From November 2011 (Period 23), Research and Analysis Project submissions and re-submissions – including payment for Period 23 – should be made online. A link with instructions of how to submit and pay online will be made available from 1 November to 21 November; all submissions have to be completed within this period.

Students should no longer send hard copies to the ACCA office at Oxford Brookes University as these will not be accepted.

The cost of submission for Period 23 is £115.

Students will be required to upload their Research and Analysis Project files, which can be in all major file formats including Microsoft Word and PowerPoint. Students should upload separate files for their Research Report, Skills and Learning Statement, Appendices and List of References. These will all then be submitted along with their payment.

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Very relevant to daily life with plenty of examples. I should have learned or avoided those mental tricks early.

When she was a graduate student, Fogel waited tables to help pay the bills. She found that she carried around a figure in her head; the amount she wanted to make each day. On any day she passed that target, any additional income became "free money" -- even though this money ought to have been a cushion for the days she did not meet her income target.

more on this

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NY Times explains a few crucial accounting issues by using real example of some small businesses in the states.

That is when he seized upon the notion of tracking his break-even number, the point at which revenue for a given period equals expenses. To do the calculation requires knowing total expenses and gross profit percentage, which is determined by dividing gross profit by sales.

Here’s how to do the math: If Mr. Campbell’s monthly expenses were $20,000 and if his gross profit percentage was 50 percent, he would divide $20,000 by 50 percent to get a break-even number of $40,000 — the amount he had to sell to break even.

more here.

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MBA Mondays

Finance Fridays

Convertible Debt series on every Tueday and Thurdays

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Rise up this mornin',
Smiled with the risin' sun,
Three little birds
Pitch by my doorstep
Singin' sweet songs
Of melodies pure and true,
Sayin', ("This is my message to you-ou-ou:")

Singin': "Don't worry 'bout a thing,
'Cause every little thing gonna be all right."
Singin': "Don't worry (don't worry) 'bout a thing,
'Cause every little thing gonna be all right!"

- Bob Marley [Listen on Grooveshark]

Image courtesy of Htoo Tay Zar on instagr.am

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Been on probation most of my life. And
the rest of my life been condemned. So these moments
count for a lot--peace, you know.

Let the bucket of memory down into the well,
bring it up. Cool, cool minutes. No one
stirring, no plans. Just being there.

This is what the whole thing is about.

William Stafford

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So it’s been a few days that I’m walking from home to Kandawgyi Lake. I kept pushing myself walking fast and then faster. And I started running this morning. First with my shoes on then I tried with bare foot. It made me fast and getting me to longer distance. I felt good. But don’t try it for yourself I mind you, because now I’ve got my right feet injured with a broken glass. It really is a silly idea to do it on the street of Yangon as I have to rest a day or two now.

Okay, Thingyan is around the corner. I still remember the time I was in the monk hood in those days. As soon as I heard the songs and people shouting, I could not take any longer that I was already on the busy street of Inya on the next day, with my head completely shaved.

This time I have no plan whatsoever yet. No going around town in a car to get wet. Nor am I staying at Mandat which is a big temporary stage on it people throwing water to others.

So am I grown up? Nah! Just let me know if you decide to sponsor me. I’ll be on it, although which is very unlikely, I know. I think I will be staying home reading. I’m going to miss all the fun.

Still there is one good thing though, I’ve registered exam for F8 Audit paper. Man I’ve never have that much confidence myself as this time. I'll pass it.

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I should have known that I’m not good enough to be a successful and intelligent person, however hard I pretend to be one

After wasting a good deal of time and money studying Singapore, I became nothing outstanding. So when my parents call me home, I didn’t hesitate once thinking I might as well start my own in my country. Screw it! I’m going back.

That was about 8 months ago. And where am I now?

During the time I thought of starting an own business 3 times with 3 different kinds and nothing materialized. Instead I worked for a PC retail shop as a sale man for 3 months with a salary substantially less than fantastic. I attended one of vocational classes. And I missed an ACCA exam.

My brother Ti Ti is now concerned, he should be rightly so. My parents are asking me as to what’s my plan. Well, the truth is I have none.

All those serial failures have done severe damages to my confidence. No one to blame but myself, I accepted.

I know I’ve got to have a plan. If not, I need to make one. But first I need to pull myself together one more time. Oh yeah, slowly but surely.

Again I thought of starting a business that I always want to? Let’s face it though. That will take a huge amount of initial outlay. And no one will finance me except my parents. And I’m not sure I will succeed. If I fail their hearts will be broken.

Forget about it!

I choose to walk a less risky path which is working regular 9-5 job. Never mind whether I’m going to make it rich or not!

But I’m going to finish ACCA, I must at least level 2 plus a project so as to earn a degree. I give myself a year for that which I think is more than enough. And I’m going to find a job that has something to do with my studies, no more sale man nor anything else.

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I’ve been effectively shut out from the world of Youtube for months. No more new music, no more viral videos and such that, for example, I am trying to watch the recent interview between Lady Gaga and Google Marissa Mayer online and so far no luck at all.

But I went to a DVD rental shop at Lanmadaw, downtown and found a copy of “Inside Job”, a documentary film about the global economic crisis of 2008. I’ve heard that it has won and nominated several awards, including an oscar winner. I’m dying to watch it.

I thought there would be no chance they would keep this kind of movie on their shelves. There are a lot of new movies I want to watch but they don't have them. They do have this one though. So I am happy.

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In the last Internet bubble (1995-2000) I had no idea what the heck of it. I didn't even know what the Internet is all about. But this coming one, I'm not going to miss it. Freemium model, web based, rapid innovation - all the good things to end users so far, I'm liking it.

Steve Blank:

Rules For the New Bubble: 2011 -2014
The signs of a new bubble have been appearing over the last year – seed and late stage valuations are rapidly inflating, hiring talent in Silicon Valley is the toughest since the last bubble and investors are starting to openly wonder how this one will end.

Breathtaking Scale
The bubble is being driven by market forces on a scale never seen in the history of commerce. For the first time, startups can today think about a Total Available Market in the billions of users (smart phones, tablets, PC’s, etc.) and aim for hundreds of millions of customers. And those customers may be using their devices/apps continuously. The revenue, profits and speed of scale of the winning companies can be breathtaking.

The New Exits
Rules for building a company in 2011 are different than they were in 2008 or 1998. Startup exits in the next three years will include IPO’s as well as acquisitions. And unlike the last bubble, this bubble’s first wave of IPO’s will be companies showing “real” revenue, profits and customers in massive numbers. (Think Facebook, Zynga, Twitter, LinkedIn, Groupon, etc.)  But like all bubbles, these initial IPO’s will attract companies with less stellar financials, the quality IPO pipeline will diminish rapidly, and the bubble will pop.

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A new CDMA EVDO SIM card is hot here these days. And my dad want me to apply and upgrade my old normal CDMA card with it. So I thought why not? I went Mandalay again to do that and I've just got it. They told me that I've got to wait setup period for about a few more days to access the Internet. No problem to me.

Extra money to swap the cards is not that expensive but then they told me that my current Huawei c5600 is of no use accessing the net. Now that's a real bummer!

So it doesn't support EVDO, whatever that means. It seems like I'm going to need a new handset. As I wrote before my intention was not to buy any smart one anytime soon. I just window-shopped around one of the major phone shops in the city. I saw some mediocre EVDO capable phones out there. Yes Huawei and ZTE, you got it.

The prices are around ks 100,000, meaning in my affordable range. I might do some online research and offline search by the time I'm back in Yangon. A Huawei Android with a lower price tag will do just fine to me, although I know it's too much of asking.

iPhone? Oh yeah, it's cool and everything but I'm not going to buy one.

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The thing about the Internet is that I cannot concentrate long enough on a single page from starting to the end. My browsing habit has been jumping tab to tab following link after link ever since I can remember. And there came the twitter and Facebook stream. Man, I'm so out of control. Oh wait, this piece is interesting. I should blog about it before I forget. :D

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My friend Wa Tout went to Mandalay today to buy some stock for his shop and I followed him.

I remember my dad used to bring along us, me and my two brothers, once in a while when we were little, to buy things for the teashop we run in the past. He left us at Nintendo game playing shop at 30th street for about 3 hours, while doing his things. And he bought us some snacks. We were happy.

I like Mandalay that I can ride motor bike in the city. There are lots of bikes both pedal-driven and motorized. But relatively fewer cars compared to Yangon. Kind of fun riding but be careful mate! The traffic lights are almost non existent at every junction. You’ve got to fight for the lane that risking a bit of your life sometime. I still think it’s efficient in a way that enables you to bypass waiting time in line under the hot sun.

[Image via travelpod]

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I went back to my old tech college in my home town for a visit. Back then it was a newly opened school with bare minimum facilities and we were the first batch of students. Obviously it has undergone rapid improvement during this few years; bigger buildings, nicer classrooms and vibrant surrounding with student hostels, teashops, cyber cafes and such. Life at school is different, I saw some students playing guitar in the street of the night when I came back. Their spirit lighten me up that I feel like young again. I still can relate here, although faintly. Only thing that my then best friend passed away since and I'm missing him dearly. If he still were around, I sure would bring him over for a drink like the old jolly time.

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I never really planned my life more than one month in advance. I try to chase whatever I think is the most interesting thing to do at the moment, and if it becomes less interesting, I find something else to do. 

I was on track to get a degree in public policy, so I have no business training other than doing a startup for a couple years before we started Groupon as a side project.The original startup was a site called the Point; it was a social-justice platform that existed to solve the world's unsolvable problems. When we launched Groupon, we were thinking this might allow us to pay the bills while we continue on this huge altruistic cause.

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There are currently 4.5 billion mobile phones worldwide and, despite the fact that some think that there will always be a place for so-called feature phones, feature phones will be replaced entirely by smart phones over the next 5-7 years. As smart phones become the volume leaders, the component costs for smart phones will fall below the corresponding component costs for feature phones. Some people may be very happy without an intelligent phone, but in the future they will have to pay more for a dumb phone than a smart one. This trend will eventually render feature phones obsolete. More…

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For small brands fighting for recognition in crowded markets, almost any publicity is beneficial, he reckons. One reason is that, for lesser-known brands, negative perceptions fade more quickly in consumers’ minds than their general awareness of the product.

Bad publicity is not so bad after all. I'm sure I won't like being in this situation though. More on the Economist

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A dual core chip and two video cameras as major updates, Apple is again slicing slowly savings of its core die hard fans. See the specs and hands-on.

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• It’s kind of craft shops they’re operating.
• Majority of them are undereducated and only one person has high school education.
• But they are skilled workers being in the field minimum 3 years each.
• Their living expenses are exceptionally low.
• Most of them are under 30s single male at the time they started the businesses.
• They all came from countryside to work in the capital city.

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Yeah right! Access to Posterous have been restored that I was just ranting about it. It could be temporary I assume. It happens. I’ve seen enough websites in and out of the firewall. Or did someone hear my frustrations and let it back up? Shut the front door! I'm in a hurry now to make changes and all that on the site while it still open.

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