladies & Gentlemen / देवियों और सज्जनों

ये लीजिये एक लिंक जिसपर आप मेरे कार्यक्रम (रुक जाना नहीं - Don't You Stop) सुन सकते हैं

Ruk Jana Nahin - Don’t you Stop

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2015-02-15T03:19:00.003+05:30

कविता / Poem : साल दर साल
(2014, बंगलोर, भारत)
ओस की बूंद ज्यों घास पर उग आती है
हर सुबह ज्यों कानों में चहचहाती है...
भोर की ठंडी गर्माहट यूं दिल टटोल जाती है
सूर्य किरण ज्यों बादलों से भी दिन छान लाती है
पंद्रह जाड़ों में मेरे तुमने यूँ गर्मियां मिलाई हैं

दिन चढता, बढता, बनता, ढल जाता है
शाम संगीन, रंगीन, हसीन, बढ जाती है
रात स्याह, चाह, विवाह में सिमट जाती है
भोर फिर प्यार को पूजा में बदल देता है
तेरह वसंतो में मेरे तुमने यूँ गीत गाये हैं

नीले आकाश में जैसे सजता पीला सूरज
नील गगन में वैसे ही सर्द चांद जड़ता है
बादल आसमान के नग बन फिरते इतराते
उडती चिड़िया ज्यूं आंखों को भाती है
तेरह होलियो में मेरे तुमने यूँ
दीवालियाँ मिलाई हैं

उन तारों का कहना ही क्या जो
उन दूरियों को दर्शनीय दिखलाते हैं
पर प्रकाश की किरन वह कृपा है
जो हीरों, तारों को, मन में सजाती है
दसियों साल तुमने मेरे प्रकाश छांटे हैं

- सीतेश श्रीवास्तव
प्रतिलिप्याधिकार © / प्रकाशनाधिकार © / copyright ©

2015-02-14T16:40:00.001+05:30

कविता / Poem

जीवन का उत्तरार्ध और दक्षिणी गोलार्ध

(जनवरी 2015, जोहानसबर्ग, साउथ अफ्रीका)

जीवन का उत्तरार्ध और दक्षिणी गोलार्ध

जुड़ाव है समन्दरों का ज़मीनों का

हवा की कड़ी जुडी बहती सभी धराओं पर

चाँद सूरज सबके बराबर के हिस्से हैं

ह्रदय को दूरी फिर क्यूँ कचोटती है

दिल दहलीज़ फिर फिर क्यूँ देखता है

जीवन का उत्तरार्ध और दक्षिणी गोलार्ध

दक्षिण से उत्तर निगाह तक नहीं जाती

उत्तर से उत्तर क्या कर आ पायेगा ?

पश्चिम से पूरब सोच भी डगमगाती

पूरब से पूर्वा क्या बह आ पाएगी ?

ह्रदय की पहुँच को आँखों का वास्ता

पैरों की बेड़ी पर फिर यादों को रास्ता

जीवन का उत्तरार्ध और दक्षिणी गोलार्ध

बादल मिलते मिलते से लगते हैं

हवा जब नाराज़ हो हो बहती है

चाँद चेहरे की रंगत पढ़ लेता है

झनक पटक वर्षा फिर मान जाती है

खेल जब होता यही हर कहीं

मेल नहीं होता क्यूँ कहीं कहीं

जीवन का उत्तरार्ध और दक्षिणी गोलार्ध

- सीतेश श्रीवास्तव

Event Report - Chalo India Art show Tokyo 2008

2012-07-11T21:30:00.000+05:30

Chalo India Art show Tokyo 2008
(The article was first published in JapanHopper, a social media site in Tokyo, in 2008)

I grew up in a middle class middle environment family in India where everything a human life needs, was available in small controlled quantities in nineteen seventies and eighties.

I was educated with texts that India is a great nation with a great accomodating history. It had great wealth in ancient times, and in modern times, which started during 16th century it became a pauper at the world stage with nothing to showcase except utterly poor masses, turbaned people doing street tricks, hermits, villages, cows and later British dominion.

I was fed with nationalist rhetorics of my political and social leaders of my time and previous times especially the leaders who had a brush with British administration. I believed I belong to a great nation.

Then I saw television in India for the first time in eighties and got to see my country from the lens of world.
I realised that all that was fed in me through my education system and the rhetorics of my political leaders and all the greatness of India was all about its internal media created by political system and people who dreamed of the state which Mahatma Gandhi had envisioned. It was not the international view of India which I received as part of my education but only the national view which was highly skewed.

I kept frowning about it all the years that my country which had everything from land to resources lacked collective will, outgrown legends and individualistic attitude. As I went to college and subsequently to job I found out many things which were fed into me in the name of nationalism was fake and made of mediocre principles of community leaders and torchbearers.

I was sad but I realized then that given all the negations, there were few things which kept me close to my nation despite camouflaged nationalism, rhetorics, crime, grime and a failed socialism. These were:

1. Land
2. Democracy
3. Government
4. Currency

I will explain them a bit to come to my point:

Land is a lifeless entity on this earth but has mysterious connection with its people who are born on it. Though land is not biologically connected with its people but who knows it may have a connection, otherwise how do you explain the deep affinity people have for the land where they were born and raised. So it helps to ask that if I have any affinity for the land I was born and brought up, don't I have any level of morals to defend it and work towards its improvisation? I will cover Land - Native people connection in detail in my another article.

Natives of the Land could be humans or animals or the natural resources and we are bound by our deep yet again mysterious connection with them though once again we are not biologically connected with them. How else do you explain of our longing for the forest which used to be covering our native village, the river nearby and our soujourns into it, or our wandering around our land and feel its greatness, vastness or emptiness, all with a feeling of "mine". You do not have such feeling when you go abroad destinations (other than your country[land /land of your forefathers and yourself]). Shouldn't then you have some, even lowly moral obligation to defend your land, work towards its improvement, spread the gospel of best practices from other parts of the world and bring in global solutions to solve the local problems?

Democracy is the highest and best form of governance I am given to understand. I agree to it with disclaimers. I agree to it with conditions.
But as they say in Indian wisdom 'Excess of anything is wrong and goes wrong', Indian democracy is practised with utopian state and its subjects in mind where both state and its subjects coexist without contributing to each other's growth as long as it permits.

Government in any country should be a legitimate government, recognized by world governments and should strive to be 'by its people for its people'. In democracy this is a tricky proposition and is exploited by statesmen and its subjects every day.

Currency is the national identity of a citizen. Currency weighs in the citizen and citizen weighs in his currency!

I am a middle class non resident Indian living in Tokyo and have a taste for art and artforms. I have visited several art exhibitions while in India and had never visited one abroad before "Chalo India art show" in Tokyo. The exhibition in India all were and have been bold messages; from the current state of nation gripped with north and south poles of economics to natural beauty and beasts of the country. But none of the exhibitions I witnessed in India were so brazen what I have seen at "Chalo India (translation:Lets go to India) art show (ongoing till march 2009)" at prestigious Mori Art Museum at famed Roppongi Hills building in Tokyo.

To the uninitiated in Tokyo life - Roppongi Hills is a landmark building in the world famous romantic district 'Roppongi' in Tokyo. Roppongi area shares its destiny with world class night clubs and cream financial banks and institutions. As a traveler if you miss witnessing Roppongi district bloom while in Tokyo, you will miss a beat of Japan! The area is infested with rich and superfluous from every walk of life and these are the very people who make or break impressions, set trends and don the hat of cultural ambassadors which is nothing but a garb but an influential and far-reaching, far-fetching garb.

As I started my journey through the art-show, I had expected the same bold messages in the form of paintings, displays and collages as I had seen back in India but soon my steps trembled as I watched the botched images of India through the twenty five or so current ambassadors of Indian art. I realised how tough it is to become an artist and not become financially successful when you are trained at top colleges in India and tutored by some great masters in the chosen art-form. I realised that the only formula is "selling is success". If you are not 'selling', you are not 'success'.
In the art world, everyone dreams to become a Picasso, Monet, Van Gogh, Raja Ravi Varma, Tyeb Mehta or MF Husain. But it appeared to me that most current artists have taken the extreme route of success shown to them by celebrated MF Husain (MFH). Though there is no art of MFH being showcased in "Chalo India", but his impressions seems to have impregnated almost all artists showcased here. Put your wild imaginations into the garb of art and give it an unfitting name with a derogatory remark and sensationalise it -and succeed.

For world of art - India has remained a loose nation with loosest democracy, poor with abject poverty and beauty with dirty embedded. From the time I remember, India's images appearing in world publications has mostly been 'sadhus', turbaned laborers and workers and people highlighting poverty in the backdrop of all the vices of socio-capitalism which is not unique to the country. That how it has been and that is what has been sold profitably over the years and no artist has the courage or inclination to break the 'milking cow model' of business - Indian art!

Though I wandered lonely under the prying and pinning eyes of japanese and other nationals, I could muster no solace in the exhibition.
I would like to mention few displaysists whose painting drew large crowds of amazed onlookers which would certainly make them feel proud but I and my fellow indian friends felt deeply ashamed of.

Ashim Purkayastha

"Gandhi/Man without specs" series of collage. I doubt whether this has ever been showcased in India. It is so easy to point fingers to a dead man who happens to be 'father of a nation'. Special scornful mention goes to the display of Indian currency bills on which Gandhi is shown as a funny man adorning hats of a comedian, hunter, man with beard and the other portion of the currency bill showing nudity at its dirtiest. Go and see it to interpret it yourself.

Justin Ponmay

"The Blind". This display shows the desperation of Indian faces which have joined fates of each other. A disgusting show of India when it is riding the economic boom and favored even at wall street as world economic superpower in a decade.

Jitish Kallat

"Death of Distance". It seems that the artist does not earn the same Indian currency and earns in some other currency! He might not even be living in India. And if he does live in India then he must be using the same currency he has scorned in this dispay. This is what I call 'licking and kicking the same ass'. I cannot imagine some japanese citizen mocking the japanese currency this way or the "Gandhi/Man without specs" display as I have mentioned above. Not today, not before when Japan was rubbing its way from world war's ashes, not in future.

Vivan Sundaram

"Metal Box". This display makes me feel my country is made of metal junk. This might be true but I am not ashamed of it. May be the artist is and found a selling proposition in it. This is the moment of India and countries like it who have got a lifetime chance to participate in the modern economy and metal junk is one of the price to pay for it. All developed countries have been junk metal box in one point in time when they were on their path to economic glories, including Japan.

There is one another display for which I do not remember the artist name. The display shows a microphone blurting out the audio of the famous speech of Jawaharlal Nehru, India's first prime minister and architect. The audio is distorted to give you a feel as if the man was hopeless while he was giving that famous 'tryst of destiny' speech in August 1947.

There was no display which showed India in even negligible bright light. The last straw was an big collage on which these big art illuminati sugar coated, philosophical yet no-logic-vague statements about India seemed like an epitaph on the grave of a country which is believed to have cradle of civiliations and its gurus have mesmerised the world with their finesse.

To conclude it all, I have decided not to visit any "Indian art show" while out of India as I feel the business model the so called artists have chosen in the name of it, is just a profitable proven venture. Selling India the poorest way is the surest way for these artists to survive in this capitalist society. The interesting assumptions here:

1. The artists are not earning Indian currency anymore.
2. They have not made any financial success with Indian currency in India.
3. Artists are the only super-exposers of India and all hard working middle class Indians, Indian IT successes, Indian entrepreners, people who hobnob with wall street giants are all fakes.

I have visited couple of art exhibitions in Tokyo by Japanese artists but I have never seen such hate in their works for their country in the name of 'artistic freedom'. I had similar experience in London. Both Japan and England went through super poverty to super fluous over last couple of centuries but in their transformation was deep nationalism which was not forced but was adopted by individuals as their ultimate identity which should not be lost at any cost. Every home has some dark secrets which family members try to hide and rectify before neighbors know it. Same is with nations. It is all about perceptions in todays world. It takes so much blood and sweat to make a nation's perception internationally and obviously no time in maligning it using the powerful media we all own.
Artists are one such breed who can think and imagine where average people can never ever dream to think. This is the very reason that artists are best suited to make or break perceptions of a community because they rule on our unconscious consciousness.
I have been keen observer of works of "Leonard Tsuguharu Foujita ", "Kaii Higashiyama" and "Takashi Murakami" and never I have seen anything which makes be sad about Japan. Why can't Indian artists achieve the same?

It is OK to showcase reality (which in India's case is always poverty and mockery of the democratic systems as per these art-mavericks) but at the same time you should do something to showcase the reality where the hard work put up by millions of workers within and outside India is indirectly trying to raise the perception about India as preferred destination either to park international money via business or for livelihood. The artists ignore the vibrancy of India knowingly and think great of themselves when their extreme-exposure displays/paintings/murals are sold at sotheby's and christie's of this world. To my knowlege, most of the paintings/displays which I have mentioned above are never showcased in India as it needs real courage and not just reel courage that these artists draw upon. Most of the paintings showcased in the exhibitions are already adorning the halls of famous art houses and drawing rooms of art lovers (read filthy rich people!). These art houses and art lovers are the people who make the most impact in making or breaking the perception of nations as they control vital and far-reaching media houses. Switzerland and Singapore are one of the tiniest yet so tenacious countries because of not only the hard work of their citizens but smart work of their politicians, media managers, system promoters and artists. "Artists impression" is a strong corner in a design magazine yet our contemporary Indian artists have been selling superbly "poor and pathetic India impression" to world over.

Forget the hardest work put over by Indian immigrants all over the world and being one of the few highly regarded asian communities by the rest of the world. Forget the young political and academic masters who could muster great show of courage to get our freedom from British in the aftermath of WWII and great depression which gave hope to many other colonies. Forget homegrown leaders who brought up India from economic zero to modern world hero nation. Even forget the classic clash of India and China where China could grab much bigger pie of Industrial revolution of this century to which India befitted its reply by best of the class service industry backyard of the world. How can one forget the nation where he/she was born and brought up.
How could it be raped so blatantly without anyone coming forward to throw even a small piece of towel to hide its private parts?

Interestingly the sponsors of "Chalo India" show are some respectable companies from Indian industry as well. These companies are projected as bellwethers of the industry. I could hear the bells which are weathered by "blindness of money" which these companies are ready to accept. Call it 'opportunity cost', in finacial terms.

Re-published for posterity!

English Poem - A Runaway Soul

2012-06-27T22:56:00.000+05:30

A Runaway Soul

Far somewhere a dense forest

Where day could not reach

And night ruled;

A SOUL LIVED

In a dark cave

In a world of its own

With darkest stories sown

In its life...

ENTER A FAIRY

With a ray of light

And Herculean might

THE FOREST LIT UP

The night trembled

The cave dawned and

The soul saw all

In the sparkle of

Doll's gleaming eyes

LAY THERE, WAS LIFE !

As a Bee, she

Hummed around

And the forest turns garden

The night recedes,

The cave enlightens,

and the soul sees-

Plants of hope

NOW AND EVER.

God bless you, Angel

For it was you who dared

And with passion, you shared

Soul's 'boring' story with you

Gems are there, but few

Match your -

Purity-Transparence

Exuberance-Tolerance

and BRILLIANCE !

Deprive me never

For a friend in deed,

Is a friend you need.

Through whose eyes

I see green pastures

On whose shoulders

I can rest forever

For whom

I MAY LAY MY LIFE

Lord, do not take away my friend

For without whom..

I die unnoticed

I live exiled

I hate genuine

I love wrong

I AM ORPHAN

FOREVER.

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/

Book Notes - VAULT CAREER GUIDE TO INVESTMENT BANKING

2012-05-21T23:13:00.000+05:30

VAULT CAREER GUIDE TO INVESTMENT BANKING

Chapter 1

1. What is investment banking? Is it banking? Is it investing? Really, it is neither. Investment banking, or I-banking, as it is often called, is the term used to describe the business of raising capital for companies and advising them on financing and merger alternatives.

2. Generally, the breakdown of an investment bank includes the following areas;
a) Corporate Finance (equity)
b) Corporate Finance (debt)
c) Mergers & Acquisitions (M&A)
d) Equity Sales
e) Fixed Income Sales
f) Syndicate (equity)
g) Syndicate (debt)
h) Equity Trading
i) Fixed Income Trading
j) Equity Research
h) Fixed Income Research

3. The bread and butter of a traditional investment bank, corporate finance generally performs two different functions: 1) Mergers and acquisitions advisory and 2) Underwriting.
On the M&A advising side of corporate finance, bankers assist in negotiating and structuring a merger between two companies. The underwriting function within corporate finance involves shepherding the process of raising capital for a company. In the investment banking world, capital can be raised by selling either stocks or bonds (as well as some more exotic securities) to investors.

4. Sales is another core component of any investment bank. Salespeople take the form of:
a) the classic retail broker
b) the institutional salesperson, or
c) the private client service representative

5. A trader plays two distinct roles for an investment bank:
a) Providing liquidity
b) Proprietary trading

6. Research analysts follow stocks and bonds and make recommendations on whether to buy, sell, or hold those securities.They also forecast companies’ future earnings.

7. Syndicate - the hub of the investment banking wheel, the syndicate group provides a vital link.

between salespeople and corporate finance.
Syndicate exists to facilitate the placing of securities in a public offering, a knock-down drag out affair between and among buyers of offerings and the investment banks managing the process.

Chapter 2

1. Commercial Banking vs. Investment Banking - A commercial bank takes deposits checking and savings accounts from consumers while an investment bank does not.

2. A commercial bank may legally take deposits for checking and savings accounts from consumers. The federal government provides insurance guarantees on these deposits through the FDIC.

3. Commercial banks make money by taking advantage of the large spread between their cost of funds and their return on funds loaned.

4. An investment bank does not have an inventory of cash deposits to lend as a commercial bank does. In essence, an investment bank acts as an intermediary, and matches sellers of stocks and bonds with buyers of stocks and bonds. Note, however, that companies use investment banks toward the same end as they use commercial banks. If a company needs capital, it may get a loan from a bank, or it may ask an investment bank to sell equity or debt (stocks or bonds). Because commercial banks already have funds available from their depositors and an investment bank typically does not, an I-bank must spend considerable time finding investors in order to obtain capital for its client.

5. Private Debt vs Bonds - ...in a bond offering, while the money is still loaned...it is actually loaned by numerous investors, rather than from a single bank. Because the investment bank involved in the offering does not own the bonds but merely placed them with investors at the outset, it earns no interest - the bondholders earn this interest in the form of regular coupon payments. The investment bank makes money by charging the client a small percentage of the transaction upon its completion. Investment banks call this upfront fee the ‘underwriting discount.’ In contrast, a commercial bank making a loan actually receives the interest and simultaneously owns the debt.

6. Legally, most bonds must first be approved by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The investment bankers guide the company throughout the SEC approval process, and then market the offering utilizing a written prospectus, its sales force and a roadshow to find investors.

7. Investment banks underwrite stock offerings just as they do bond offerings. In the stock offering process, a company sells a portion of the equity (or ownership) of itself to the investing public. The very first time a company chooses to sell equity, this offering of equity is transacted through a process called an IPO of stock. Through the IPO process, stock in a company is created and sold to the public.

8. Glass-Steagall Reform - The famous Glass-Steagall Act, enacted in 1934, erected barriers between commercial banking and the securities industry. A piece of Depression-Era legislation, Glass-Steagall was created in the aftermath of the stock market crash of 1929 and the subsequent collapse of many commercial banks. At the time, many blamed the securities activities of commercial banks for their instability.

9. The framers of Glass-Steagall argued that a conflict of interest existed between commercial and investment banks. The conflict of interest argument ran something like this: a) A bank that made a bad loan to a corporation might try to reduce its risk of the company defaulting by underwriting a public offering and selling off the bad loan.

Chapter 3

1. Almost everyone loves a bull market.

2. A bull market occurs when stock prices move up. A bear market occurs when stocks fall. More specifically, a bear markets generally occur when the market has fallen by greater than 20 percent from its highs, and a correction occurs when the market has fallen by more than 10 percent but less than 20 percent.

3. The most widely publicized, most widely traded, and most widely tracked stock index in the world is the DOW JONES INDUSTRIAL AVERAGE. The Dow was created in 1896 as a yardstick to measure the performance of the US stock market in general. Today the Dow is made up of 30 large companies in a variety of industries and is measured in the thousands of points.

Chapter 6

An IPO is the process by which a private company transforms itself into a public company. The company offers, for the first time, shares of its equity (ownership) to the investing public.
The primary reason for going through the rigors of an IPO is to raise cash to fund the growth of a company and to increase the company’s ability to make acquisitions using stock.
From an investment banking perspective, the IPO process consists of these three major phases: hiring the managers, due diligence, and marketing.

Hiring the managers

i. The first step for a company wishing to go public is to hire managers for its offering. This choosing of an investment bank is often referred to as a ‘beauty contest’. The primary manager is known as the ‘lead manager’, while additional banks are known as ‘co-managers’.

Due diligence and drafting
Marketing

i. Investment banks earn fees by taking a percentage commission (called the ‘underwriting discount’, usually around 8% for an IPO) on the proceeds of the offering.

A company that is already publicly traded will sometimes sell stock to the public again. This type of offering is called a ‘follow-on offering’, or a secondary offering. Another reason that a company would issue a follow-on offering is similar to the cashing out scenario in the IPO.
When a company requires capital, it sometimes chooses to issue ‘public debt’ instead of equity. Almost always, however, a firm undergoing a public bond deal will already have stock trading in the market. (It is relatively rare for a private company to issue bonds before its IPO.)

Chapter 8

GOING PUBLIC

Phase 1 – Hiring the Managers

Pitching / Beauty Contests
Selecting the Managers in the Deal

Phase 2 – Due Diligence & Drafting

Organizational Meeting with All Parties
Due Diligence
Drafting the Prospectus
Meeting at the Printer and Filing the Prospectus

Phase 3 – Marketing

Designing the Roadshow – Slides & Presentation
Amend the Prospectus – Per Comments from the SEC
Managers Set Up Roadshow Meetings
Roadshow Begins
Roadshow Ends & Stock is Priced
Stock Begins Trading the Next Day

COMMONLY USED RATIOS

SOLVENCY RATIOS

Quick Ratio = Cash + Accts Rec / Total Current Liabilities	Shows the dollars of liquid assets (convertible into cash within 30 days) available to cover each dollar of current debt.
Current Ratio = Total Current Assets / Total Current Liabilities	Measures the margins of safety present to cover any possible reduction of current assets
Current Liabilities to Net Worth = Total Current Liabilities / Net Worth	Contrasts the amounts due creditors within a year with the funds permanently invested by owners. The smaller the net worth and the larger the liabilities, the greater the risk.
Current Liabilities to Inventory = Total Liabilities / Net Worth	Compares the company’s total indebtedness to the venture capital invested by the owners. High debt levels can indicate greater risk.
Fixed Assets to Net Worth = Fixed Assets / Net Worth	Reflects the portion of net worth that consists of fixed assets. Generally a smaller ratio is desired.
EFFICIENCY RATIOS
Collection Period = Accounts Receivable X 365 / Sales	Reflects the average number of days it takes to collect receivables
Inventory Turnover = Sales / Inventory	Determine the rate at which merchandise is being moved and the effect of the flow of funds into a business
Assets to Sales = Total Assets / Sales	This rate ties in sales and the total investment in assets that is used to generate those sales
Sales to Net Working Capital = Sales / Net Working Capital	Measures the efficiency of management to use its short-term assets and liabilities to generate revenues
Net Working Capital = Current Assets – Current Liabilities
Accounts Payable to Sales = Accounts Payable / Sales	Measure the extent to which the supplier’s money is being used to generate sales. When this ratio is multiplied by 365 days, it reflects the average number of days it takes the company to repay its suppliers.
PROBABILITY RATIOS
Return on Sales (Profit Margin) = Net Profit After Taxes / Sales	Reveals profits earned per dollar of sales and measures the efficiency of the operations.
Return on Assets = Net Profit After Taxes / Total Assets	This is the key indicator of probability for a firm. It matches net profits with the assets available to earn a return
Return on Net Worth (Return on Equity) = Net Profit after Taxes / Net Worth	Analyzes the ability of the firm’s management to realize an adequate return on the capital invested by the owners of the firm.

Glossary

Consumer Price Index (CPI) – The CPI measures the percentage increases in a standard basket of goods and services. The CPI is a measure of inflation for consumers.

Convertible bonds – Bonds that can be converted into a specified number of shares of stock.

Derivatives – An asset whose value is derived from the price of another asset. Examples include call options, put options, futures and interest rate swaps.

Dividend – A payment by a company to shareholders of its stock, usually as a way to distribute profits.

Equity – In short, stock. Equity means ownership in a company that is usually represented by stock.

Leveraged buyout (LBO) – The buyout of a company with borrowed money, often using that company’s own assets as collateral.

Mutual Fund – An investment vehicle that collects funds from investors (both individual and institutional) and invests in a variety of securities, including stocks and bonds. MFs make money by charging a percentage of assets in the fund.

Notes: These are my notes from the book that have been shared. This is not a book review.

हिंदी कविता - अंततः

2012-05-05T23:10:00.002+05:30

अंततः

अंततः यही तो होना है,
सुन्दर पहनना और अच्छा खाना,
दुनिया के रंग में रंगते जाना
अंत में चिता ही बिछोना है.

और हाय यही विडंबना है,
वह किसी का अपना है और,
किसी का वह सजना है
किसी का वह जन्मा है
उसका भी एक सपना है
फिर भी यही विडंबना है
अंततः चिता ही बिछोना है.

अरे लाश..कुछ तो मुख खोल,
अब जरा सुनु गर्व भरे बोल,
अब दिखा हेकड़ी, जमा अब गोल,
हो गया तेरा भी मोल-तोल,
और हाँ यही विडंबना है,
अंततः चिता ही बिछोना है.

कल बड़ा चहकता था तू,
आती होगी बस तुझमे बू,
और अब तेरी विडंबना है,
अंततः चिता ही बिछोना है.

कल तक तूने बहुत कमाया,
तन पर आज कपडा ना जुराया,
आँखें खुली या है पथराया-
मौत सी सीना तान ना पाया,
समझा? तेरी यही विडंबना है,
अंततः चिता ही बिछोना है -
अंततः चिता ही बिछोना है.

संवत १९९० में अयोध्या के सरयू नदी के घाट पर ठिठुरती जाड़े की रात में जलती किसी लाश के किनारे बैठ कर कुछ सच देखे थे, कुछ गर्माहट पायी थी. कलम ने उन राख के कुछ टुकड़ों को कागज़ पर ढलवाए थे.

English essay - Life Value of Money

2012-04-28T13:57:00.002+05:30

MBA is a great science. It is fanciful and marketable. For last decade or so, MBA has become fashionable. There must be a study about how many MBA one can find out of a sample population while walking in New York, London, Tokyo, Melbourne, and other world cultural and industrial capitals. It evokes passion to hear about someone MBA from Ivy league and other ranking colleges. MBA is truly Sexy and mainstream. It fascinates me to relate to concepts taught at these curriculum with daily life events and extrapolate a new insight. One such concept is "Time Value of Money". It states that money in hand today is more valuable than in hand tomorrow. Then 'cash is king' and 'liquidity crunch' are talk of the W Street and all the media surrounding or surviving on it.

So then what is this "Life Value of Money" that struck me while talking to my impressively suave colleague at office?

Life Value of Money which I will sweet-cut to LVM, is the thinking and harnessing the value that money has on our lives. Since time is said to be the most precious thing (touched and untouched combined) on this earth, it is actually a set of scheme oblivious to many who think it follows a watch. Now, scientists and mathematicians can define 'Life' and 'Time' with all proof that a common human believes or believes because it does not alter the usual way of things interrelated.

No scientist can explain money. Mathematician can count and formula-coat money but cannot define it. These two together cannot explain the relation between 'Life' 'Time' 'Money' and their sum total with 'Value'. So now we have following combinations:

a) Life Time Money (LTM) - every one has kind of estimate for it for himself / herself.

b) Time Value of Money (TVM) - property of MBA curricula.

Now see stark clear - Life and Value are disconnected whenever Time and Money are associated. Both Time and Money are notional subjects. Please argue that Value is also notional.

Only Life is real.

So now this real thing called Life needs pseudo help from notional subjects - our friends, mentioned above. Pseudo because general thinking says its essential for Life to play on with the rules of Time and Money. For most, it is true like a transparent glass. There cannot be perfect symphony between real and notional, or even perfect synergy. All that can happen is 'perfect balance', seen from the eyes of the juggler who in turn can make it believable (thus achievable) to his followers or circle of influence.

During the ancient and medieval periods, life flourished and perished in almost equal ratios. Though we have data of great famines, epidemics, fire and wars/battles of known history, not much is known about the population growth during the same period. But these centuries are filled with achievements those having the strength of changing course of communities and countries. Arts flourished equally along with science. Though development of science in medieval ages is debatable, its discoveries and inventions cannot be pushed as mediocre.

What is more evident during these times is the human depiction of values of life through centuries when countries were not demarcated and communication was exclusive. The art, paintings, structures, literature, and science flourished together. Human race, across the globe could identify with Machu-Pichu, Indus valley civilization, Arab invasions, and Pyramids. Time waited for the masters and their master pieces. Time was important but timing was not. It had its daily value which was consumed with great passion. And when daily life is lived with passion, time can be tamed. The monie valuations of those centuries are not known and that adds to the mystic of historical ages. Imagine finding the GDP of Europe or Americas during 1000, or 1100 year and also connected GNP, Trade Deficits and all other wall street benchmarks with MBA college gyan! History will loose its sheen if this happens.

Today we can't imagine living without these 'cooked up' data. These were created to measure the businesses and they have invaded our personal well being.

Then Life was celebrated, now Money is celebrated and exalted.

Desires are 'in thing', Life is achieved 'Just Once', This is 'Just One Life'; all this half baked quarter understood statements are now used to rotate the capitalistic money. We all get hooked. Communism is dead, long live Lenin & Marx. Newspapers look like product and sales catalog. Advertising is a big and deep thing. Look for your deepest personal spaces and you can see an advertisement for a product asking you to 'charge of your life' by buying it and then showing it. 'Flaunting' is the user interface of urban and up-market masses.

LVM can balance this tilt. Every penny that you spend, do spend a minute of thought in terms of LVM. The real challenge is to teach children and youth on this. Both thrive on raw energies. My TV is better than your TV or My car is steamier than yours makes the whole equation of TVM go for a toss. Envy sets in early and lives longer than our lives.You can say LVM is an angle of detached living or alternate living; where you live, consume, enjoy, buy, sell, splurge at times, yet you enjoy each atom of it in peaceful state of your mind.

I encourage my reader patrons to share their thinking on this and think of practicing LVM.

Enhance the elixir of life by living it your way, garnished by larger social ways.

SHAHRUKH KHAN @YALE, Success Nuggets

2012-04-13T15:27:00.004+05:30

When you fail…fail well enough to succeed the next time. Don’t be afraid…facing your fears and failures.

My hope is “that you never cease to dream exciting and inspiring dreams”.

My hope for all of you is that you retain a lifelong love of learning.

Overcoming some of my failures has made me discover that I have a strong will…and more discipline than I suspected.

Failure also gets you to find…who your real friends are.

Repeated failure has taught me to stop pretending I am someone else.

Failure also gives me an incentive to greater exertion…harder work…which invariably leads to later success in most cases.

It’s not the absence of failure that makes you a success…it is your response to failure.

If you aren’t scared enough of failing, you are unlikely to succeed.

I believe the true path to success is through the fear of failure.

I don’t want as much to succeed as much as I don’t want to fail.

Talking [success] is a waste of time…whatever happened to me happened because I have always been terrified of failure.

Success is a wonderful thing, but it tends not to be the sort of experience that we learn from.

Whether we like it or not, my life has also been in constant play with what the world calls ‘success’.

Happiness…lies in the things you will never be able to count.

Your age is the age when we most confuse happiness with gratification.

Do not be afraid to be hungry. Do not be afraid to walk alone if necessary.

Do not be afraid to destroy systems that kill art and your souls.

Do not be afraid to defy conventions.

Do not try to feed your stomach with creativity, it is food for your soul, not for your stomach.

Your fulfillment will always lie in your creative expression not in its products.

Creativity is your gift to the world. It was never meant to be barter for anything, not even appreciation.

Becoming cynical about your life is single most destructive thing you can do to it.

Learn to laugh at yourselves too. Never become cynical about yourself and your life.

Life as a creative person is like being on a tight rope.

The world will be unkind to you…not be able to see you. You must learn at such times, to be able to see yourself.

There is only one thing you can do to survive – hang on to who you are inside.

So [art] comes from your gut…and it is put out there for others to accept it or throw it in the gutter.

At the same time & quite paradoxically, a man becomes distinct from his creation…the moment it’s…in the public domain.

A good artist cannot be separate from his creation. Good art is honest art.

However I look at it, in its eventual analysis, my life has centered around my creativity.

I have understood that the measure of m life lies in the expanse of my heart’s experience.

I don’t have a place to arrive, I just keep doing what I know how to do the best that I can do it.

I will tell you the story of me but I’ll tell it in my own way. In the language of my perceptions…beyond fame & success.

As for my destination, I don’t think I ever knew one. I walk, I run, in the direction of my dreams.

I am here to share ‘experience of my life’s journey’ about survival, happiness, creativity, success.

[Shahrukh Khan is conferred with Chubb fellow of Yale University, USA.]

Collated from Twitter handle:
@iamsrk #YaleSRK

हिंदी 'बेबी' कविता

2012-04-08T19:08:00.002+05:30

राह कठिन है, चाह नहीं,
काम कठिन है, वाह वाह नहीं,
इंसानी ज़ज्बा चक्रवात है,
सामने जिसके, कोई आह नहीं.
(७-मार्च-२००८)

हिंदी कविता - "..................."

2012-03-31T11:33:00.003+05:30

"............................................................."

[वर्ष: १९९६]

भोर के धुंधलके में
पानी भरे बादलों के नीचे
हरे भरे खेतों के बीच से
मेरी आँखें दूर दूर तक
नयनों की सीमाओं तक दौड़ रही हैं
तुम कहीं नहीं हो और
यहीं कहीं हो
यही मेरी विवशता है
मेरी बेचैनी है.

बरसात का असर दिख रहा है
क्यारिओं बागों में दिलों पर
मैं अकेला चकोर
तुम्हें सूनेपन में आवाज़ देता हूँ
तुम नहीं सुनती, बस
हवाओं में तुम्हारी धड़कन
सुनाई देती है मुझे

तुम्हारी महक मेरे संसार में सर्वश्रेष्ठ है
काले जामुनी मेघ बिखर जाने को बेताब
बिलकुल मेरे समान जैसे मैं सदा तुम्हें
अपनी बाहों में भर, तुम पर न्योछावर
हो जाना चाहता हूँ,
अपनी आत्मा के साथ.
.............................................................................................................
मुझे नाम दे दो.....
मध्यमवर्गीय सोच पीछा नहीं छोडती मध्यमवर्गीय लोगों का जीवन भर. १९९६ का वह साल करियर के लिहाज से अच्छा ही था पर मालूम ही नहीं था की एन्त्रेप्रेंयूर्शिप क्या चिड़िया होती है. धंधा, बिजनेस, कारोबार, व्यापर, जैसे कुछ शब्द होते थे तब जो कि उस समय के उत्तर प्रदेश में मध्यमवर्गीय लोगों के लिए डरावने रास्ते होते थे. सिर्फ नौकरी और उसमे भी सरकारी, की पूछ होती थी. कुछ साल पहले ही मेरी ज़िन्दगी ने बड़ी करवट बदली थी और आने वाला साल एक और करवट बदलने का इंतज़ार कर रहा था. यह कविता किसी यात्रा के दौरान लिखी गई थी पर आश्चर्य होता है कि इसका शीर्षक क्यों नहीं रखा मैंने उस समय...
इस कविता को नाम की जरूरत है. क्या आप मेरी मदद कर सकते हैं इस कविता का नाम चुनने में..?

Video: TIEC Social Entrepreneurship Forum

2012-03-18T21:26:00.014+05:30

On a cold saturday afternoon on 14-November-2009, Tokyo International Exchange Center held the coveted event '29th TIEC Research and Presentation'. This event focussed on the subject "Needs, Challenges & Opportunities for Social Entrepreneurs in Asia". It was well covered by media and Internet.

For the first time, a video is available of the event.

Youtube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aD2vUArWOn0&feature=channel

(open this link in new window/tab. if it still does not open, do type "TIEC Social Entrepreneurship Forum" in the youtube video.)

Trust you will be moved and motivated.

For the ease of viewers, I provide some factual details of the video, speaker names and where you can see and hear them in the video. This is due to the fact that the video is lengthy.

Video Length: 1:59:09

Facilitator: Todd Porter (Curator, Innovators Greenhouse and TEDxTokyo)Welcome speech: Naoki Muto, Director TIEC

Panelists:
Peo Ekberg (Environmental Consultant)
Sandeep Casi (Director, TiE Tokyo)
Yasunobu Hotsuki (CEO, WisePocket)
Daisuke Miyoshi (Japan Chief Coordinator, Grameen Communications Global Change Makers Program)

Hear the change making stories here:->

Arvind Panwar, India - 5:40 - 12:18

Peo Ekberg, Sweden - 12.30 - 57:50
Story: Sustainability calling upon future change makers, One World Network

Dr. Suresh Munuswamy, India - 58:05 - 1:05:36

Phan Huu Viet, Singapore - 1:05:53 - 1:12:43
Story: New life for street children in Vietnam

Kieng Paiboon, Thailand - 1:12:45 - 1:18:21
Story: Zero to ‘Amata’: It is Possible

Anika Schulze, Germany - 1:18:23 - 1:26:18
Story: Dialog in the Dark

Yuki Higuchi, Japan - 1:26:20 - 1:35:26
Story: MotherHouse

Sitesh Shrivastava, India - 1:35:28 - 1:47:45
Story: Mumbai Dabbawala - Mumbai Bento Boys

Kwang Naeyong, Korea - 1:47:47 - 1:58:32
Story: Social Enterprises evolving in Korea

Oana Rocka - Master of Ceremony

Photostream at Flicker:http://www.flickr.com/photos/44856437@N04/show/with/4124107529/

Write-up has been alive on following links so far:
http://tiecgreenproject.blogspot.in/2009/11/tiec-social-entrepreneurs-forum.html

http://www.jasso.go.jp/tiec/koryukenkyu29_e.html

http://tsaj.org/smf/index.php?topic=4869.0;wap2

TIEC
Tokyo International Exchange Center (TIEC) is part of Japan Student Services Organization (JASSO). JASSO operates events in Japan and overseas to provide the newest and correct information on Study in Japan to all students aspiring to study in Japan for their successful studies.
http://www.jasso.go.jp/index_e.html
http://www.jasso.go.jp/tiec/index_e.html

Use these links if you wish to study in Japan or refer someone about studying in Japan.

हिंदी कविता - द्वन्द

2012-03-11T20:39:00.005+05:30

द्वन्द

मै तुम्हारा हूँ - इसका माँगा है
प्रमाण तुमने - नित्य नवीन
कैसे बोलूं वह भाषा असीम?
प्रेम तो व्याख्या रहित है.
शब्दों से उसे नाप नहीं पाउँगा..
नयन अभिव्यक्ति नहीं कर पाएंगे
शारीर कभी ना कभी ठंडा हो जायेगा,
और रह जायेगा प्रश्न यथा का यथा..
नित्य नवीन प्रमाण कि व्यथा.

अन्यथा क्या तुम्हारा ना रहूँगा?
प्रेम जल तुम्हें छल जायेगा?
या अग्नि में सपना तुम्हारा जल जायेगा?

वस्तुतः प्रेम मात्र भ्रम है,
मायावी है - छलावों का क्रम है.
प्रेम पाश है - उसकी तलाश है
जो कभी नहीं मिलता;
जहाँ चाहो वहां नहीं मिलता,
जहाँ मिलता है वहां अपनाया नहीं जाता.

धिक्कार है विधाता बता,
यह जीवन किस प्रयोजन
ना निगलते बने ना उगलते.
मुगालते में प्रेम के सुलगते;
रहे अब और कितना ??
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मुंबई में नयी रंगीन दुनिया कि तलाश में १९९८ में कदम रखे थे. मुंबई पहले पहल डराती धमकाती है, और जांचती है कि उसके प्रेम में कितनी शिद्दत है. फिर जकड लेती है अपनी बाहों के घेरे में. वो घेरे जिनके अन्दर प्यार भी है और प्यास भी.
प्यार और प्यास के उस अनबुझ वर्ष में कलम ने वो मोम उगला जो दिल में पिघला था. वह अब तक बहता है.
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Book Notes - Stay Hungry Stay Foolish

2012-03-02T22:48:00.016+05:30

Stay Hungry Stay Foolish

Rashmi Bansal

When I had started out my career, all such books *I am not sure to which genre they belong* were coming in from the west. Be it Jack Welch, Stephen Covey, Edward de Bono, Philip Kotler and the likes were cramming for the shelf spaces in Indian book stores - whether in a shop or on a railway platform. I could then find out two great books about Indian entrepreneurship by home grown author Gita Piramal, and it struck immediately to me that to succeed in India, one needs to study Indian businessmen and entrepreneurs. Then there were Shiv Khera, Shakuntala Devi etc. These industrious authors brought the much needed contemporary Indian writing from the days of R.M. Lala. I would rate this book by Rashmi Bansal in the same league. It has taken the enterprising Indian youth by instilling the thought that while in India; do as Indians do.

Here I bring you my notes from this perennial book:

Venkat Krishnan, GiveIndia

1. Nothing shapes your future as much as the house in which you are born.

2. When you go to convent school, you actually don't see the whole spectrum of people. It will be middle class dominated.

3. Books influenced- Communist Manifesto, George Orwell's 'Animal Farm'

4. I see myself as an instrument or tool that is available to society. And my choices should be guided by maximising the returns that i will give to the society. So i will not do something just because I like it, but because that is the best use of my time for the society's benefit.

5. Whenever you look beyond business, into the things that make a difference to the quality of our lives, we somehow think there's no need to apply scientific thought.

6. I think if there is passion in the environment, people pick it up.

7. It is the middle class who were the authors of the freedom struggle, not the rich, not the poor. Gandhi was spot on. I cry everytime I think of 15th august when all were celebrating freedom and he was in the middle of a village near Calcutta saying, 'Now is not the time to celebrate freedom. Now is the time to fight the next enemy that we have, which is religious intolerance'. What courage it takes for a guy to think like that!"

8. The poorest people give the most, as a percentage of income. This is true all over the world.

9. Why is that the tax rupee does not get used effectively? Because most of us look at taxes as a license to exist. We are paying taxes and telling the government, 'I don't care whether you are doing anything with this money or not, leave me alone'."

10. My advice to 'would be' entrepreneurs- nothing is perhaps a greater truism than the '3 year rule'- if you are able to hang in and survive for 3 years, you'll be up and able to hang in and survive for 3 years, you'll be up and running and by the fourth year, you will be better off as an entrepreneur than you'd have been in a job.
For '4 yrs+ old entrepreneurs'- I want advice FROM you on how to take yourself out of an institution and leave it better off without you than it is with you.
My advice for IIMA alumni- the IIMA qualification is the best possible 'income insurance' you can get in India today. So if at all there is anyone who can take risks with a low downside, it has to be you.

Anand Halve, Chlorophyll

1. Somebody else is going to run the agenda as long as you are not driving it.

2. Mohammed Khan of Enterprise said,"if you have pots of money, you don't need good advertising. You can just hurl enough advertising rupees at the customer, until almost in sheer panic, the customer gives up and says okay, I surrender".

3. Jay Chiat of Chiat Day (the agency which produced commercials for the likes of Apple and Nike) once said: "How big can we get before we get bad!"

4. Madan Bahal once said: 'you don't make big money by doing more work. You make big money by selling companies'.

5. Instead of per capita billing, we use 'per rupee manpower'. How productive is each rupee of manpower?, we ask.

6. Every decision is driven by the satisfaction levels as well as lifestyle desired by the entrepreneurs. It's a space they have created where they can just be, not forced to be.

7. We use three yardsticks and we know it is very unlikely that any project will fulfill all three. But let's hope for at least two in every project. If it's only one then it better be superlative on that one dimension. And the dimensions are: it must give us money, or it must give us fame, or it must give us great joy.

8. Reporting to your own conscience is the highest and most rewarding form of servitude. And you can even make a good living out of it.

9. Advice:
Goals-
-follow your heart. (The brain can do many things, but only the heart can answer the meaningful questions of life)
-Think of intangibles you value first- and let them determine the tangibles. Steve Jobs and Michael Dell are driven by different intangibles... Figure out who you'd rather be.
- Don't defer your joy at a beach today, for some imagined future weekend in Acapulco- by the time that happens your diabetes may not let you enjoy the pina coladas.

Money
- Money is not an end in itself. (Anu Aga, ex chairperson, Thermax, once said: "Profits are important but not the only thing... Without breathing, you and I can't live, but if you ask me what is the purpose of my life and if I say breathing, it is such a narrow way to define it.")
-create love and affection in your workplace. (Peope give up their lives for what they love but no one will do it for an EBITDA)

People and values
-Surround yourself with like minded people. You can't plan together, if the guys at the table are Gautam Buddha and Genghis Khan.
-Define your Do's and Don'ts before you start. Post facto, any act can be justified.
-No deal is worth losing your self-respect

The last word
-Finally, if you don't laugh enough, your busibness model is probably wrong.

SB Dangayach, Sintex

-It pays to push an idea ahead of its time if you genuinely believe it addresses a pain point with your customer.
- An entrepreneur must constantly play the role of 'trinity'. One one hand you have to realise which products are not working or declining and eventually get rid of those lines. Simultaneously you need something which can be big in the future.

Vijay Mahajan, Basix

- a space is where 'nothing is happening' is actually just what you need to do some serious soul searching.

- single most important quality you need to have and cultivate further is to get up and walk everytime you fall down.

- One has to persist in terms of operational difficulties.

- ...equally important ability one needs to cultivate is the ability to learn- from experience, critics, competitors, failures, summer trainees, mothers-in-law and from regulators. Expert knowledge is useful but increasingly has shorter shelf life. So what is permanent is the ability to understand a new situation and respond appropriately, using both learning from the past but also a fresh appreciation of the situation.

- Entrepreneurship Is widely misunderstood to be a personal trait. It is so, to some extent. But entrepreneurship is a social construction - it is a phenomenon where certain behaviors get expressed in certain individuals, due to the support of their 'eco system' - colleagues, family members, investors, regulators, competitors and customers. All of these interactions, cooked in the skull of the entrepreneur, make for the heady mix that all of you are after. So nurturing this eco-system and interacting with it are extremely important.

Deep Kalra, makemytrip.com

Deep's story tells you that the path of entrepreneurship is a crooked one. You never know what lies around the next corner.
- Growth is a hydra headed monster with an endless appetite.
- Why take money from so many different people? Because different guys bring different things to the table. They also help to manage competitive pressures. Of course, managing so many investors is definitely a challenge in itself. Deep's investor philosophy is simple, "I have only taken in capital from guys who I think can add value to us. My litmus test is, would I take this guy on my board if he wasn't giving me money? As an independent member? We have refused money from bigger 'brands' where I don't think the partner in question would add value to my board."

Advice to Entrepreneurs

- Choose your field very carefully- there must be a 'huge' (large is not good enough) market potential. If you don't have personal expertise in this field, get a team of domain experts locked-in, preferably as partners or co-founders.
- plan your funding very carefully
- ideally raise as little cash as possible in the pre-revenue stage as you end up diluting too much equity. Try raising the first round from angel investors as it is most time-efficient and typically you will get the best terms. However, for later rounds, never risk starving your company of cash.
- it's all about people
- hire the best folks in the business. Don't hesitate to hire people better than yourself in that specific area. Colleagues who challenge and make you feel uncomfortable are your best friends and the 'yes men' are your worst enemies!
- don't focus too much on exits (especially not too early in the game). Concentrate on building a solid business, the rest will take care of itself.

Rashesh Shah, Edelweiss Capital

- I realised that when you want to hire people, having an office with a computer, fax machine and receptionist matters a lot. People want to work for what looks like a real company. They don't want to work for ideas.- when we started, we had an offer from an industrial group for a 15-20% JV. It was a very attractive offer, this extra capital. But one valuable advice from Narayana Murthy was: 'Give capital to people who add value, or to strategic partners. Don't go for capital for the sake of capital'.
- Fixed compensation at Edelweiss has been more reasonable though the variable compensation is aggressive. This helped keep costs under control. "it's an owner mindset rather than 'employee' mindset.
- "there is something known as an intensive and extensive approach to a thing. Should we go more deep into one area or should we be more broad bases? Historically, India has been a very large market, but more broad than deep," says Rashesh. And hence it makes sense to drop many different anchors to keep your company in place.There is an example of Reliance which started with petrochemicals, then got into trading yarn, fibre manufacturing, refining, exploration and now, even retail. This is what you call growth through 'adjacent markets'.
- "you go on changing only one parameter, either the product or the client parameter and you keep on growing in the adjacent market," says Rashesh. "very often you will try something and find it difficult, competition hai, and you go to the adjacent market. But going to the adjacent market because of that is not a good reason."
- when you are the CEO and shareholder, you want to avoid raising money because your equity goes down. When you wear only the CEO's hat, all you want is to grow as fast as possible.
- We always differentiate between a plan and an aspiration. There is always a short term plan, but there are always long term aspirations.- i believe that entrepreneurship is not all about assets, it is about emotinal energy as aspirations.
- As human beings, as entrepreneurs, all of us overestimate the short term and grossly underestimate the long term.
- ...you sacrifice Glamor and build an institution. Advice to entrepreneurs- cash flow is underestimated by most people- the amount of cash flow. If its possible, be a little overcapitalized. Being financially savvy is a part of the business.
- Never have equal partners. You start off as equals, but the one does more, one does less, one is the public face, the other is not, and then slowly the whole thing disintegrates. So there should be a 'first among equals', who has a slightly higher equity share. Thats what Mr Narayanamurthy advised us.These days I advise people- two or four partners is okay, but ideally not more.- have the emotional staying power.

Nirmal Jain, India Infoline

Opportunity is about putting two and two together.
- if you are an artist like MF Hussain or a player like Tiger Woods your individual skills only matter, and not how good a team player you are or how good a team you can build. The analogy applies to business as well. Do you want to be Tiger Woods, the golfer or captain of Team India?
- you don't have to shy away from taking on the 'big boys'. The mouse is always more agile than the elephant.
- one aspect is managing growth at different levels.When compamies are 10-15 people, that is one size. Another size is 50-100 people, then 500-1000 people. At every size you haveAdvice to Entrepreneurs- entrepreneurship is risky. So you should have a mindset, should be prepared to fail. If you are not prepared to fail then this is not your cup of tea.- you should have the ability to build a team of the right people and not people you like.- whatever the number of partners, there has to be one leader. Whether it is an army or a country or a company there has to be one person, one leader in charge.

Vikram Talwar, EXL Service

In life, timing is the single most important thing.
- ...it has to be an inner drive to succeed in what your objective is. And it cannot be money in my mind. If you want to get into entrepreneurship to make money, I don't think you will be as successful.
- ...you need ability to share or you can never build a company of size and scale. Today Vikram owns 6% of EXL. And he never owned more than 12%. How about Azim Premji then, who owns 80% of Wipro?"yes, but it was a family business much before they got into IT. There is very big difference between rich young men going to become entrepreneurs and middle class, non-moneyed individuals becoming entrepreneurs. Would I call Mukesh Ambani an Entrepreneur? The answer is absolutely no. He is a good businessman, not an entrepreneur. Sunil Mittal is an entrepreneur. That's the difference.
- you could get into entrepreneurship on a whim or a fancy like I did. But if you want to plan how to be an entrepreneur, get some solid experience- how companies work, how people are managed, what finance is all about.
- If you do start a business, select your partner very carefully. Its tricky. Working with a partner requires a huge amount of sacrifice, understanding and tolerance. Its like a marriage at the end of tbe day. I mean, worse than a marriage. Advice to entrepreneurs- don't be an entrepreneur without very good financial knowledge. Or have a trusted partner who knows all about this.

K Raghvendra Rao, Orchid Pharma

If the capital was hard to come by, could he not have downsized the project?
- it is not a question of cutting the cloth to suit your size. Without that kind of a minimum critical mass, that project would not be viable. The cost and technology were not in favor of downsizing the project.
- MBAs who take up entrepreneurship are generally attracted to knowledge based industries, or services. Few venture into large, manufacturing projects.
- we started as public limited company right from day one of the organisation. Because I went and told them, I am committed to this, this is my pan and this is what I have.-wherever I worked, even when I held zero shares, my attitude towards the work and the project has been absolutely the same.
- I have always felt that you should take a niche segment, go deeper and broader into that, create a nucleus and reach a critical mass so that you become one of the low cost producers. And add value. You then replicate that in other therapeutic areas. So by design, yu wil limit competition. Even if others try to replicate it later they will be less efficient because they will be trying to catch up with you.
Attracting Talent- I used to market to them my 'five year plan'. In fact I always carried the five year plan book with me I would say, with or without you, I plan to do the.
- ...the price of ambition is a tremendous strain on the balance sheet.

Advice to entrepreneurs
- think either big or niche.
- there is no dearth of capital to back right ideas and entrepreneurs. Aim to create lasting value.

Jerry Rao, Mphasis

Jerry Rao does not mix emotions with entrepreneurship. Being attached to the company you create, is 'moha', he says.You have to do what's best for the business and if that means selling out, so be it.
- in America, if you look at it, people are much more cold blooded about their companies. At the right time, the CEOs resign, retire, sell out. India I think, the first generation entrepreneurs get very attached to their companies. Not in rational market related terms vut in very irrational emotional terms.
-...in the initial days you have to spend a lot of time with customers. It cannot be delegated to junior people.
- ...if you are a small company, you have to be extremely transparent and honest.
- ...research has shown that transparent companies have a lower cost of capital.
- ...plans are okay, but if you don't have the courage to make mid-course corrections and changes, particularly in highly changing environments like technology space, you will get into trouble.
-don't create overheads you can't sustain.
- I talk about passion, not emotion. They two are different words. Emotion is what you feel for your children.
- You can't postpone your whole life to the future.

Advice to Entrepreneurs
- in your sales pitch, the first point should be about your weaknesses, not your strength.

Shivraman Dugal, ICRI

Remember IIMs have weakness. They teach you marketing, finance. And systems but they don't teach you how to raise money.You open a shop and say, I must know where every penny is going.The control freak will remain a dukaandaar.

Shankar Maruwada, Marketics

Culture is set of daily behaviors exhibited by an organisation. The senior guys walk the talk, others will follow. Because an organisation, especially in the beginninh, is nothing but the reflection if the founders.We will have globally delighted clients who will benefit from us being the world's best professionals in what we do. In doing so we will have fun and get rich.When you want to expand, there is a window of opportunity. If you don't utilise that, you will get left behind. Do you want to stay happy but small or do you want to grow? These are two different paths and you have to choose one. Don't jeopardise your company's future by confusing what is good for you as a person with what is good for the company. When money is no longer the motivation, life can be pretty good. We got what we deserved. What we gave to others, they deserved. Advice more than VCs, an entrepreneur needs an angel at start up stage. VCs should ideally come in once you know what you want, the model is proven an d you think the best way to scale it up is to get their investent

Ruby Ashraf, precious formals

As an entrepreneur you don't say that 'I have to reach a particular place in 5 years' you just keep doing whatever you are doing. As a designer I woukd like to design only expensive clothes. But as a strategy you have to see where the market is going. There are customers for everything. Its a delicate balance. You dont want to make very cheap clothes, because then you have to sell too many to make money. And you dont want to keep them so expensive that people get intimidated or do not appreciate.You start with a strategy, but you have to change it at so many stages along the way. Markets change, buyers change, you have to change with it.

Advice
You can achieve beyond your dreams, so its OK to dream and make an action plan to turn it into reality.

Deepta Rangrajan, IRIS

While we are not starving, we are not tremendously greedy, we don't constantly compre our net worth with somebody else. Having said that, it is fantastic to create wealth. Because often, it is not only an endorsement of the fact that you have done well, it gives you tremendous opportunity to do other things as well.The service and consulting business is people dependent. The more you grow, the more people you need for it. Whereas once you develop products, you profit from your IP and go beyond working for specific clients and projects.You need to keep the sails open and then wait for the wind to blow.

Cyrus Driver, Calorie Care

Its good to be a consumer of the product you are planning to launch.

Sanjeev Bikhchandani, naukri.com

As an MBA from IIMA, we all have a hunger for multinational companies. Because its prestigious. But to my mind, it is false prestige. You are a prisoner of your visiting card and the logo on it, a prisoner of your EMIs...We got the money just before the market meltdown. So we dint get time to spend it foolishly. We just put it in fixed deposit.The very act of becoming an entrepreneur is contrarian to 'middle class values'; study hard, get a good job, be happy with secure income and steady salary.I could have quit anytime in the first 10 years, and I would have been a failed entrepreneur. Why did I keep going? Because I wasn't chasing money. And if you choose something long enough, sooner or later you will get lucky.You see, there is no such thing as a failed entrepreneur. You are a failed entrepreneur only when you quit. Until then, you are- Simply not successful...yet.

Advice to Entrepreneurs
Be early. You can make your mistakes while it is cheap to make them, when there is no competition.Do not exaggerate your business plan. Undercommit and overdeliver.Get great people- sell them the vision, the idea and share the wealth, be generous with offering stock.If you are starting a business to make money, dont do it. Chances are that you will fail, because there will be hard times. And if your motivation is not something beyond money, those hard times will test you. You will quit and go back to your job. But if you are doing something other than money, you will rough it through. If you are in enough places, enough times and long enough, you get your breaks in some form or other. You just have to be smart enough to take them. Scaling up is also a lot about letting go. Get smart people. Keep in mind that every choice you make impacts the family.

Shantanu Prakash, EDUCOMP

You don't need any capital to start, you can start with zero capital. If you have capital, great. If you don't, it does'nt mean you can't start.When you are an optimist some of the external environment stuff does not really bother you.The trick is to identify the DNA in a person, where he or she wants to do something different, and wants to be differently incentivised. It means not just a big fat salary cheque, but things like stock options, feeling of partnership, being part of a start-up organization, fast growth, all of that. More than the monetary sacrifice, it is really the sacrifice of time when you are an entrepreneur. And that is a much more expensive sacrifice than money.

Advice to Entrepreneur

The risk reward equation is completely in favor of the entrepreneur. There is no way that you will be economically rewarded lesser for being an entrepreneur than by taking up a job.

Vinayak Chatterjee, Feedback Ventures

Money is a by-product. Business growth, turnover, bottomline is a by product of what your heart and head want you to do. So if you follow that, money will follow. Woh Gandhi waali baat hai. 'Find purpose and the means will follow.'

Advice to Entrepreneurs

What i find is many people hear that inner voice but just don't have the conviction to act upon it. Don't get too concerned about peer pressure. You may be succesfiul, you may be unsuccessful, but in the philosophical market, what is success and what is failure? At least you will have pleasure when you face yourself in the mirror to say "I did what my inner voice told me! Koi phikr nahi hai, tu apna kaam kar!I don't want to put a premium on entrepreneurship. It's not a fad or fashion to follow. Remember Narayana Murthy's quote "It has taken me 25 years to become an overnight wonder."

Ashank Desai, Mastek

The IT industry is lime sitting on a tiger. You have to keep reinventing yourself. When you are sitting on a small market, you have to be good at many things. Smallness adds to the complexity of operations.Ultimately when you are running a company, you have a risk you have a responsibility to make it successful. So the buck stops at you. So to that extent, there is a difference between an executive and and the owner.

Advice to Entrepreneurs

Everyone does not need to build a 100 crore or 1000 crore company. Small vs big vs superbig is a choice that an entrepreneur makes himself or herself depending upon the ambitions, value and what he likes doing.

R Subramanian, Subhiksha

Entrepreneurship is an itch. The only ointment that soothes it is work. Lots and lots of it. And it must be interesting, intensive and audacious. If we would have known how difficult retailing is, we would have never got into it. Operationally it is very challenging business, the pain factor is very high. That's what makes it so difficult for competition to come in very easily. Retail has two main costs- space and people. In the developed world, retail happens outside cities, where space is very cheap. Everybody has a car, so they drive down and shop. And in most of those parts of the world, people are very expensive. So what they try to do is have 'very low staff, large space' formats. In places like India, people are much cheaper, but space inside the city is incredibly expensive. And you have to locate in the city because no one will sit in a bus and spend two hours to travel outside the city and reach your store. You need a smaller space but an 'overmanned' kind of format. And to compete with the thousands of local retailers, you have to deliver the best prices and have amazing supply chain management.

The consumer saves money because Subhikhsa exists. "so as long as consumers save money and we make money and we don't destroy value for ourselves, it's quite okay."
You will sell out it the business is not doing well. Or the business is not likely to be well in future.

Advice to Entrepreneurs

The way we look at it, there are two worlds - the real world and the virtual world. The virtual world is something which the financial types operate. The real world is where lot of us slog to physically do work.

Narendra Murkumbi, Shree Renuka Sugars

Entrepreneurship is about 'jugaad'. And a period of struggle is when that quality really comes to the fore. Your core business is not making money.
In every business, the more you know about the grassroots, the better.
"I think the drive to start off something on your own, once you have it, you will continue to have it. If something is running well and smoothly, you will look for new challenges. And in India, there are so many opportunities, that I think it doesn't make sense to stick to one business."
"I think the old philosophy that we all learnt even on the campus, or core competence, of doing one thing world class, it no longer holds in this country. The more successful entrepreneurs at the moment have successfully been able to jump into new opportunities. And also scale up those opportunities." And each new business is a challenge but it will never be as tough as the very first one.
If there was a moral to the Shree Renuka story it would be summed up like this - there is no old business. There is only old ways of doing business.
"Everything that we do, everyday, is innovative. It's not that you have to dream of something that nobody has ever done. All my ideas have been done by others. We have done only two things. One, we have done better than the guy who got that idea. And second, we have scaled those ideas up."
The limits are in your own thinking. The impossible is what you believe cannot be done.

Chender Baljee, Royal Orchid Hotels

'Pyar kiya to darna kya. Business kiya to ab socho karna kya.'
"The easiest thing is to make a spreadsheet but assumptions are on paper only."
"When things are tight you monitor every expense. Only when business is doing well inefficiencies creep in."

Advice to Entrepreneurs

If you love the business you take up, you will definitely make a success of it.
Learn the business you want to get into for a couple of years. Raising money is not so difficult today. There are VCs, or at least angel investors. There is even lease financing, for example.

Madan Mohanka, Tega Industries

"If you take a new product, which has not been tried out before, at least plan for 50% or double the investment you envisage. Otherwise you will be in trouble. When your project fails, and you have no money, people treat you like a dog. And you are like a beggar asking for money and help."
"If you believe in the product, and if you believe in the business, don't give it up. Never give it up."
"You need a lot of patience to handle people in government."
"It was very difficult for us to convince them that we can supply as good a material as you are buying from Europe or America. Give us a chance! So I had to take a very hard decision. I hired and Englishman and brought him to India to look after the export market for us. His salary was almost equal to the salary of the entire company. Now there are two ways to look at it. If I don't grow, the company will remain small and die over a period of time. And if I fight and if this man does a good job, the company will fly. So I would rather take a risk and die than not take a risk and die. It was the second hard decision in my life - to bring that man. But when he went out for exports, we found nobody asked him any questions - how big the company is, how small the company is, can you supply, not supply? We just started booking orders."

Advice for Entrepreneurs

There is a lot of scope in manufacturing. In India our manufacturing base is only 37%, whereas in all advanced countries, the manufacturing base is 65-75%. If any economy has to become strong in long term, it can become only with the manufacturing base, not the service base. Service base is only temporary. This will not create long term employment and if the economy has to become strong, it has to go into manufacturing.

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This book can read and re-read for its sheer simplicity of narration. There is also a dedicated site for this book. You can find some more excerpts of this book and make your own notes. If you have not read this book yet, do grab it today; from your friend, nearby bookstore or roadside vendor, libraries so to say the least.

http://www.stayhungrybook.com/

Over the years, I have strongly believed that if some "Desi" wishes to startup his/her own business or even is enthusiast about the entrepreneurial subjects, he should have a balance of reading between the western success stories and Indian success stories. I observe that our corporate and university libraries are full of stories from the western world / developed world.
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हिंदी कहानी - वह दिन

2012-02-25T00:22:00.000+05:30

वह दिन

सुबह के सात बजे होंगे. मैं अपनी पुस्तकों की मंत्रिपरिषद के समक्ष अपनी काबिलियत के प्रदर्शन में प्रयासरत था कि शायद कुछ हासिल हो जाये पर यह मंत्रिपरिषद हमारे 'भारत गणराज्य' के मंत्रिपरिषद की ही तरह मुझे घास नहीं डाल रही थी. तभी दरवाजे पर दो जोड़े दस्तक मेरे कर्णो में ख़ुशी बनकर समा गए, क्योंकि अब पढाई से छुट्टी मिलने वाली थी. भौंहों पर कोई शिकन नहीं आई क्योंकि सुबह का समय था. कलम को खुले हुए ही कॉपी पर छोड़कर उठ गया, इसलिए कि मेहमान के सामने ही किताबें बंद करूँगा ताकि वे और ये सब ये समझें कि मजबूरी है. लपकते हुए द्वार खोला और पलक झपकते हुए उन्हें देखा. उनकी एक इंच कि मुस्कान ने मेरी मुस्कान कि लम्बाई और भी बढ़ा दी. मेरे अगवानी करने से पहले वह सोफे पर धंस चुके थे.

दरवाजा बंद किया और किताबों में पेन डालकर उनको भी बंद किया. तब तक बातों का सिलसिला बढ़ रहा था. इसी बीच में रसोई विभाग को 'कुछ भी' का आदेश दे आया था. हम गुफ्तगू में मशगूल थे. हमने बातों ही बातों में राजनीति, दर्शन, अपराध और विमर्शन सब पर अपने अपने राय थोपे. बुश, मिखाइल, मार्गरेट और देश कि नीतियों को तार तार कर दिया हमने. वह हमारे तर्कों के आगे बौने लग रहे थे और हम फूलते ही जा रहे थे कि अचानक...

अचानक मेज पर दो गिलास नीम्बू के शरबत और उन गिलासों के पावों से लगी दासी प्लेट जिसमे थे दो बिस्कूट, नज़र किये गए. उनके रखने कि बेतरतीबी से साफ़ था कि रसोई विभाग कुपित है. कोई बात नहीं, हम युवाओ के मित्रों के साथ ऐसा ही होता है. बड़े बूढों के मित्र आयें तो देखिये आलम. मेजपोश पर कड़क चाय और वगैरह वगैरह सज जायेंगे जबकि बड़े बूढ़े 'फोर्मेल्टी वश ' थोडा ही खायेंगे. खैर हमारा भी समय आएगा. हमने गिलास का फीका द्रव 'ढकोचा' और बिस्कूटों पर रहम कर उन्हें 'मेहराने' के लिए छोड़ दिया (वैसे उन्होंने अपना हाथ बढाया जरूर था). गिलासों के दौर के बाद वे यूँ करबद्ध हो उठे कि हमें लगा कि सिर्फ कुछ 'ढकेलने' के लिए आये थे. मुझे लगा बुरा और मैंने सभ्यता से उन्हें सोफे पर लिया गिरा ताकि वे समझ ना पायें. वे बैठ तो गए, पर इस आशा से कि गर्मी के दिन हैं सो कुछ देर बाद फिर कुछ पेश होगा. अब मैं कुछ गंभीर मिजाज़ में आ गया था सो उनके मुस्कियों का प्रभाव ना पड़ा. उन्होंने बातों के दौरान ही पूछा, 'आपका वह कौन सा दिन था जब आप महत्वपूर्ण या महत्वहीन थे?' मैंने कुछ क्षण सोचा और उन्हें 'वह दिन' कि महिमा समझाने लगा.

परिभाषानुसार 'वह दिन' वह दिन होता है जो आपकी ज़िन्दगी के अनलिखे इतिहास का एक अनुच्छेद बन जाये या बन गया हो. 'वह दिन' दो प्रकार का होता है, (अ) वह दिन जब आप खुश हुए हों, (ब) वह दिन जब आप दुखी हुए हों. इन दो मुख्य भेदों के अनेक उपभेद हैं. मसलन वह दिन जब आपने किसी को पीटा हो (चाहे प्रत्यक्ष या परोक्ष). या फिर वह दिन जब आपकी शादी हुई हो (पता नहीं कि शादी ही है या आप भी औरों कि भांति सिर्फ 'फंस' गए हैं). तो मै आपको बता रहा था कि 'वह दिन' कि महिमा अपरम्पार है.

मेरा 'वह दिन' था जब मेरा जन्म हुआ था. अन्यों कि भांति हमने भी ख्वाब देखे थे कि हम होंगे निराले और निहायत शरीफ. पर इस कलियुग की मिलावट में शरीफों के बारे में सोचना भी पाप है क्यूंकि शरीफों को 'शरीफों' कि भांति खा लिया जाता है. दूसरा 'वह दिन' वह दिन था जब हमने स्कूल में दाखिला लिया, सोचा कि रोम्यां रोलां या सुकरात या फिर अरस्तु तो बनना ही है. पर कुछ ही दिनों में ख़ुशी काफूर हो गयी और हम बिना पेंदी के लोटा ही रह गए. तीसरा 'वह दिन' वह दिन था जब हम हाई स्कूल में अव्वल आये. चौथा 'वह दिन' वह दिन था जब हम 'इंटर महान' में अव्वल आये, पांचवा 'वह दिन' वह दिन होगा जब हम 'फलाना' करेंगे, क्षठवा 'वह दिन' वह दिन होगा जब हम 'ढेकानो' पर अपना रौब जमायेंगे, सातवां 'वह दिन' वह दिन होगा जब...आठवां 'वह दिन' वह दिन होगा जब...नवां 'वह दिन' जब.....मैं शेष विश्व से कट कर अपनी ही धुन में धारा प्रवाहमयी धारा में गिरता पड़ता चला जा रहा था और मेरी आँखें टंग चुकी थी कि कमरा हिल उठा.

"तेरा एक 'वह दिन' वह दिन भी होगा पुत्र जब तू संसार की निस्सारता को छोड़ कर नए वस्त्र पहनने चला जायेगा और तेरे 'वह दिन' सारे अगले जीवन में चले जायेंगे; रुकेंगे नहीं. अतः पागलपन छोड़ और कर्म कर कर्म".

मैं अवाक् था. बिना सर उठाये कमरे का मुआयना किया. वे नदारद थे और दीवारें सवाक हो गयीं थीं. यह असमंजस की स्तिथि कब तक रही पता नहीं, पर मैं आज तक इस घटना से अवाक् हूँ. यह चिरंतन सत्य, यह वेद वाक्य इस प्रकार मेरे सामने प्रस्तुत किया जायेगा, यह मैंने नहीं सोचा था.

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[यह रचना १९९५ में एक गुलाबचंद त्रिपाठी फाउन्डेसन द्वारा 'शुभाशंषा सम्मान" से पुरस्कृत और स्थानीय दूरदर्शन केंद्र से प्रसारित की गयी थी. उस उम्र में मन की आग जो भी उगलती थी, उसमे एक धुन होती थी. आज जो मन में आग है उसमे घुन लग गया है...]

Event report - JAPAN HABBA 2012

2012-02-20T00:20:00.001+05:30

JAPAN HABBA 2012 - AN INDO-JAPAN CULTURAL EXCHANGE PROGRAM
60 Years, 2 Nations, 1 Goal

19-Feb-2012, Bangalore University, India.

One day for Japan. Each day for Japan.

The day is Japan Habba 2012, the event held by Bangalore University, is in it seventh year of milestone. University's Jnanajyothi auditorium reverberates Japan beats whole day. This is my second year visit and my family's first year visit. This is closest that we can come to Japan by being in Bangalore. This is the closest we can be to Japan while being away from it.

This year's slogan is 60 years, 2 Nations, 1 Goal and the theme is KIZUNA, meaning 'Friendship ties'. It marks the 60th anniversary of Japan - India Diplomatic relations.

The day started with usual welcome address and introduction to dignitaries. Then addresses by dignitaries. I wish the format was updated to at least some latest entertainment standards. No mention of 'kolaveri...' in Japanese - thank God!

The auditorium was full by the time of cultural items. Morning had gone by with karaoke concepts where Japanese sang in Hindi, Kannada, Tamil and Indians sang in Japanese with ease.

Song: Mubarak ho tumko samaa ye suhana, by Kazumasa Kuboki san

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U58-kyx

Outside the auditorium, the food court adorned with Onigiri, Karaage Chicken, Yakisoba, Yakitori and Gyoza were truly competing with samosa, Chole- Bhature, and Idli- Wadas.

Outside was also brimming with Origami, Calligraphy, Kanji Mehndi, Manga reading, Kadou-flower arrangement, and off course Yukata wearing dashed with Tea ceremony. I was in little Japan in Bangalore today.

Outside did showcase higher education from Tokyo University and Ritsumeikan University and it was pleasure to see their booth. This is first time I saw Japanese universities showcasing in India which is sarcastically obsessed with western universities.

Inside Bollywood ruled our Japanese guest girls with 'chammak challo' and others. Bollywood is is one of the best glue.

Song: Chammak Challo by Japanese girls

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iH-lPcf5pCQ

Bonodori dance by students of Toyota Kirloskar Motors was a great choreography of a revered Culture. Last but not the least was the darling "Doraemon" song by Japanese kids who lamented that they have to see their favourite childhood hero in Hindi, by being in India. Algorithm march was another feather by these kids which left our children jaw dropped.

All in all, it was an event to be relived for many days to come. It must have been great pleasure 500+ Japanese community staying in Bangalore. This is third biggest Japanese community in India, after Delhi, Mumbai / Chennai.

Japan Habba 2012 is supported by Japan government, Japan chamber of commerce, BNK, Koyo and Japan Foundation.

Times Of India, Bangalore edition (20-Feb-2012), did also cover this event "With love from Japan"

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/bangalore/With-love-from-japan/articleshow/11957589.cms

Enjoy and Revel in the glory of Nihon a.k.a Japan!

Book Notes - The White Tiger

2012-02-18T10:51:00.002+05:30

The White Tiger
(winner of The Man Booker Prize 2008)
Aravind Adiga

No Entrepreneur has it easy. No Entrepreneur will ever have it easy.
Their journey though is generally a potboiler story in its own uniqueness - each one has one. What is less known, not known or purposefully hidden, is the underbelly of entrepreneurial journey. Every hard boiled entrepreneur has to be part of this underbelly and play through its rules. Aravind Adiga's "The White Tiger" is probably the first such book. The journey of a 'no man' to 'the man' in this entrepreneurial journey is sloshed with heavy does of dark alleys. The beauty of this book is in its hauntedness, which keeps chasing you after you have read it, for a long time. The book tries to elevate Bangalore into a cult city status and does a good job at it.

Some excerpts of my choice, for you.

1. ...And our nation, though it has no drinking water, electricity, sewage system, public transportation, sense of hygiene, discipline, courtesy, or punctuality, does have entrepreneurs. thousands and thousands of them. Especially in the field of technology. And these entrepreneurs - we entrepreneurs - have setup all these outsourcing companies that virtually run America now.

2. ...When you have heard the story of how I got to Bangalore and became one of its successful *though probably least known* businessmen, you will know everything there is to know about how entrepreneurship is born, nurtured, and developed in this, the glorious twenty first century of man.

3. The entrepreneur's curse. He has to watch his business all the time.

4. My country is the kind where it pays to play it both ways: the Indian entrepreneur has to be straight and crooked, mocking and believing, sly and sincere, at the same time.

5. Entrepreneurs are made from half-baked clay.

6. I am not a sentimental man, Mr. Jiabao. Entrepreneurs can't afford to be.

7. To break the law of this land - to turn bad news into good news is entrepreneur's prerogative

8. I have always been a big believer in the education especially my own

9. In his journey from village to city, from Laxmangarh to Delhi, the entrepreneur's path crosses any number of provincial towns that have the pollution and noise and traffic of a big city - without any hint of the true city's sense of history, planning and grandeur. Half-baked cities, built for half-baked men

10. There is no reward for entrepreneurship in most of India. It's a sad fact.

11. I absorbed everything - that's the amazing thing about entrepreneurs. We are like sponges - we absorb and grow.

12. It's 2.44a.m. The hour of degenerates, drug addicts, and Bangalore based entrepreneurs.

13. The great socialist is said to have embezzled one billion rupees from the darkness, and transferred that money into a bank account in a small beautiful country in Europe full fo white people and black money.

14. Now that the date for the elections had been set, and declared on radio, election fever had started spreading again. These are the three main diseases of this country, are typhoid, cholera, and election fever. This last one is the worst; it makes people talk and talk about things that they have no say in.

15. Would they do it this time? Would they beat the Great Socialist and win the elections? Had they raised enough money of their own, and bribed enough policement, and bought enough fingerprints of their own, to win? Like eunuchs discussing the Kama Sutra, the voters discuss the elections in Laxmangarh.

16. If I may go back for a moment to that WANTED poster, Your Excellency. Being called a murderer: fine, I have no objectio to that. It's a fact: I am a sinner, a fallen human. But to be called a murderer by the police! What a fucking joke.

17. Free people don't know the value of freedom, that's the problem.

18. Drivers like to say that some men are first-gear types. Mr. Ashok was a classic first-gear man. He liked to start things, but nothing held his attention for long.

19. A servant gets to know his master's intestinal tract from end to end - from lips to anus.

20. God, why is it always the wrong kind of Indian who goes abroad?

21. When you retain semen in your lower body, it leads to evil movements in the fluids of your upper body.

22. Sometimes what is most animal in a man .......best thing in him.

23. Iqbal, that great poet, was so right. The moment you recognize what is beautiful in this world, you stop being a slave.

24. See, men and women in Bangalore live like the animals in a forest do. Sleep in the day and then work all night, until two, three, four, five o'clock, depending, because their masters are on the other side of the world, in America. Big question -: how will the boys and girls - girls especially - get from home to work place in the late evening and then get back home at three in the morning? there is no night bus system in Bangalore, no train system like in Mumbai. the girls would not be safe on buses or trains anyway. the men of this city, frankly speaking are animals. Thats where entrepreneurs come in.

25. The last stage in my amazing success story, sir, was to go from being a social entrepreneur to a business entrepreneur. This part wasn't easy at all.

26. They are my employees, I am their boss, that's all. I make them sign a contract and I sign it too, and bothof us must honour that contract. that's all. if they notice the way I talk, the way I dress, the way I keep things clean, they will go up in life. if they don't, they will be drivers all their lives. I leave the choice up to them. when the work is done, I kick them out of office, no chitchat, no cups of coffee. A white tiger keeps no friends, its too dangerous.

27. I am sorry, madam, i said "I offer you my sympathies, in addition, I offer you my company, White Tiger Drivers".
"Do all your drivers have licences?"
"Offcourse, madam. You can call the police and check."
she did just that, and called me back. I think the police must have put in a good word for me. And that was how I got my own - as they say in English - 'start up'.

28. Only four men in history have led successful revolution to free the slaves and kill their masters, this page said:
Alexander the Great
Abraham Lincoln of America
Mao of your country
And a fourth man. It may have been Hitler, I can't remember.

29. An Indian revolution? No, sir, it won't happen. People in this country are still waiting for the war of their freedom to come from somewhere else - from jungles, from the mountain, from China, from Pakistan. That will never happen. Every man must make his own Benares.

30. Mobile Phones cause cancer in the brain and shrink your masculinity the Japanese invented them to diminish the white man brain and balls at the same time.

31. You will have to keep paying and paying the fuckers. But I complain about the police the way the rich complain; not the way the poor complain. the difference is everything.

32. I love my startup - this chandelier, and this silver laptop, and these twenty six Toyota Qualises - but honestly, I 'll get bored of it sooner or later. I am a first-gear man, Mr Premier. In the end, I'll have to sell this start up to some other moron - entrepreneur, I mean - and head into a new line. You see, I am always a man who sees 'tomorrow' when others see 'today'.

हिंदी कविता - थाली में चाँद

2012-02-12T00:07:00.000+05:30

पानी की थाली में ज्यों चाँद उतर आता है

यूँ ज़िन्दगी में मेरे तुम उतर आई हो.

चाँद हकीकत में कोई छू नहीं पाता है

चांदनी बन कर तुम जीवन परछाई हो.

तुम्हे भी मैं कभी छू ना पाऊंगा

तुम शायद प्यार की गहरायी हो.

मुझ जैसे किनारे बैठे मछुआरे ने

जैसे 'गोताखोर की मोती' पायी हो.

एक 'अपना परिवार', जैसे सपना साकार

तुम कहाँ से निकल चली आई हो?

सोचता हूँ किस प्रयास से

तुम मुझ तक पहुच आई हो.

आओ इस ज़िन्दगी का शुक्रिया करें

कि तुम मुझसे मिल आई हो.

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सन २००४, मुंबई के अंतहीन रोमांटिक महीनो में लिखी गयी थी ये - जिसे आप तो कविता कहेंगे परन्तु मैं कहूँगा दिल की आवाज़.

कुछ बात है कि हिंदुस्तान कि सरज़मीन पर मुंबई जैसा कोई और शहर नहीं, कोई और दरियादिल जगह नहीं, कोई और मस्ताना नगर नहीं जहाँ किस्मत कर्म का पीछा करती है. भारत को ३० मुंबई जैसे शहरों की सख्त और तुरंत जरूरत है.

Book Notes - GOLDMAN SACHS - The Culture of Success

2012-02-09T23:51:00.003+05:30

A book, as they say, is known by its cover. I must say that a book on GS (popular name of Goldman Sachs) adds to the aura to the institution which is synonymous with wall street for significantly more than a century. It remains my favorite books read all time. Here, I bring some excerpts of the book to you:

1. A partnership is a much more personal organizational structure than a corporation.
2. In a private partnership none of the assets of partners are shielded from liability, and the individual partners are exposed down to the pennies in their children's piggy banks.
3. Capital should be a restraint. It helps you make selections.
4. All partners regardless of their stake, left the bulk of each year's earnings with the firm, to be withdrawn only after retirement. Partners took home an 8 percent draw each year against the amount they had in their capital accounts(the amount of the firm's profits they had accrued but left invested with the firm.
5. If there is a recurring theme In our thought process, it is that Goldman Sachs under promises and over delivers to itself.
6. Not everyone can be the first with a new idea, but there is no excuse for not copying a good idea quickly
7. Through its strong client focus Goldman Sachs has been able to control egos and monitor arrogance. The client, mot the salesman, banker, or trader, is the focus of any transaction. The banker is there to do his client's bidding.
8. Clients are simply in your custody. Someone before you established the relationship and someone after you will carry it on.
9. If you are willing to turn down money and you keep your ego under control, you can save yourself a lot of heartache in this business.
10. Gus levy's maxim- greedy, but long term greedy, was the firm's watchword.
11. Partners reinvested almost all their earnings in the firm, so the focus was always on the future.
12. Value of ownership-No one ever washes a rental car.
13. One of the most visible manifestations of the the firm's culture is its emphasis o understatement. Men of great wealth, the partners of Goldman Sachs deliberately discouraged its overt trappings...believing money is for bank account, not flashing about.
14. Money is always fashionable- Henry Goldman
15. Save and serve.-Henry Goldman
16. Most men can stand adversity; very few men can stand success.
17. During 1930s Weinberg's contribution to the firm was so great that he was accorded one third of the firm's profits. But as his son john pointed out more than sixty years later, one third of nothing is still nothing.
18. To Gus(Gus Levy) short range was what's happening this morning and long range whats going to happen this afternoon. Levy had two secretaries on the theory that he would never need to wait for one to be free.
19. Short term profits would not be earned at the expense of of long term relationships.
20. J Aaron's philosophy was 'never tell anybody how much money you make, just smile on the way to the bank.' in a public limited company we would never have been able to do that'
21. The standards of fitness for individuals within an organization should be conducive to achieving fitness for the organization.
22. The risk arbitrage business, in its most simplified form, involves the purchase or sale of securities deemed to be mis-priced, often because of their complexity or some change occurring in the company of which the shares represent ownership. Many of these opportunities arise as a result of a takeover by one company by another.
Risk arbitrage is all about risk.
"you had to stick to your discipline and try to reduce everything in your mind to pluses and minuses and to probabilities", Rubin remembers. "if a deal goes through, what do you win?" if it does not go through, what do you loose? It was a high risk business, but I'll tell you, it did teach you to think in terms of probabilities instead of absolutes. You couldn't be in that business and not internalize that probabilistic approach to life. It was what you were doing all the time."
23. When Weiner announced his retirement after forty years he was a vigorous sixty five years old. He joked that wanted to out "a master of my own destiny, and not drooling." he explained: These guys are ready, and I'm ready. This is the logical time. When the goose is cooked, you better go ahead and eat it."
24. Friedman has said "facts are extremely wiggly; they are like greased pigs, so you have to ask a lot of questions."
25. Losses are part of trading; learn something from them and move on. Rubin grew up with trading risk. He argued that "as long as there are risks there will be losses. If the day ever comes when there are no risks, there will also be no profits."
26. Levy taught many things, but the most important was about risk. Never worry about how much money you are going to make on a trade, focus instead on how much you are going to lose if you make a mistake.
27. For Rubin and Friedman, if GS was not surging ahead, it was falling behind.
28. In 1993, profits were going up so fast that mo one worried about the fact that risk was going up faster- a trader
29. In 1993 annual review, Friedman praised the firm for its exceptional year. But he took time to remind all concerned that trees do not grow to the sky. A lover of military history, he knew that after great victories in battle generals would have a spectacular procession to mark the event. As they marched in the parade someone would follow a few steps behind whispering in their ear, "remember you are mortal, remember you are mortal."
30. Investment banks live and die by their ability to analyze the balance between risk and reward.
31. Bad assets(non performing loans and the like), liquidity problems, and lack of legal compliance are the three things that can bring down firms in a heartbeat.
32. There are good times and bad, but the shared values that make up the firm's culture are immutable.- John Weinberg
33. Don't trust self made men because they think it's their fault.- Michel David Weill, Chairman of Lazard Freres
34. Jon Corzine could deliver bad news and make you feel good about it.
35. For every one you layoff, you frighten four," says limited partner Roy Smith. "You're destroying loyalty in the interest of year-by-year profit management."
36. Corzine feels that a leader passes on a culture not just by what he says and does, but also by whom he selects for the succeeding generation of leadership.
37. By bringing a larger group of partners into the upper reaches of management, the culture of the firm, as transmitted by its leaders, could more easily be spread to a larger group of people. "You have to broaden the number of people who have a leadership mandate," Corzine said. "Against that you have to make sure that you don't dilute the value of the mandate."
38. "We need to do something that challenges the organization to be more than it is today," Jon Corzine
39. Structure follows strategy.
40. Good firms worry about competition. Great firms worry about their clients. - Hank Paulson
41. The two Johns were opposed to the partners selling the firm. They believed strongly that "if it ain't broke don't fix it."
42. Greed is a two-sided coin, Corzine argued, and a system in which 1.5 percent of the participants reap the vast majority of the rewards in good times and adjust the compensation and headcount of the other 98 percent of the firm in rough times also might be viewed as grossly unfair. Perhaps, Corzine ventured, selling the firm in good times and spreading the largesse broadly, deeply, and generously would actually be less greedy.
43. In a risky cyclical business it makes no sense to expose the resources of a handful of people to the whims of the world's capital markets.
44. The most successful traders make their fortunes over time not by picking the biggest winners but by deftly cutting their losses, putting it all behind them and then moving on with an open mind.

Book Notes - ONE UP ON WALL STREET

2012-02-02T21:09:00.001+05:30

While reading this book couple of years back in Japan, I just laid my eyes in my real estate agents' office, and borrowed from him. It appeared to be just another book on the shelf. Once I started reading and went past couple of pages, it appeared to be a volume. I then read this book in trains, home, parks and while walking to office and finished it with more hunger, anger (that why I did not read it much before) and aggressiveness. Here, I bring some excerpts of this book, for you:

1. There is unwritten rule on Wall street "You'll never lose your job losing your client's money in IBM"

2. Acceptable mediocrity is far more comfortable than diverse performance.

3. There's an unwritten rule that the bigger the client, the more talking the portfolio manager has to do to please him.

4. The old wall street adage "Never invest in anything that eats or needs repairs" may apply to racehorses, but it's malarkey when it comes to houses.

5. Only invest what you could afford to lose without that loss having any effect on your daily life in the foreseeable future.

6. "Rise early, work hard, strike oil" - J Paul Getty

7. If you must forecast, forecast often.

8. I believe in buying great companies-especally companies that are undervalued, and /or underappreciated.

9. "As far as I am concerned, the stock market doesnt exist. It is there only as a reference to see if anybody is offering to do something foolish" - Warren Buffett

10. Don't overestimate the skill and wisdom of professionals.

Pointers:

Take advantage of what you already know.
Look for opportunities that havent yet been discovered and certified by Wall STreet - companies that are "off the radar scope"
Invest in a house before you invest in a stock.
Invest in companies, not in the stock market.
Ignore short term fluctuations.
Large profits can be common stocks.
Large losses can be made in common stocks.
Predicting the economy is futile.
Predicting the short term direction of the stock market is futile
The long term returns from stocks are both relatively predictable and also far superior to the long term returns from bonds
Keeping up with a company in which you own stock is like playing an endless stud-poker hand
Common stocks aren't for everyone, nor even for all phases of a person's life.
The average person is exposed to interesting local companies and products years before the professionals
Having an edge will help you make money in stocks.
In the stock market, one in the hand is worth ten in the bush

11. So often we struggle to pick a winning stock, when all the while a winning stock has been struggling to pick us.

12. A great patients's drug is the one that cures an affliction once and for all, but a great investor's drug is one that the patient has to keep buying.

13. In general, if you polled all the doctors, I'd bet only a small percentage would turn out to be invested in medical stocks, and more would be invested in oil; and if you polled the shoe-store owners, more would be invested in aerospace than in shoes, while the aerospace engineers are more likely to dabble in shoe stocks. Why is that stock certificates, like grasses, are always greener in somebody else's pasture I'm not sure.

14. Investing without research is like playing stud poker and never looking at the cards.

15. I separate the growth stocks into slow growers (sluggards), medium growers (starlwarts), and then the fast growers - the superstocks that deserve the most attention.

16. A sure sign of a slow grower is that it pays a generous and regular dividend.

17. If you choose wisely, Fast Growers is the land of the 10 to 40 baggers and even 200 baggers. With a small portfolio, one or two of these can make a career.

18. Turnaround stocks make up lost ground very quickly.

19. "Any idiot can run this business" is one characteristic of the perfect company, the kind of stock I dream about. You never find the perfect company, but if you can imagine it, then you'll know how to recognize favorable attributes, the most important thirteen of which are as follows:

IT SOUNDS DULL - OR, EVEN BETTER, RIDICULOUS
IT DOES SOMETHING DULL
IT DOES SOMETHING DISAGREEABLE
IT'S A SPINOFF
THE INSTITUTIONS DON'T OWN IT, AND THE ANALYSTS DON'T FOLLOW IT
THE RUMORS ABOUND: IT'S INVOLVED WITH TOXIC WASTE AND/OR THE MAFIA
THERE'S SOMETHING DEPRESSING ABOUT IT
IT'S A NO GROWTH INDUSTRY
IT'S GOT A NICHE
PEOPLE HAVE TO KEEP BUYING IT
IT'S A USER OF TECHNOLOGY
THE INSIDERS ARE BUYERS
THE COMPANY IS BUYING BACK SHARES

20. The common alternatives to buying back share are (1) raising the dividend, (2) developing new products, (3) starting new operations, and (4) making acquisitions.

21. If I could avoid a single stock, it would be the hottest stock in the hottest industry, the one that gets the most favorable publicity, the one that every investor hears about in the car pool or on the commuter train- and succumbing to the social pressure, often buys.

22. BEWARE THE NEXT SOMETHING

23. AVOID DIWORSIFICATIONS

24. BEWARE THE WHISPER STOCK

25. BEWARE THE MIDDLEMAN

26. BEWARE THE STOCK WITH THE EXCITING NAME

27. Although it is easy to forget sometimes, a share of stock is not a lottery ticket. It's part ownership of a business.

28. A quick way to tell if a stock is overpriced is to compare the price line to the earnings line. If you bought familiar growth companies when the stock price fell well below the earnings line, and sold them when the stock price rose dramatically above it, the chances are you'd do pretty well.

29. The p/e ratio can be thought of as the number of years it will take the company to earn back the amount of your initial investment- assuming, of course, that the compay's earnings stay constant.

30. You might begin by asking whether the p/e ratios of various stocks you own are low, high, or average, relative to the industry norms. Sometimes you'll hear things like "this company is selling at a discount to the industry" - meaning that its p/e is at a bargain level.

31. A broker can also give you the historical record of a company's p/e-and the same information can be found on the S&P reports also available from the brokerage firm. Before you buy a stock, you might want to track its p/e ratio back through several years to get a sense of its normal levels. New companies, of course, haven't been around long enought to have such records.

32. Company p/e ratios do not exist in a vaccum. The stock market as a whole has its own collective p/e ratio, which is good indicator of whether the market at large is overvalued or undervalued. When you find that a few stocks are selling at inflated prices relative to the earnings, its likely that most stocks are selling at inflated prices relative to earnings.

33. There are five basic ways a company can increase earnings: reduce costs, raise prices; expand into new markets; sell more of its product in the old markets; or revitalize, close, or otherwise dispose of a losing operation. These are the factors to investigate as you develop the story.

34. Wait to see if this good idea from the neighborhood would actually succeed someplace else.

35. It's never too late not invest in an unproven enterprise.

36. What you can't get from the anual report you can get by asking your broker, by calling the company, by visiting the company, or by doing some grassroots research, also known as kicking the tires.

37. If you buy and sell stocks through a full service brokerage firm instead of a discount house, you're probably paying an extra 30 cents a share in commissions.

38. If you use the broker as an advisor (a foolhardy practice generally, but sometimes worthwhile), then ask the broker to give you the two miniute speech on the recommended stocks.

39. Professionals call companies all the time, yet amateurs never think of it. If you have specific questions, the investor relations office is a good place to get the answers. The accepted form of the question is subtle and indirect: "what are the wall street estimates of your company's earnings for the upcoming year?"

40. Better you lead off with a question that shows you've done some research on your own.

41. Even if you have no script, you can learn something by asking two general questions: "What are the positives this year?" and "what are the negatives?"

42. When Looking at the same sky, people in mature industries see clouds where people in immature industries see pie.

43. When I visit a headquarters, what I'm really after is a feel for the place.

44. The first thing, by the way, is: "when is the last time a fund manager or an analyst visited here?" If the answer is "two years ago, I think," then I'm ecstatic.

45. Rich earnings and a cheap headquarters is a great combination.

46. Among other things, proxy statements tell you how many shares are owned by the various corporate officers and directors, and how much those people are paid.

47. I've continued to believe that wandering through stores and tasting things is a fundamental investment strategy.

48. It's amazing how much analysis of the auto industry you can do in the parking lots of ski lodges, shopping centers, bowling alleys, or churches.

49. The p/e ratio of any company that's fairly priced will equal its growth rate. I'm talking about growth rate of earnings here. In general, a p/e ratio that's half the growth rate is very positive, and one that's twice the growth, is very negative.

50. A slightly more complicated formula enables us to compare growth rates to earnings, while also taking the dividends into account. Find the long term growth rate (say, company X's is 12 percent), add the dividend yield (Company X pays 3 percent), and divide by the p/e ratio (Company X's is 10). 12 plus 3 divided by 10 is 1.5

51. How much does the company owe, and how much does it own? Debt versus Equity. It's just the kind of thing a loan officer would want to know about you in deciding if you are a good credit risk.

52. Among turnarounds and troubled companies, I pay special attention to the debt factor. More than anything else, it's debt that determines which companies will survive and which will go bankrupt in a crisis.

53. It's the kind of debt, as much as the actual amount, that separates the winners from the losers in a crisis. There's bank debt an there's funded debt.

54. "Do you know the only thing that gives me pleasure? It's to see my dividends coming in." - John D Rockefeller, 1901

55. The smaller companies that don't pay dividends are likely to grow much faster because of it. They're plowing the money into expansion. The reason that companies issue stock in the first place is so they can finance their expansion without having to burden themselves with debt from the bank. I'll take an aggressive grower over a stodgy old dividend payer any day.

56. A company with a 20 or 30 year record of regularly raising the dividend is your best bet.

57. The flaw is that the stated book value often bears little relationship to the actual worth of the company. It often understates or overstates reality by a large margin.

58. Unwritten rule - The closer you get to a finished product, the less predictable the resale value. You know how much cotton is worth, but who can be sure about an orange cotton shirt?

59. Overvalued assets on the left side of the balance sheet are especially treacherous when there is a lot of debt on the right. Let's say that company shows $400 million in assets and $300 million in debts, resulting in a positive book value of $100 million. You know the debt part is a real number. But if the $400 million in assets will bring only $200 million in a bankruptcy sale, then the actual book value is a negative $100 million. The company is less than worthless.

60. Just as often as book value overstates true worth, it can understate true worth. This is where you get the greatest asset plays.

61. There are many kinds of hidden assets besides gold and silver. Brand names such as coca-cola have tremendous value that isn't reflected on the books. So do patented drugs, cable franchises, TV and radio stations - all are carried at original cost, then depreciated until they, too, disappear from the asset side of the balance sheet.

62. "Goodwill" is carried on the new books as an asset, and eventually it, too, will be written off. This in turn will create another potential asset play.

63. Sometimes the best way to invest in a company is to find the foreign owner of it. I realize this is easier said than done, but if you have any access to European companies, you can stumble onto some unbelievable situations. European companies in general are not well analyzed, and in many cases they're not analyzed at all. I discovered this on a fact finding trip to sweden, where Volvo and several other giants of Swedish industry were covered by one person who didn't even have a computer.

64. Cash flow is the amont of money a company takes in as a result of doing business. All companies take in cash, but some have to spend more than others to get it. This is a critical difference that makes a Philip Morris such a wonderfully reliable investment, and a steel company such a shaky one.

65. Occasionally I find a company that has modest earnings and yet is a great investment because of the free cash flow. Usually, it's a company with a huge depreciation allowance for old equipment that doesn't need to be replaced in the immediate future. The company continues to enjoy the tax breaks (the depreciation on equipment is tax deductible) as it spends as little as possible to modernize and renovate.

66. Dedicated asset buyers look for this situation: a mundane company going nowhere, a lot of free cash flow, and owners who aren't trying to build up the businesses. It might be a leasing company with a bunch of railroad containers that have a 12 year life. All the company wants to do is contract the old container business and squeeze as much cash out of it as possible. In the upcoming decade, managment will shrink the plant, phase out the containers, and pile up cash. From a $10 million operation, they might be able to generate $40 million this way. It wouldn't work in the computer business, because the prices drop so fast that old inventory doesn't hold its value long enough for anybody to squeeze anything out of it.

67. A company may brag that sales are up 10 percent, but if inventories are up 30 percent, you have to say to yourself: "wait a second. Maybe they should have marked that stuff down and gotten rid of it. Since they didn't get rid of it, they might have a problem next year and a bigger problem the year after that. The new stuff they make will compete witht the old stuff, and inventories will pile up even higher until they're forced to cut prices, and that means less profit."

68. On the bright side, if a company has been depressed and the inventrories are beginning to be depleted, it's the first evidence that things have turned around.

69. As more companies reward their employees with stock options and pension benefits, investors are well advised to consider the consequences.

70. That "growth" is synonymous with "expansion" is one of the most popular misconception on wall street., leading people to overlook the really great growth companies such as Philip Morris.

71. one more thing about growth rate: all else being equal, a 20 percent grower selling at 20 times earnings (a p/e ratio of 20) is a much better buy than a 10 percent grower selling at 10 time earnings (a p/e of 10). This may sound like an esoteric point, but its important to understand what happens to the earnings of the faster growers that propels the stock price.

72. Its no accident that the Wal-Marts and The Limiteds can go up so much in a decade. Its all based on the arithmetic of compounded earnings.

73. Whats the bottom line? Whats the real bottom line? Its the final number at the end of an income statement: profit after taxes. Profit before taxes, also known as the pretax profit margin, is a tool I use in analyzing companies. Thats whats left of companys annual sales dollar after al the costs, including depreciation and interest expenses, have been deducted. Pretax profit margin is one more factor to consider in evaluating a companys staying power in hard times.

What you want, then, is a relatively high profit margin in a long term stock that you plan to hold through good times and bad, and a relatively low profit margin in a successful turnaround.

The Final Checklist

Stocks in General

1. The p/e ratio. It is hight or low for this particular company and for similar companies in the same industry.

2. The percentage or institutional ownership. The lower the better.

3. Whether insiders are buying and whether the company itself is buying back its own shares. Both are positive signs.

4. The record of earnings growth to date and whether the earnings are sporadic or consistent.

5. Whether the company has a strong balance sheet or a weak balance sheet (debt to equity ratio) and how its rated for financial strength.

6. The cash position. With $16 in net cash, I know Ford is unlikely to drop below $16 a share. Thats the floor on the stock

Slow growers

1. These are big companies that arent likely to go out of business. The key issue is price, and p/e ratio will tell you whether you are paying too much.

2. Check for possible diworseifications that may reduce earnings in the future.

3. Check the companys long term growth rate, and whether it has kept up the same momentum in recent years.

4. If you plan to hold the stock forever, see how the company has fared during previous recessions and market drops.

Cyclicals

1. Keep a close watch on inventories, and the supply demand relationship. Watch for new entrants, which is usually a dangerous development.

2. anticipate a shrinking p/e multiple over time as business recovers and investors look ahead to the end of the cycle, when peak earnings are achieved.

3. If you know your cyclical, you have an advantage in figuring out the cycles.

Fast growers

1. Investigate whether the product thats supposed to enrich the company is a major part of the companys business.

2. What the growth rate in earnings has been in recent years.

3. That the company has duplicated its successes in more than one city or town, to prove that expansion will work.

4. That the company still has room to grow.

5. Whether the stock is selling at a p/e ratio at or near the growth rate.

6. Whether the expansion is speeding up or slowing down.

Turnarounds

1. Most important, can the company survive a raid by its creditors? How much cash does the company have? How much debt?

2. It its bankrupt already, then whats left for the shareholders?

3. How is the company supposed to be turning around? Has it rid itself of unprofitable divisions?

4. Is the business coming back?

5. Are costs being cut? If so, what will the effect be?

Asset Plays

1. Whats the value of the assets? Are there any hidden assets?

2. How much debt is there to detract from these assets?

3. Is the company taking on new debt, making the assets less valuable?

4. Is there a raider in the wings to help shareholders reap the benefits of the assets?

Event - JAPAN HABBA 2012

2012-02-01T23:53:00.003+05:30

All Japanophiles invited