dyutita

Upload your Interest toward Social Networking & Hydroponics: Join the Brigade

noreply@blogger.com (M.P.Singh) — Sun, 25 Sep 2011 06:06:00 +0000

Dear Friends,

There is an eagerness toward the unanswered questions, which leads an individual toward search and search and research. In identifying such answers, we need to suggest and answer for our quest.

Today, we need to know your quest toward two issues:

1. Social Networking sites: for expressing your quest click on the link: SNS survey

2. Hydroponics: for expressing your quest click on the link: Hydroponics survey

Just invest 5-10 minutes of time and feel proud to be the part of research two important aspects.

Importantly, If you are in corporate, circulate among friends.

If you are academician/ research scholar/ Researcher do favor and spread about these issues among your students and friends.

If you are student, know about the basics of research and spread among your friends.

Feel proud by supporting a research work.

Lot more interesting works are under pipeline which will create thrill in you regarding the result. Every time with new work we will ask for your support and will provide the research finding too on the same platform..

List of Individuals who have supported till date are:

1 s. kumar 2 Anuj Jain 3 raj kumar 4 sudhir kumar srivastava 5 Arpita Chakraborty 6 Deb 7 Karan Jindal 8 Amit Manglani 9 Manaswi 10 Dharmender 11 GAURAV KANSAL 12 Jimmy Thomas 13 ravikant swami 14 B Singh 15 hemant kumar singh 16 AMIT KUMAR 17 Dr Bhawdeep Singh 18 Anubhuti 19 Chirag Pande 20 sugandh rawal 21 jjjj 22 Hridesh Baweja 23 Jatin Joshi 24 Anandita Jain 25 Raju 26 Simran 27 B K Singh 28 Shweta Bhatt 29 Saket Chaturvedi 30 anup bang 31 Harleen 32 Nalin Bhatnagar 33 amit rai 34 ashutosh pandey 35 Priyanka Verma 36 Deepak Mandal 37 Nitin 38 Chaitanya Agrawal 39 Anand 40 nimish kumar singh 41 sonik gupta 42 Rajat Mohta 43 Babru Bahan Singh 44 Sanjay Purohit

Do favor and Enjoy.....

Thanks and regards,

Manvendra Pratap Singh, Shamaile Nabi

Assistant Professor

Confidence Rejuvenation

noreply@blogger.com (M.P.Singh) — Sun, 28 Nov 2010 06:04:00 +0000

Today Its very dishearten for me; three friends (very close friends) three marriages; 2 in luck now and 1 in Delhi but unlucky and unable to attend any of them. First two because of office interruption wont get leave and 3rd in Delhi because of personal problem and medical check up.

Above all, my objective of writing this blog is to mention that zeal and speak up the truth play a vital role in any of decision and personality making. Moreover every

successful individual/family is very social in nature and they never missed out such opportunity at any cost. Its not because of eagerness for party no! its about relationship.

I am considering the marriage issue because in marriages earlier we made lot of commitments with our friends that we will be there at any cost etc but when the time comes we try to skip of the situation. Try to avoid such circumstance by switching off the mobile or by giving some lame excuses. Similarly, in business scenario, sales people normally used to do the same when they sort of their targets or points. They give various excuses to their bosses to come out of the issue for that point of time.

Suppose once we get and opportunity to hide from the p

roblem then we always try the same till the time we spoil our image , growth prospect and goodwill in office. If we make it as practice its promise that we will be always ready with excuses.

Do we ever feel sorry for our conduct, if yes it means somewhere we did wrong because of that our persona start changing and we start loosing confidence and zeal in us to face the tough situations but after effect of this phenomena is very huge and really make u sorry submissive and back foot individual that u can’t be able to express yourself in any of the conditions.

Its my personal experience that never hide anything if you are unable to attend the marriage better you talk to your friend explain him your problem, and say sorry. Similarly in business scenario, try this you won’t be dishearten and won’t b

e embarrass in any of the situation throughout the life. It will give you new inspiration, motivation, zeal to do the new things. Similarly new ways to find out the best possible solution in different situations so that every thing will perfectly alright. Moreover, personality dynamics will also be changed in positive direction and give you fresh energy to do the things.

I have tried just now! You try and tell me that is it true?

Imperialism to Naxalism

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 28 Sep 2010 10:35:00 +0000

Speaking from the Colonial point of view there is a striking similarity between colonizing a country in those days and acquiring a company in these days. While making a acquisition these days all companies need is a controlling stake. The controlling stake obviously comes from buying fat board members or agency which are few in numbers. Once it is done the fate of stakeholders are left to be decided…Of course with lot of ifs/buts/unions/laws/policies in between.

When East India Company came all they had to do was buy or please upper strata – to say Nawabs, Nizams, Kings. Once they agreed or sometimes subjugated, the fate of citizens was left to be decided.

From the Era of defunct Nawabs & Nizams power drifted to upper middle class Browns and Eurasians. These people were Indians but not in there thought process and up bring. These people were not former rulers but people either born or brought up in English Style. They loved eating, dressing and speaking English. They send there sons to Trinity and oxfords of England and the sons came back to become administrators of Her Majesty’s govt. (The lower class in any case was not much affected; actually British gave them a stage to showcase their woes).There was no unified Leadership, such was the situation that when Pandit Nehru came back after completing his degree form Trinity he was afraid of Public Speaking, partially because he was shy and mostly because he wasn’t sure the masses will cope up with his English English.

Gandhiji after his return from South Africa and his Indian Victory in Champaran was the first leader to connect with masses, the village masses (Kisans), which was huge. Gandhiji was believable and people followed. He was not discussing policies in committees with Intelligentsia but was going to villages. He knew the power of public opinion and wanted masses to have and give their opinion in shaping India of future.

To give his struggle and masses strong reason to unite, Gandhiji brought back concept of “Ram Rajya” so that Hindus can be united for a common cause. He partly succeeded, Hindus were in majority. But Untouchablity was something which again was not allowing masses in village to participate as equals. The upper class Hindus would not fight or participate with them; they will protect their heavens rather than fight for earthly freedom.

To fight this menace and uplift the self esteem of trodden, Gandhiji called them “Harijan”- Son of God.

By the way Mr. Jinnah was a secular Muslim and one reason why he drifted away from Gandhiji was because he wasn’t of the opinion of mixing politics and religion like Gandhiji was doing.

Harijan proved good for all parties and parasites. Mr. Jinnah got Pakistan, Harijan got acceptability, to an extent and the duo of Kanshi Ram and Mayawati got Utter Pradesh…though much latter.

Back to our times, when all these struggles were going on there was one more aspect to India which was completely forgotten. The Tribal India, the aborigine India. Tribals were mostly secluded from the Indian Politics. By tribal I don’t mean Shibu Soren, but real people.

There was a leadership gap just like Pre Independent Indian once had. May be we need to wait for another someone from Africa who will connect the gap, for the time being Naxals are feeling the gap, though in a Chinese way. Coming to Corporate India, shouldn’t they get all those carbon credit points?

Nuts & Bolts

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 06 Jun 2010 14:06:00 +0000

Education today is merely a displacement device, people are nomads once again. The number of Institution which can develop curiosity for knowledge and passion for innovation is marginal. Youth get secondary education in towns and are left with very less of choice but to leave for bigger cities. The higher education which they get mostly turn them into small nut and bolts which can only befit a big machine without any entrepreneurial value of its own. The higher education almost makes sure that they never return back to there native place. All the money, time and resource which a small town or village has spent on its human resource invariable never returns back to it, on the other hand it increases concentration of human being in bigger cities. The suburbs keep on expanding with more people coming in to be like there once similar now relatively rich cousins. The synonyms for cities now are concrete jungles and tickling bomb. The need of resources required by such high concentration of humans is creating an ecological disaster. The basic amenities like water is depleting and technological solutions and mindless planning is making situation worst.

Md.Younus, the Nobel prize winner and founder of Grameen Bank has explained in economic terms, “ The human destruction caused by pollution also takes an economic toll. Premature deaths, Hospital stays and doctor visits, days missed from work, and the expense involved in trying to remedy environment problems (which are much cheaper to prevent in first place), all add up to a tremendous drain on the economy.

Perhaps we are trusting technology for more than the job it is meant for. We are cutting trees for houses and malls and then are fitting those malls with air conditioners for cooling. The basic fact that we cannot survive without trees is completely being ignored by us in quest for better life. Runways, expressways and flyovers are great but watching old aged and children struggling to cross the road is not unusual. We have made the most natural act of walking across, a nightmare. In the words of Eduardo Galeano, ' In their rush to the funeral, they (we) are burying the wrong corpse'.

On the contrary there are people who want to leave in sync with nature. They have served there flora and fauna. Nature has responded with making there land fertile and earth filled with minerals. These people don't exploit the gift but worship them. We today are trying our best to displace there population, to snatch there land, to dig out the last piece of ore which is there in there piece of earth. We are all on to kill the aborigine population.

The United Nations Human Development Report (1996), identified five types of distortions or imbalances that can come to afflict the process of economic growth anywhere: jobless growth, ruthless growth, voiceless growth, rootless growth and futureless growth. We are justifying the report.

These people share the same world with us but are very unadulterated, they fail to understand our logic of growth which anyways is very illogical. Is is fair enough to displace people in the name of growth or have we failed to evolve a growth model which is natural. Is Industrialization the only way and how much of it.

Maslov, the psychologist proposed need hierarchy theory which starts with physiological needs like hunger and thirst, proceeds to safety need like security and goes upto need for self development and realization - which he termed as Self actualization.

Today we are living most unsecured and uncertain life. The land for agriculture is shrinking, the fertility of land is losing, the water levels are going down, with less of trees the soil erosion is increasing. We might soon see ourselves at the bottom of Maslov's hierarchy struggling once again with hunger and thirst. The growth we are about to achieve will be leave us with all nuts and bolts to eat.

CAREER DELUSION

noreply@blogger.com (M.P.Singh) — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 17:39:00 +0000

Only two years back, I was behind the table and now in front of the table. Here I can acknowledge the superficial gap between both the cases. Veteran Mr. Amir Khan has well depicted various aspects of our life in his latest movie “3 IDIOTS” which are really untouched either due to our negligence or because of our parental pressure for defined set of studies i.e. “engineering, management or medical”. Fascinating professional courses i.e. B.Tech, MBA, MBBS etc are presumed to be above normal courses and can create various opportunities in life. That’s true upto large extent because it’s a shortest platform for corporate world and huge money.

In the melo drama of “3 IDIOTS” there were various instances which showed a tussle between student and professor and their attitude where the thought process of an individual (Mr. Ranchor das chachar ) and other students and faculty was perfectly pole apart.

In our education, we do our graduation on our family terms and conditions and post graduation on the basis of appealing market situations. Here, the concern is not about our education but about our passion, desire, willingness and happiness.

There is only one question to all of us- are we satisfied with our job role and workdone.

SHORT STORY: An individual who did B.Tech, MBA from one reputed college, everybody had expectation of some fascinating job with huge package and happened similar but wont worked out for long because it was not his cup of tea. That job didn’t suited him for long and in between he got an opportunity for guest lecture in one of the B school in Bangalore.

That day only, life took some strange decision and he left his job and decided to work for education sector as professor in B school as “lecturer”.

Here the theme comes that “Either you love what you do or you do what you love”. In former case, One is bound to work and bound to love his work because that’s his/her bread butter but may be he is not really enjoying. In later case, one is not working, he is enjoying his work as hobby and hobby is something which one always wishes do because it is his passion or love.

Today he is the happiest one and enjoying his life…….

That one individual is me and I am Ranchor das chachar, I am Raju rastogi, & I am farhan Qureshi.

ALTER EGO!!

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 16:11:00 +0000

It’s been two an a half years when I saw him first, standing quietly in a corner of a big showroom with two innocent twinkling eyes. Since then it has been a love & hate affair. He has always been there in my thick and thin. Almost like a helpless younger sibling, has been victim of my transgression.

Every time my self respect is violated by an eccentric client or is tossed at the whims of my boss (who always strive to make things perfect and situation ideal) he has provided vent to all the frustration. Quite often I have deliberately used him as an escape goat.

I never really have liked, but many a times I have left him standing in parching heat on the mercy of strangers, while myself sipping soft drinks in clients air conditioned chamber. But still we are companions. Be it a hot summer day, chilling winter or romantic autumn we spend maximum time together.

My busy schedule leaves me with no time to take care of him. Though he has never complained, these days he is not at all keeping well. Almost like an alter ego he too looks dull and has lost his shine.

But before it’s too late I want to change things around for me and my alter ego …my motorbike.

So here I pledge to service my mo bike twice a month and go jogging daily and like my boss create an ideal situation for both of us. This is not gona change the world but guess will make us both better equipped to face it.

Bruised Almighty!

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 18:15:00 +0000

Bruce there is no Almighty up there listening to your prayers.

"So God created human beings in his own image. In the image of God he created them; male and female he created them." (Genesis 1:26-27)

And in the process he died. Yes God died the day we were born; just like a parent cell disintegrates into daughter cells. In the process the parent cell dies but the daughter cell are genetically identical to the parent cell, having the same DNA. We are made in his image and have the same genetic material and are as capable as he was or as he would have ever wanted his sons and daughters to be.

The God has shifted from matter to mind. His imprints or trace is there within you and me and through us he lives. God lives with us in the form of freewill. This freewill is the essence of God which makes human so strong spiritual being. It has the power to mould so called destiny.

We these days often see or here people around us killing in the name of God. What can be more disrespectful for creator to see his creations killing each other, that too in his name? Creator lives in his creations.

It is not almost insane to kill somebody who is just like you for someone you are not even sure about?

Our entire attempt to find God, define him by giving name & shape will be futile for he doesn’t exits. He died for your love.

Next time don’t just blame God when you bump into a tree, lose a job or ran out mobile balance; for dead are to be respected and not blamed. Evaluate your options available and ask your freewill what God would have done if been in your place.

Fantasies & Expectations

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 03:24:00 +0000

When I was a child I wanted to be a Taxi driver who take foreign tourist for a ride, earn good money and go places. There was this Mr. Bacchans’ movie released during that time in which was the flamboyant lifestyle of a Tonga wala. Suddenly I wanted to be a Tongawala. As I grew up to social expectations I swapped Tonga with a Taxi. Like every kid I too wanted to be an actor. The very idea of being an actor was so thrilling to me. If somehow I can be an actor I can be right up to everybody’s expectation. I can be a doctor in one movie and can make my father happy; in another can be an Engineer for mummy and so on. And it took quite a while for me to realize that being an actor and a successful at that need lot of sweat and commitment, probably more than I was ready for. My other fantasy of becoming a cricketer also faded in the same fashion when I came to know that the ball with which we play is not used in professional cricket but in lawn tennis.

When I grew up to an age where I was able to think logically, I analyzed all my fantasies. There was one thing common in all the career path I wanted to walk through, They were all individualistic and independent in nature. Amitabh as a Tongawala was an independent professional who didn’t required a big corporation behind him for support and so was the case with an actor, a doctor or a cricketer. They are all skilled individual who can survive independently.

and I am scanning all the feasible professional and unprofessional options : Teacher, Consultant, Writer. My fantasies are still yearning for independence of that of an Hermit , of that of an Rasta man, of that of an Fakir….

Morning Thinker: Monopolistic cues in Aviation Industry!

noreply@blogger.com (icecool) — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 13:55:00 +0000

No-fly zone for new airlines as big players signal Mayday

No Need For More Players When Existing Cos Are Losing, Feels Civil Aviation Ministry

Nirbhay Kumar & G Ganapathy Subramaniam NEW DELHI

RATTLED by the crisis afflicting the airline industry, the civil aviation ministry has slammed the brakes on issue of licences for new airlines. No new airline licence is likely to be granted till the UPA government bows out, highly-placed civil aviation ministry sources said. “There is no written word, but the signal is clear,” said the source who did not want to be identified. It’s learnt that two of the country’s major airlines have urged the ministry to hold new licences. They have argued that there is excess capacity in the market and addition of capacity would only make things worse. Speaking to ET, a top official in the civil aviation ministry admitted that permission to launch airlines had been frozen. However, he added that the freeze was not at the behest of incumbent airlines. “We don’t need anybody’s recommendation for taking such a stand. We are watching the situation. At this point, we think there is excess capacity in the market and an attempt to add capacity will aggravate the problem,” he said. The hold-up would affect Emeric, Star Aviation and Premier Airways. While Star Aviation is owned by the Gulf-based ETA Group with interests in engineering, construction and shipping, Premier Airways is controlled by a group of NRIs. Premier, which wants to launch a national airline under the Easy Air brand, is waiting for necessary government approvals since December 2007, am industry watcher said. While the aviation ministry’s logic behind the bar is that new airlines should not jump into the fray while existing ones are tottering, those keen to launch an airline are not amused. Companies planning to launch air services are, however, not happy with the development. “We are ready to start operations provided the regulatory clearances are granted. We have been pushing our case vigorously. If the government plans to hold our application, it’s certainly not good for us,” Emil & Eric Group CEO Muhaimin Saidu said. Emil & Eric plans to launch regional air connectivity in the south with the Emric brand name. Emric, with an equity base of Rs 20 crore, plans to start a scheduled airline with two Bombardier aircraft. The company’s foray into aviation is aimed at developing synergy with its core business activity, hospitality. Industry watchers say entry barriers are not good and the government should not prevent new players from entering the fray. “If some carriers didn’t have a sound business model and kept on over-stretching, over-leveraging and over-estimating the market, why should others be penalised? Generally, after air operator’s permit is given to a company, it takes 8-12 months to start operation. We don’t think the government has a rational logic. If the economic crisis continues for another year and airlines with huge losses collapse, what would happen to the industry? Would anybody be left to operate air services?” an industry source familiar with the government’s move said on condition of anonymity. “The value chain of the industry — from airports to maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) — would get affected in the long run if the government holds back new launches,” he added. Most domestic airlines are facing a financial crunch and the industry is expected to lose $2 billion in 2008-09. In a bid to cut costs, Kingfisher and Jet Airways entered into an operational alliance last month for common ground handling, cross-selling each other’s seats and code-sharing on domestic and international sectors.

email: nirbhay.kumar1@timesgroup.com

This article in ET gave some fodder for my brains. If we go by Aviation Ministry’s logic as there is a crisis situation in the Aviation sector; more competition will do more harm than any good. I smell a rat here. Why did Kingfisher and Jet shake hands for an “operational alliance”? I see monopolistic cues here. I feel there is a lot of lobbying going on in Mr. Praful Patel’s staff. Had these small companies been allowed to set up their shops. They would have given a tough time to the big players. Frankly speaking apart from all that cries of economic meltdown many small players are doing well. Take the instance of Spice Jet and Indigo, they are taking a lot of market share from the big players. Let suppose that these small player were to operate then all the layed off employees in aviation sector would find jobs. The small companies being more agile would restructure faster to market changes. In a nutshell the mammoths of the industry are afraid of competition and hence busy lobbying while ministers are busy throwing lavish parties for their daughter marriage!!

Innovation,Jugaad and Power Theft

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 15:22:00 +0000

Necessity is the mother of invention and Lack of resources the mother of Improvisation or what we call “Jugaad”. The improviser in pure country sense is called Jugaadu. A more subtle word for jugaad can be “upaay”.

Urbanditionary.com defines Jugaad as a small trick that will make a "BIG Difference". Wikipedia defines, “Jugaadu” as a person who know methods/ways of doing the workaround or accomplishing the basic result by alternate/illegal means. Jugaad is somewhere between ephemeral and permanence. It is ought to be a temporary improvisation but can last for a life time. It is also considered to be a small problem fixer.

This locally made motor vehicles that are used mostly in small villages as a means of low cost transportation in India is a classical case of Jugaadship. Apart from classical jokes on it jugaad is part of our lingo, Jugaad is a very much a way of life or call it an art which is as old as life itself.

The philosophy behind Jugaad is that “Everything is manageable, solvable, everything has a work around”. My endeavor here is differentiating between different natures of Jugaad. It is social in nature, and is appreciative or is it beyond the permissible threshold of Society.

Juggad can be both Parasitic as well as Symbiotic in nature. The simple example of jugaad in everyday life can be:

Parasitic Jugaad:

Late to work, Problem finding a parking spot.

Symbiotic Jugaad:

Shopkeepers using traditional money "IOUs" and "Tokens" when running short of change

What actually provoked me to write this article is an incident which happened few days back. I have wondering in the Intellectual land of JNU when I saw a vendor lighting his small jugaad shop selling bread, butter etal with a jugaadu light bulb which was illuminated by the energy of the electric wire which was supposedly not meant for him.

It made me to think how much this kind of entrepreneurial ship and Jugaadship is really helping us.

A little googling gave me that 30.13 per cent of the energy available for sale was lost; this includes losses due to technical reasons, theft, and pilferage.

If it was only done by underprivileged it was understandable. But Power theft is a jugaad which again is a way of life for us. Former Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Member of Parliament K.D. Jeswani was booked for power theft and a Rs.90,000 fine slapped on him. There is no point giving stats but if we can do a little Jugaad in our mindsets and stop being creative with our electric meters and human meter readers, it can be a lot better.

Interesting Articles on Jugaad:

http://www.devdutt.com/the-great-indian-jugaad

http://www.livemint.com/2008/03/25000530/Rural-India8217s-jugaad-for.html

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com//articleshow/2692688.cms?

http://www.indiatogether.org/2004/apr/env-powerrob.htm

The Ghost of Subprime Crisis

noreply@blogger.com (Saurabh Raja) — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 20:50:00 +0000

Being jobless sometimes gives you luxury to do things that you enjoy doing, but still can't do because of lack of time and commitment or just due to laziness. I was a regular author on this blog till the time I joined my first job. But now with the market crashing and all of my efforts failed to secure me a new job, I decided to continue with my one time love and that’s blogging.

Choosing a topic was not a tough choice for me as market which has given me this tough time, deserves all possible attention as a tribute. Lot has been written in financial media about current market meltdown. Sometimes back I got an article from one of my former colleagues about Credit default Swap and I decided to share a simplified version of same story.

The Ghost of subprime crisis is still there and fueling what has been described as worst recession after 1929 great depression. This post is about one of the biggest name in Insurance industry that is AIG. Last month with fall of Investment Banking giants like Lehman Brothers and Merill Lynch, AIG was also on the verge of collapse before Fed taking control of situation by putting $85 billion. AIG with presence in almost 130 countries and ranked 18^th biggest company by Forbes Global 2000 list is another example of consequences of bad bets on subprime related assets.

What Went Wrong With AIG?

Fundamentally core business of AIG is doing fine. Root cause of problem was exposure in Credit default swap.

A credit default swap is an OTC insurance instrument whereby two parties enter into an agreement, one insurance seller and one insurance buyer (who want to cover default risk on Loans disbursed by him). Insurance buyer pays an upfront fee and yearly premium (same as we pay for life or any other insurance) to insurance seller. Now if the loan on which insurance buyer has taken this insurance defaults insurance seller has to pay the full loan amount.

Suppose you are an institution engaged in housing finance. You (let’s say A) has given loan to some person (say B). Now there are chances that B can default on loan repayment. So to protect yourself from default risk you go to an insurance seller (say C). You pay an upfront fee and yearly premium. If B repays loan, C keeps all upfront fee and premium, thus making profit. But in case of default by B, C will be required to pay the full loan amount to A.

Basic purpose of this instrument is to serve as a hedging tool for institution who provides loan,buy bonds or in broad sense holds loan portfolio, thus subjected to default risk by borrowers.

As discussed CDS is basically an OTC instrument hence they are subject to counter-party risk. One more serious problem with CDS is that Investment Banks, Insurance Companies often use them in excess of their actual capital base. Lack of regulation on CDS exposure results in institutions taking as much as exposure they want.

Final Blow

With the collapse of housing market and subprime crisis most of institution in this market was in red. Firms like AIG before this crisis written insurance in the form of credit default swap for corporate and kept all upfront fee and premium as default rate on loans was low, thus making handsome profit. But once the housing bubble busted and default rate on loan increased AIG has to pay for insured loans. CDS that AIG has written as an insurer had much of toxic debts, asset backed security that has started to default as housing bubble busted. The mortgage pool that AIG insured started to fall rapidly. Losses started mounting and it was only after Fed’s intervention company could be saved by the way of injecting $85 Bn.

The biggest lesson from this crisis, that has emerged is need of proper regulation on OTC market. OTC market indeed helps hedgers and other market participants to take customizable position in the market, but lack of regulation results in reckless exposure by companies. Accounting principles has largely misused in this case.

OTC markets now needs proper attention by regulators. Even capital base requirement for firms needs to be updated in the light of emergence of more complex financial instrument.

Indian Identity

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 08:51:00 +0000

Here goes a song by my favorite legendary singer BoB Marley:

Until the philosophy which hold one race
Superior and another inferior
Is finally and permanently discredited and abandoned
Everywhere is war, me say war

Just finished reading Sudhir Kakar's insight on Indian Identity. Especially the paper "The colours of Violence" is a very noble service to mankind. I wish someday maybe common people get to read his work as well because most of the time they are the one who get instigated.

Religious violence has a very dynamic nature with no one reason which can be pinned down. But ignorance of course is a reason. What makes me wonder after reading "Indian Identity" is that seldom is religion the cause for so called religious violence and most of the time the reason are socio-politico-economic. Religion is just used to fuel the fire.

Hindus are living with their Muslim counterparts since long enough to be dated, but they never really mingled, their colonies were different from each other and though we may have history of Hindu-Muslim living together, they relationship was never homogeneous in nature. It is almost like animal Kingdom, they all live in jungle but in there own territory and with there own herd, pride, flight, group or whatever.

Hindu and Muslims are living separately together. As a Hindu I Know Id and Ramzan but that is it. I don’t know the significance, story, belief, epic and legend behind it so though I want to respect them; I am not real able to. And its not only about Muslims, Hindus have some kind of reverence for Buddha, Mahavira and Sikh Gurus. The reason as pointed in the book may be one that these are religion of Indian Origin. The other reason may be that we know the legend behind the Buddha and the Mahavira.

I personally like Bible and its stories a lot. The more i read it the more I love it and the more I love my own religion, may be because I see a connection (people are fond of find differences rather then similarities). Coming back, because I read Bible and know the legends I have a lot of respect of Jesus, the Christ and never ever I can think of vandalising a church. I will be scared of Jesus just like any other God of my religion of birth.

Though Hindu-Muslims-Christians live together, we are ignorant when it comes to respect each others belief. Every thing which doesn't go with our belief system is illogical to us. We explain even our occults with lot of logic but are not patient enough to mingle study and lend our heart and ears to the belief system of others.

Until we are able to do it "India will always remain the melting pot of cultures, with lots of heterogeneous mixture and fire beneath the pot", and this heterogeneous mixture will never become Indian but will always be seen as Hindus, Muslim...etc..etc.

As Bob Marley used to say:

That until the basic human rights are equally
Guaranteed to all, without regard to race
Dis a war

The morning thinker: Why do fools around me INVEST?

noreply@blogger.com (icecool) — Sat, 27 Sep 2008 13:54:00 +0000

It was a Wednesday morning. I was commuting to work; it was a normal day with an anomalous business paper in my hands. The dark news of crumbling of the biggies of US financial jungle was out in Black & White. Dailies were filled with analysis, scrutiny, sarcasm and depressive words. It felt like there was no tomorrow. I have not yet invested a single buck in the stocks, yet I was feeling the pinch. Why?

Well the answer lies in the fact that all Indian ministers and chieftains of Indian banking behemoths were lying when they say that India is protected from the current financial turmoil. I don’t believe a word they say. This morning I was pondering sitting in a BEST bus (Mumbai’s public transport). I was pondering why the hell do these guys invest in stocks? What are their incentives and motivations? And why do they have such long faces every time the markets crash?

To find the answers I imagined a scenario. Analyst in me was put to work…

Let’s assume I am a guy who just got a job in a BPO. 10 months later I have a good corpus from my savings as I have very less expenses, say Rs.1, 00,000. I want to marry after 4 months and want to take housing loan, to buy a flat in Mumbai! To get superlative returns I invest in stocks. Which stocks do I buy? A friend told to buy some banking stocks. I thought he is right after all banks are doing great. My broker told me investments would appreciate by 20%. I was very happy. I had looked out for my flat as well. I had talked to the estate agent and inquire about the papers I would require to apply for a housing loan. Two months later my stocks crash.

I ask, why did I loose? Why the hell did I loose my hard earned money? All those night shifts, pacifying those angry American customers, why me? For the fist time in my life I buy an ET and read that some sub prime lending lead to the fall. After 4 week of reading the business dailies I understand that because some lazy American bum didn’t pay his mortgage, I lost my housing loan! I say this is unfair. On my last holiday in Goa, I saw how these American bankesr work one year and holiday for another. Our driver told us that these Americans work for a year and put all their money in FDs and come here and holiday! Just because his currency is worth 40 times mine I loose my dream home! I feel like going back to Goa and kicking that white man and screaming in his ear drums, “ run home you fools and pay your motgage!! You will loose your home and I will lose mine!”

What a beautiful story I thought! But I wish it was perfect. I had a gut feel that something was wrong. The systems thinker in me told that this ought to be a balanced loop not a negative reinforcing loop.

How come everybody is loosing, somebody must have gained. There must be some positive forces in this loop. Why was everybody happy earlier? What happened before this? Two things happened.

I the Indian got the job. The American went on a holiday. Na….
The American went on a holiday… Job got outsourced… Indian got the Job.

Now the cycle is complete.

So the loss is on both sides,

Short term:
American lost his job, Indian lost his house.

Long term:
American looses his house, Indian looses his job.

Vola !

One Angry AIRTEL Customer

noreply@blogger.com (icecool) — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 14:09:00 +0000

Though Vodafone tops the list for highest number for unattended complaints, if you ask me it would be AIRTEL. I feel CRM is a term which doesn’t exist in the books of AIRTEL. This post is a result of shear frustration of dealing with customer care executives of AIRTEL. Finally I lodged a complaint with CORE (Consumer Online Resource and Empowerment System). This is a site supported by Ministry of Consumer Affairs. I found it to be a very useful site. It’s the JAGO GRAHAK JAGO Campaign initiative. So next time you have a to went your anger and agony you know where to go. BTW I have changed my service provider.
I also found a blog where there was an endless list of consumer grievances related to AIRTEL and other companies.

Highlights of CORE:

Over 1.4 Crores hits received from 50 countries across the globe on www.core.nic.in till date
Over 6.8 Lakhs Visits
July 2008 witnessed 2,98,564 hits, 8,639 visits, 98,765 Page views respectively..
16940 Subscribers of CORE Centre E-Newsletter
More than 1.15 lakhs of web pages of contents of different consumer related issues e.g. Caselaws, Acts, regulations, Gist of Judgments, Test Reports, Consumer Studies, Articles etc. are uploaded on CORE website. Every month’s new pages of contents are being added into CORE website.
More than 47 Thousand Complaints received from March 2005 to July 2008 from all parts of India and also from abroad
Total 1372 complaints (25.7% of all complaints handled) were resolved by CORE Centre from April 2008 to July 2008.
In the month of July 2008 CORE has received 1241 Complaints, in which 440Complaints were resolved.
Hindi version of CORE Centre website has been launched with selected links. More than 25 thousands hits are being registered per month in the Hindi section of CORE website.
Arrangements made for more regional languages such as Telgu, Malayalam & Gujarati being added.

My Complaint
Complaint Id : 5605

1. I was wrongly billed by the service provider on my prepaid card for using VAS downloads 2008. On contacting the customer care executive I came to know that it was for the accessing Internet services. But I had never activated GPRS services on my SIM. I was billed an exorbitant amount of Rs. 555. When I told this to the executive he registered my complaint and told that action will be taken immediately (within 24 hrs). After 2 days I called him again and then he told that he cannot do anything and I will have to go to Airtel Customer Relation Center and reach an executive on the hotline. My complaints were not properly entertained. First executive didn't hear my problem properly. Second one told that I will get my balance in 24 hrs. Till date I have not received a single penny!

2. I had taken a VAS called tuney talk charging Rs. 20 monthly. After a while i wanted to discontinue and deactivated the service. But I am still being charged even after deactivation.

My losses:
- Monetory loss of Rs. 555 + RS. 20 * 4(months)

- Bad response from custoner care executives.

- Was not having any mobile service for 3 days for having no balace in the mobile. Which led to other opportunity costs( I was not able to recieve imp phone calls from my office.).

I have now switched to another service provider. HURRAY!!!

Two Faced India

noreply@blogger.com (icecool) — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 14:13:00 +0000

This Olympic as India writes history with Abhinav Bindra’s first and only individual Olympic gold there’s something interesting happening in Beijing. Where Abhinav showed the world that an Indian can win in style, Akhil showed how to loose in style! In these two personalities you can see a new India coming to life. While one is an India which is affluent, rich, unflinching, basking in its corporate glory symbolized by Abhinav. Indian sporting system has no stake in his glory. Abhinav’s father seems to have a big hand in his son’s victory. The wining moments were telecasted again an again for almost two days! There is one thing to note. Nobody can stop this part of India from succeeding. It’s got all that it needs to succeed. No wonder Abhinav didn’t look so amazed that he won, he was happier that the hard work was over.

This Indian’s victory didn’t amaze me as much as the loss of another. Akhil Kumar represents another India, which isn’t as fortunate as Abhinav’s. He represents the rustic, gritty, and fighting India. He had a great journey to Beijing. He’s a fighter to core, not just in the rink but in every aspect of life. Right from fighting to get his South African trainer on board to Beijing, to knocking out the world champion. He wanted to win a medal for his ailing father, suffering from cancer. In his last match Akhil gave it all. The score was tied till the second round. Akhil predominantly has an attacking style, though he couldn’t get through his opponents defences. He took the risk and went all out after him eventually loosing the bout. But there were no cries, sighs or drooping shoulders. Akhil held his head high and congratulated his opponent. He may not have achieved a medal, but he showed the way to two other boxers. He fought with style, guts and pride.

3G, Boon or Bane?

noreply@blogger.com (icecool) — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 10:13:00 +0000

The government is all set to roll out 3G services in mobile telephony. 3G is the precursor to the 4G technology which will provide support to multimedia services. The telecom ministry also announced the start of mobile number portability (MNP) allowing mobile subscribers to switch from one operator to another without changing their mobile numbers. Though MNP is a good move but I am skeptical about how successful 3G will be in India. India is predominantly voice based market. 3G has only been successful in tech savvy populations of Japan and Korea. The scope of 3G is limited to metros and tier 1 cities. There are a few positives out of this move in the telecom industry. Companies involved in VAS and the Indian gaming industry might get a boost. New models of handsets will be launched supporting 3G services. Another interesting thing to note would be how the bidding process takes places and how much of the cost will be transferred to the customers availing these services?

Liars make us believe

noreply@blogger.com (icecool) — Sun, 20 Jul 2008 12:51:00 +0000

Few days back I read a book which intrigued me a lot. It was titled "All Marketers are Liars" by Seth Godin. There was an example given in the book rather a myth which even I believed. It's known that the taste of the wine is dependent on the shape or curvature of the glass in which it is held. So whether it is s $5 wine or worth $500 it will taste great only if its in the right glass. Can you believe that? Mind you every wine expert/taster believes this. But its been proven scientifically that its a myth. People fail in blind tests but not with their eyes open. So is making the customer "Believe" in your marketing proposition, a necessary and sufficient condition of a successful sales pitch? So are we liars? The author tells that key to marketing is to tell a story that people can believe and you will sell your product.

What if the prospect doesn't know what he needs? Would it be wise to tell him that he doesn't know? Worse what if your competitor is catering to the "idea" that he needs it, rather than the need itself or rightly not needing it? But isn't it, how compelling is the story or marketing folklore you tell to your client about your previous clients? Is it the differentiating factor? How your story is more compelling than your competitor's? I have even experienced myself that many times my customers are buying products they don't need at all. So what is it they are buying? Just the story or the experience of buying it?

Marketing is about letting people know about you and a percentage will buy without needing personal interaction. Some products and services need personal selling to ensure needs are well matched. Direct personal sales is an active way of meeting needs and is suitable for specific product and service evolutions. I can agree that Marketers are Liars when their team fails to deliver what is promised by good intentioned sales and marketing people - The best marketing and sales people don't let this happen.

A successful Marketing Proposition is a good start point but having a bad sales organisation can ruin it. Here is a quote that I love and illustrates the point. "If the circus is coming to town and you paint a sign saying "Circus Coming to the Fairground Saturday," that's advertising. If you put the sign on the back of an elephant and walk it into town, that's promotion. If the elephant walks through the mayor's flower bed, that's publicity. And if you get the mayor to laugh about it, that's public relations. If the town's citizens go the circus, you show them the many entertainment booths, explain how much fun they'll have spending money at the booths, answer their questions and ultimately, they spend a lot at the circus, that's sales. - Unknown"

Ease in bank accounts

noreply@blogger.com (M.P.Singh) — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 14:48:00 +0000

When we go to new city and want to apply for any service or product, mostly we worried about the documents required like address proof, ID proof etc.

Ex: When I went to Hyderabad for higher studies I wanted to apply for SB account in an Indian leading bank but due to unavailability of local address and identity proof I was unable to apply.

Same is there if you go for gas connection, sim connection etc.

Now RBI eases the process for account opening. Today If you have any permanent address proof means the address at which you usually resides and can be taken as the address as mentioned in a utility bill or any other document accepted by the bank for verification of the address of the customer and banks can also accept an identity document and a utility bill of the relative with whom the prospective customer is living along with a declaration from the relative that the said person (prospective customer) wanting to open an account is a relative and is staying with him/her. Banks can use any supplementary evidence such as a letter received through post for further verification of the address.

May be you wonder that why RBI relaxed the account opening process.

To avoid inconvenience to individual who is coming first time to the place.

Bank account helps individual to apply for other basic requirements like mobile connection, gas connection etc

Problem for Banks:

Proper KYC (know your customer)
AML (anti money laundering)

To know more about this click here ===>

Changing Banking Strategies

noreply@blogger.com (M.P.Singh) — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 11:23:00 +0000

Banking Industry is most attractive and challenging industry in our country, with the change in business dynamics our work culture, lifestyle is also changes accordingly. Presently banks are offering highly customized, comprehensive & cost effective portfolios to the customers as per their requirements. Five years back no can believed that banking will change so quickly where customers or clients like businessmen & bigshot professionals are not required to come to branch for their personal banking, business banking & investments.

Do we ever thought of this ease where banks will come forward with customized managed portfolio programmes where they (BANKS) will manage customer’s personal banking (Saving accounts), investments solutions and business banking (current accounts etc) under single portfolio. Today it’s possible If you won’t believe just check out this link Premier Banking

What you think as a businessmen or professionals Its worth go for that???

Ten Tips For Workplace Success

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 13 May 2008 08:34:00 +0000

Employers and Employees need to work together in order to be efficient and productive. Sometimes, this is harder to achieve than it should be. Here are some tips for both management and employees that should help create a better workplace.

5 TIPS FOR EMPLOYERS

1. Give More Informal Feedback. Don't wait to tell employees if they are doing a good or bad job. Timely feedback goes the farthest. Periodic feedback enables supervisors to re-enforce good performance and root out objectionable behavior. Don't let a lot of administrative structures tie you down in the "process" of feedback -- drop a note, e-mail, or voice-mail to a deserving employee, or a direct verbal comment makes the most impact.

2. Avoid Dramatic Showdowns. Letting problems fester or a poor relationship deteriorate can only lead to dramatic showdowns. Rarely does anyone come off looking good after these incidents. They are disruptive and disturbing for all, including managers and supervisors. You can preempt an argument by seeing someone unscheduled on their turf, or by scheduling a difficult meeting outside the office. Plan ahead to cover sensitive issues in a way that does not exacerbate the situation. Always be in control of your response, and never allow the discussion to turn into personally insulting dialogue.

3. Kindness is a Virtue. Try a little kindness in your everyday dealings with your employees. Besides being its own benefit, kindness in the right amount can increase morale and productivity. An inexpensive gift or card can go a long way in sustaining or repairing a work relationship with subordinates (and co-workers).

4. Keep Regularly Scheduled Performance Evaluations. Employees have a great deal invested in their jobs, and they can get anxious when annual performance reviews come around. Keeping these scheduled dates sacred goes a long way to avoiding problems down the road. Many disgruntled workers' primary complaint is that the employer neglected to keep regularly scheduled reviews, or ignored them altogether. Employees need feedback in order to know what they are doing right and what needs improvement. They also expect that well-run companies recognize and timely act on this. This has obvious benefits to companies, too.

5. Watch Your Bedside Manner. There are many different management styles, but one component is being aware of how you are perceived by others. Miscommunications can be easily averted by imagining yourself as the receiver of the message you are sending. Even bad news can be handled with tact and efficiency. Employees will be less willing to pursue grudges against those managers who have expressed themselves appropriately and with some sympathy. Balance the company's need with respect for the individual.

5 TIPS FOR EMPLOYEES

1. Seek Feedback and Clarification. If you are unsure about whether you have done a good job on a project, don't let your bewilderment poison your attitude. Take it upon yourself to be appropriately proactive in seeking the feedback that will allow you to move forward. Managers frequently are busy and do not realize they have forgotten to let you know how you did, and so they do not always take the initiative in giving you feedback. Try to keep the lines of communication open to the extent you have control.

2. Look Down the Road. If a company seems to be making some major changes that may not include you, don't wait until the axe falls. Get on top of the situation and make a decision about whether you will wait it out or seek a new position. Bemoaning a restructuring may be natural, but it does not have to be the engine that decides your workplace fate.

3. Keep the Boss Happy, When You Can. No one likes a sycophant, but there are ways to keep your supervisor happy that all of us must learn and practice in order to have satisfaction in our careers and jobs. Being pleasant, helpful, and cooperative aids in the workplace, and is a habit we should carry with us when we are not at work. There may come a time when a boss is unpleasant, or worse. If you cannot tolerate his unpleasantness, you may need to dust off that resume.

4. Keep Evaluations in Perspective. Evaluations are simply a touch-base session with your supervisor regarding your recent work performance. While many of us link what we are with what we do, we should not let our sense of self be tied to evaluations, even if they involve raises. If your review contains negative comments you feel are erroneous, they should be used as a guide on how to re-package yourself so that your next review is more positive. Respectfully and appropriately disagree is you can do so without causing a rift with your boss. Also, because most evaluations come only once a year, there is much anticipation surrounding them. Don't let that eagerness cloud your ability to separate one person's opinion about you from how you view yourself.

5. Trust Your Instincts. Most people have good instincts as to whether they are held in good esteem by their superiors or whether they are in the doghouse. But sometimes people ignore their instincts, usually because the reality is difficult to accept. If you are experiencing anxiety at work, you must either work things out with your employer or take appropriate steps to find another job. It's better to leave on your own terms than have the terms imposed upon you. Take control and trust your instincts.

These tips are some common sense ways to improve your workplace situation. They are not a cure-all, but it practiced often, they can benefit employers and employees. If you feel that the issue you are facing in the workplace may be a legal one, seek the help of a competent lawyer as soon as possible.

Spiritual Sale - 100% OFF

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 09 Feb 2008 20:15:00 +0000

The sign of growing economy is its Service sector and not manufacturing, though manufacturing cannot be ignored. If we talk about the greatest export of Spirituality from India to the west, its:

Osho
Mahrishi Maheshi Yogi Jee
Sri Aurbindo
Prof. Zakir Naik
Swami Ramdev

Manvendra would probably realize what we have missed, His Holiness Maharishi Mahesh Yogi Jee, may peace be upon him.

Every Country exports its Strong points, which defines her. Japan exports Whales so does Greenland. Germany exports technology, in terms of Automobiles and so does the whole Europe. Switzerland advertises its scenic beauty and Austria its Heritage. When all of this is going on some of the Indians are doing export of what India is known for, the spirituality. From Deepak Chopra to the Tattoo on Beckham’s forearm, its spirituality. So there is no reason why we should be hiding or be ashamed of it.

For export, the most important consideration it that your commodity should be of universal value. It should be above cult, culture, creed and nationality. That’s exactly what spiritual Guru’s from India have done, mind you its spiritual gurus’ and not religious gurus’.

Osho and the product/service he believed in and endorsed can’t be reduced to a religion or country. His philosophy was universal; no wonder he still has so much of fan following in Europe and America that can give Rock Stars a complex. May peace be upon him, Osho and his teachings have a mass appeal comparable to FMCG.

Next comes our Maharishi Jee, we never realized during our school days, but Transcendental Meditation (TM) is a heritage which we shall always be proud of. Yes people Mavendra, me and Beatle, we all had one guru, His Holiness Maharishi Mahesh Yogi Jee, Surprised but indeed, may peace be upon him.

If we or anybody would try to access the amount of dollar ($), Euro and Pound these Holy man had brought in India, I believe the best of calculative matrix would fail, because in these endeavors money is always a secondary by product and not the end product.

The most recent universal, spiritual export from India is Swami Ramdev, again a service which is for masses. A spiritual FMCG product. A product/service which can be used by anybody, anywhere irrespective of class, creed, country and religion.

It’s high time we start realizing the power of India as a Super Spiritual Exporter (SSE), more in deeds then in words and be proud of it.

It’s not that India and all Indian Guru’s are Spiritual FMCG. India has very enriched and classified class or targeted spiritual product as well. One of my personal favorite is Prof. Zakir Naik, a MBBS by Profession. His Speeches and seminars on Q TV are a true treat, enlightening and eye opening. Prof. Zakir Husain is an authority on Muslim Text and not only on Quran’. But he also is a gem of other text like Torah (Jews) and Bible. His comparisonal and comparable teachings are the one which makes him more believable and of course saleable in Muslim nations, Saudi and the west. He is the most saleable niche spiritual export from India.

I will end this conversation with a request. Please let your soul be silent for a minute to pay tribute to mine and manvender’s spiritual support system, His Holiness Maharishi Mahesh Yogi Jee, May peace be upon him. Jai Gurudev.

The Three Little Investors

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 18 Jan 2008 06:07:00 +0000

I watched as the minute hand of my clock raced
endlessly around the face. The prospect of choosing a
stock the next morning to invest my college savings in
was keeping me awake. I had decided to invest my money
in a stock because there was still a long time before I
went to college, and I knew that in the long run,
stocks could provide the greatest return on my money.

Eventually, I fell asleep. Suddenly, I was strolling
through a town, next to a stockbroker and the three
little pigs from my favorite children’s storybook.

“Where are we going?” I asked.

“Today we are going stock shopping to find the perfect
stock to invest our college savings in, just like you!”
explained the first little pig enthusiastically.

As we approached the first stock, I realized that the
stock was in the shape of a straw hut. “Pick me!” it
wailed. “I’m the least expensive, so you can buy more
shares of me than the more expensive stocks.”

“Say no more,” interjected the first little pig. “I
choose to invest in you.” I could tell this was a
mistake by the stockbroker’s irritated expression.

The other two little pigs, the stockbroker, and I
continued on our search. Along the way, I decided to
ask the stockbroker why he was upset.

“That stock was not a cheap stock,” he explained. “You
cannot tell how inexpensive a stock is by just looking
at its price. You must consider the price/earnings
ratio, which tells you how much you must spend to get a
dollar’s worth of the company’s earnings.”

We arrived at the second stock, which was also in the
shape of a house; however, this house was made of
sticks.

“Invest in me!” it begged. “My company is marketing a
new medicine to cure cancer.”

“Say no more,” interrupted the second pig, confidently.
“I choose to invest in you.”

The last little pig, the stockbroker and I resumed our
journey for the perfect stock. I had thought that the
second pig had made a wise decision, but immediately
after beginning on our journey, the stockbroker
elucidated why he was so upset by the second pig’s
choice.

“The second pig did not invest—he speculated. Investing
is for long-term profit, whereas speculating is for
short-term profit (not for investing for the future).
He didn’t know anything about that company or the
product. By speculating, the second pig took the risk
of the new medicine being a scam and losing all his
money. ”

The third stock, just as the last two, was in the shape
of a house. It looked much better than the other two
stocks. It was made out of brick and it looked strong
and sturdy. Immediately, I could tell the stockbroker
also agreed by the approving smile on his face.

“I am the Nationwide Insurance stock,” it informed.
Finally a stock whose company I was familiar with.
“Invest in me! Clothes, cell phones, and furniture go
in and out of style; however, insurance never goes out
of style. Everyone needs insurance if they want to own
a house, a car, or a business. Insurance protects from
tornadoes, fires, and even big bad wolves!”

I used my new knowledge to question the stock. “What is
your P/E ratio?”

“My P/E ratio is extremely low, which is extremely good
for investors.”

“I’m investing my future in the future of your company,
so how do I know that your future will be successful?”
I asked.

“Natural and man-made disasters are always occurring,
so people will always need insurance. Insurance is a
priority, not a luxury. When money is tight, people
stop buying clothes, computers, and other luxuries.
However, they always keep their insurance.”

Finally, I felt confident in investing in a stock. “Say
no more,” I said. “I would be happy to invest in you.”
The stockbroker smiled, and I knew I had made a wise
decision. The third little pig also invested in
Nationwide because it had a low price/earnings ratio,
and a bright future.

The next morning, I awoke knowing exactly what stock to
invest in: Nationwide because it’s a brick-strong
investment.

Olivia Goldberg’s winning First Place Investwrite Essay – Spring 2007, 6-8 Grade Division.

Contributed by Debashis Chand

Top 20 Internet Millionaires Under 30

noreply@blogger.com (icecool) — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 14:31:00 +0000

Check out this list of young internet millionaires under 30.

1. Mark Zuckerberg [ Facebook ] 23 years old | $700M
2. Andrew Gower [ Runescape ] 28 years old | $650M
3. Blake Ross and David Hyatt [ Mozilla ] 22 years old | $120M
4. Chad Hurley [ Youtube ] 30 years old | $85M
5. Angelo Sotira [ Deviant ART ] 26 years old | $75M
6. John Vechey [ PopCap Games ] 28 years old | $60M
7. Alexander Levin [ WordPress ] 23 years old | $57M
8. Jake Nickell [ Threadless ] 28 years old | $50M
9. Sean Belnick [ Biz Chair ] 20 years old | $42M
10. Kevin Rose [ Digg ] 30 years old | $31M
11. Ryan Block [ Engadget ] 25 years old | $20M
12. Aodhan Cullen [ Stat Counter ] 24 years old | $18M
13. Tom Fulp [ Newgrounds ] 29 years old | $15M
14. Rishi Kacker and Matt Pauker [ Voltage ] 24 years old | $12M
15. Markus Frind [ Plenty of Fish ] 29 years old | $10M
16. Catherine and David Cook [ My Year Book ] 17 & 19 years old | $10M
17. Fredrik Neij [ The Pirate Bay ] 28 years old | $10M
18. David Hauser & Siamak Taghaddos [ GotvMail ] 24 years old | $8M
19. Jermaine Griggs [ Hear and Play ] 23 years old | $5M
20. Jay Westerdal [ Domain Tools ] 29 years old | $5M

read more | digg story

TECHNICAL ANALYSIS of RUPEE APPRECIATION

noreply@blogger.com (M.P.Singh) — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 05:29:00 +0000

From March 2007, rupee appreciation becomes an apprehension for us. It’s like thunder storm for exporters of our country especially (SMEs). Rupee appreciated by 13%, in the value of the rupee over the US dollar since March 2007 and 7% against a basket of currencies including the yen and renminbi is an increase that does not reflect economic fundamentals and is seriously hurting Indian industry’s competitiveness, margins and exports. Initially it was taken as boon by the Indian business community but due to various reasons it becomes a curse for Indian export community.

According to various economists and experts, there are some factors which are boosting this issue like excess capital inflow, federal interest rate cut, poor government policies, political intervention etc.

Capital Inflow: if look at the statistics, Capital inflows have reached close to $16 b during Jan-Nov 2007 and around $8.2 b came in between the Fed rate cut in September and when the Indian govt. imposed curbs on foreign investors in mid-October. If we analyze the situation thoroughly, capital inflow in country is very good but due to its utilization or output is very subdued, it’s is creating a gap and supporting rupee appreciation. Few examples are given below:

Indian railway plans to raise Rs 728 bn and partially from ECB (External commercial borrowing).
Real estate and infrastructure sector accounted around $2.2 bn of investment and its climbing on top of top of PE funds.
IT & ITES sector is all time hit for foreign investors.

Capital inflow is good for development of country but its returns are very slow because of non productivity and inefficiency of system which affects exchange rates and results a setback for Indian business community.

Federal rate cuts: Last year (2007), when US Federal Reserve decided to cut the interest rates, around $ 8.7 Bn portfolio investment flowed into Indian stock market.

Government Tussle: India is very lucrative market for investors and they are investing in it very well, at the same time our government become greedier and trying to pool so much of capital investment without any proper use of last investments.

Biggest Losers:

As per the estimation of FIEO, around 8 mn jobs likely to be lost in export intensive industries. There are few industries which are the heavily suffered from havoc (rupee appreciation) are given with available statistics:

Textile and garments	6 lakhs job lost, loss in production capacity-20-25%
Leather	7 lakhs job lost, reduced profitablity-75%
Processed agriculture products	around 20% job lost, cash loss of 15%
handicrafts	8 lakhs job lost, business loss-$ 7.5 bn
Engineering goods	16 lakhs job lost, cash loss- 12-17%
chemicals	reduction in exports-20-25%
Marine Products	reduction in exports-10%

Technical analysis of rupee appreciation:

Here I am trying to explain that how exchange rate affects exporters’ trade, derivation table of price elasticity of demand is given below just go through it once with pen and paper, then you realize quantitatively that how badly exchange rate affects exporters’ trade dynamics.

Look at the eq. 5 also brings out clearly how rising costs and an appreciating local currency can apply pressure on both the cost and revenue sides and render the export trade quite uneconomic.

Let me explain all this with one real time example:

Let’s assume that one Indian exporter exports only to the U.S. How this rupee appreciation affects his business.

P=C/S*(1-1/N) where P is price quote by exporter (in USD).

C is Cost incurred in producing one unit of product (in Rs).

S is Exchange rate Rs/$

N is price elasticity of demand

Year	S	C (in Rs.)	C (in USD)	P (in USD)
aug,2006	46.56	100	2.15	4.30
Jan,2007	44.35	110	2.48	4.96
May,2007	41.39	121	2.92	5.85
Sep,2007	40.9	133.1	3.25	6.51
Jan,2008	39.39	146.41	3.72	7.43

In the table given above, Price quote by Indian exporter is calculated by the formula given above, if we compare the cost of production (C in USD) to the exporter and price quote by exporter to its US customer (P in USD), there is margin that’s ok but I am trying to draw your attention toward the price P(in USD) quoted by Indian exporter to his US customer is increasing every quarter and its marginal change of price (P) in percentage is increasing in every quarter with rupee appreciation. The price quote change in last 16 months is increased by 73% just because of price value of rupee against dollar.

Compare the above workings with that for a Chinese exporter who has not experienced such cost side pressures and also, importantly, benefits from a relatively much more stable currency. The Chinese yuan, for instance, has been allowed to rise around 9 per cent against the dollar in the two years since July 2005 — from 8.28 to 7.51 now — but the Indian currency is up 13 per cent in just the last 9 months.

The Indian exporter will be literally priced out by his competitors who have not experienced such cost side pressures/local currency appreciation and have no bargaining power too.

It is obvious that the Chinese exporter will have a significant price advantage which can be extremely useful in increasing market share — particularly in low value-added items.

Rs appreciation & its impact on economy

Rs app. and textile industry

Online Mohabbatein Earns Him Millions...

noreply@blogger.com (Srikanth Manvi) — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 02:44:00 +0000

Markus Frind, 28 is a millionaire who works just 10 hours/week. He stuck gold by starting an Online Dating site Plentyoffish.com. He started it just to learn a new language ASP.Net he himself never knew that learning a new language would make his so rich. He Works out of his apartment in Vancouver, British Columbia,and he says he has net profits of about $10 million a year.Below is the image of the Cheque he received from Google AdSense, worth a million. This was his second check for 2 months, as the first one was rejected by his bank stating that the amount was too big !! Recently he hired an employee to maintain the site, until then he was the only one who was maintainign the site.

There are many dating sites, but what makes plentyoffish.com a success is that its totally free. The tag line says..100% free. Put Away Your Credit Card.The site has a few flaws though, very less or no customer service, poor look and feel, members photos get distorted as there is no feature to re size your photograph,in spite of all this his site has 500 million page views.Markus says as he gets visitors in spite of these flaws he considers them trivial and doesn't bother to fix them.

At a point it became difficult for him to scan the new members for spam, and to verify the pictures for nudity. He solved this by calling for volunteers from his members to do the job, and as people take good interest in looking at others picture and profile, it worked out well for him .Below are some of his facts as mentioned at moneygeek.

Markus Frind :
-- Age: 28 years old

-- Height: 6' 0" (183 cm)

-- Sign: Gemini [6]

-- He started Plentyoffish site because he had to learn ASP.NET and he doesn’t want to buy a book

-- He said Plentyoffish traffic = 3 X Digg.com traffic..