I know people are losing their jobs and that’s a sad thing
I also know that mid-day is filled with tripe and no one ought to take it seriously.
BUT STILL
Today’s cover story talks about the the Jet Airways sacking of 800 employees (and more to come). Here are some gems from the report:
Monica Gawande (28), one of the 800 odd crewmembers laid off by Jet Airways is distraught. “I underwent eye surgery, since the airlines wouldn’t allow me to fly with my spectacles on.
Yeah right. Ever heard of contact lenses?
Also mentioned in the story, “As mid day found out, 90% of the 800 odd crewmembers being laid off have huge educational loans and home loans to repay, families to support and dreams to fulfill”
What? 90% have dreams to fulfill? That’s some survey!
Mid day to crew member (22 years): So, do you have any unfulfilled dreams?
22 year old: Nope. I just want to wander about with this vacant look in my eyes. Its quite fun actually!
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Essence of India
I suddenly felt like looking at the Indian government site. Plain curiosity that’s all.
http://india.gov.in/
Turns out, this site serves a dual purpose. It’ll help you learn the art of writing in flowery language, one tests the limits of artistic expression. If you don’t believe me, outlined are some phrases. Decide for yourselves…. on you own. Get the redundancies?
This section introduces you to the National Identity Elements of India. These symbols are intrinsic to the Indian identity and heritage. Indians of all demographics backgrounds across the world are proud of these National Symbols as they instill a sense of pride and patriotism in every Indian's heart.
The Indian peacock, Pavo cristatus, the national bird of India, is a colourful, swan-sized bird, with a fan-shaped crest of feathers, a white patch under the eye and a long, slender neck. The male of the species is more colourful than the female, with a glistening blue breast and neck and a spectacular bronze-green train of around 200 elongated feathers. The female is brownish, slightly smaller than the male and lacks the train. The elaborate courtship dance of the male, fanning out the tail and preening its feathers is a gorgeous sight.
The long span of Indian history covering more than 3000 years and enumerating several civilizations has been a constant reminder of the country's rich multicultural extravaganza and world-renowned heritage. The people and their lifestyles, their dance forms and musical styles, art & handicrafts, and such other elements go on to reflect the varied hues of Indian culture and heritage, which truly epitomises the nationality of the country. This section attempts at showcasing all those elements, which act as a window to the culture and heritage of India.
The beauty of the Indian people lies in their spirit of tolerance, give-and-take and a composition of cultures that can be compared to a garden of flowers of various colours and shades of which, while maintaining their own entity, lend harmony and beauty to the garden - India!
I don’t know about you, but I find this stuff funny (ok also deeply educative. I did not know our national tree was the Banyan Tree.)
http://india.gov.in/
Turns out, this site serves a dual purpose. It’ll help you learn the art of writing in flowery language, one tests the limits of artistic expression. If you don’t believe me, outlined are some phrases. Decide for yourselves…. on you own. Get the redundancies?
This section introduces you to the National Identity Elements of India. These symbols are intrinsic to the Indian identity and heritage. Indians of all demographics backgrounds across the world are proud of these National Symbols as they instill a sense of pride and patriotism in every Indian's heart.
The Indian peacock, Pavo cristatus, the national bird of India, is a colourful, swan-sized bird, with a fan-shaped crest of feathers, a white patch under the eye and a long, slender neck. The male of the species is more colourful than the female, with a glistening blue breast and neck and a spectacular bronze-green train of around 200 elongated feathers. The female is brownish, slightly smaller than the male and lacks the train. The elaborate courtship dance of the male, fanning out the tail and preening its feathers is a gorgeous sight.
The long span of Indian history covering more than 3000 years and enumerating several civilizations has been a constant reminder of the country's rich multicultural extravaganza and world-renowned heritage. The people and their lifestyles, their dance forms and musical styles, art & handicrafts, and such other elements go on to reflect the varied hues of Indian culture and heritage, which truly epitomises the nationality of the country. This section attempts at showcasing all those elements, which act as a window to the culture and heritage of India.
The beauty of the Indian people lies in their spirit of tolerance, give-and-take and a composition of cultures that can be compared to a garden of flowers of various colours and shades of which, while maintaining their own entity, lend harmony and beauty to the garden - India!
I don’t know about you, but I find this stuff funny (ok also deeply educative. I did not know our national tree was the Banyan Tree.)
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Crisis!
So far, I’ve never discussed work at my blog. However, of late, with the financial crisis rocking the world (you know when even Mid-day has several cover stories on it), it is time to discuss my work. My job involves closely following the markets – specifically the fixed income markets (bonds), which have been at the epicenter of the crisis. This post will also stand as proof that I was in the thick of things during the greatest financial crisis since the Great depression (1929-1940) (I’m not saying this. Experts are).
I think it’ll take years to properly attribute reasons to all that we’ve seen take place in the financial world in the past year. Yes, although grabbing the headlines now, the financial crisis has been making news since April last year believe it or not!. That was pretty much when I joined my current job (July 07). So its been very interesting for me.
In this post I will not do anything other than present a time line of the crisis that I have nicked from Bloomberg as well a graph where you can see at what pace things have been moving of late. Its rather long. I’ve warned you that the crisis has been going on for ages now!
So without further ado, here goes:
2-Apr-07 New Century Financial Corp., which specialized in loans to people with poor credit defaults, files for bankruptcy protection after being overwhelmed by customer defaults.
17-Jul-07 Investors in two Bear Stearns Cos. hedge funds that invested in collateralized debt obligations backed by subprime mortgage loans are told there is no value left in the funds, wiping out $1.6 billion originally invested.
19-Jul-07 Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke tells the U.S. Senate's Banking Committee that there may be as much as $100 billion in losses associated with subprime mortgage products.
22-Aug-07 Countrywide Financial Corp., the biggest U.S.mortgage lender, sells $2 billion of preferred stock to Bank of America Corp., the biggest U.S. bank by market value, to bolster its finances.
14-Sep-07 Northern Rock Plc says the Bank of England agreed to provide emergency funds to ease a ``severe liquidity squeeze'' sparked by U.S. subprime mortgage defaults following the first run on a British bank in more than a century.
11-Jan-08 Bank of America, the biggest U.S. bank by market value, agrees to buy Countrywide for about $4 billion.
14-Mar-08 Bear Stearns Cos. gets emergency funding from the U.S. Federal Reserve and JPMorgan Chase & Co. as a run on the bank depletes its cash reserves in three days.
16-Mar-08 JPMorgan Chase agrees to buy Bear Stearns for 7 percent of its market value in a sale brokered by the Fed and the U.S. Treasury.
1-Apr-08 Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., the fourth- largest U.S. securities firm, raises $4 billion from a stock sale to quell speculation it's short of capital.
9-Apr-08 Washington Mutual Inc. rejected an offer from JPMorgan Chase to buy it for as much as $8 a share, or $7 billion, before announcing it received a $7 billion capital infusion from a group led by TPG Inc., the Wall Street Journal reports, citing people familiar with the situation.
28-Apr-08 The U.S. Internal Revenue Service starts distributing tax rebates electronically as part of a $168 billion economic stimulus plan.
31-May-08 Bear Stearns ceases to exist as the acquisition by JPMorgan is completed.
11-Jul-07 IndyMac Bancorp Inc., the second-biggest independent U.S. mortgage lender, is seized by federal regulators after a run by depositors depleted its cash.
31-Jul-08 Nationwide Building Society, Britain's fourth-biggest mortgage lender, says U.K. house prices declined the most in almost two decades in July and consumer confidence fell to a record low as the economy edged closer to a recession.
31-Aug-08 Commerzbank AG agrees to buy Allianz SE's Dresdner Bank for 9.8 billion euros in Germany's biggest banking takeover in three years.
7-Sep-08 The U.S. government seizes control of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the largest U.S. mortgage-finance companies.
15-Sep-08 Lehman Brothers files the largest bankruptcy in history, and Bank of America agrees to acquire Merrill Lynch & Co. for about $50 billion.
16-Sep-08 American International Group Inc. accepts an $85 billion loan from the Fed to avert the worst financial collapse in history, and the government takes over the company.
18-Sep-08 Lloyds TSB Group Plc, the U.K.'s biggest provider of checking accounts, agrees to buy HBOS Plc, Britain's largest mortgage lender, for 10.4 billion pounds.
21-Sep-08 Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Morgan Stanley receive approval to become commercial banks regulated by the Fed as tight credit markets forced Wall Street's two remaining independent investment banks to widen their sources of funding.
23-Sep-08 Goldman Sachs Group Inc. says it will raise at least $7.5 billion from Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc. and public investors in a bid to quell concerns that pushed up the Wall Street firm's borrowing costs and hurt its stock.
26-Sep-08 The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission ends a program that monitored securities firms' capital after Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs, the only companies remaining under its jurisdiction, became banks overseen by the Fed.
26-Sep-08 The SEC's inspector general releases a report asserting that the agency failed in overseeing Bear Stearns because it knew the firm had ``high leverage'' and was too concentrated in mortgage securities before its forced sale to JPMorgan Chase & Co.
26-Sep-08 Washington Mutual Inc. is seized by government regulators and its branches and assets sold to JPMorgan Chase in the biggest U.S. bank failure in history.
27-Sep-08 Washington Mutual files for bankruptcy protection.
28-Sep-08 Fortis, the largest Belgian financial- services firm, receives an 11.2 billion-euro ($16.3 billion) rescue from Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg after investor confidence in the bank evaporates.
29-Sep-08 The House of Representatives rejects a $700 billion plan to rescue the U.S. financial system, sending the Dow Jones Industrial Average down 778 points, its biggest point drop ever. Citigroup Inc., the biggest U.S. bank by assets, agrees to acquire the banking operations of Wachovia Corp. for about $2.16 billion after shares of the North Carolina lender collapsed under the weight of overdue mortgages. Bradford & Bingley Plc, the U.K.'s biggest lender to landlords, is seized by the government.
30-Sep-08 Dexia SA, the world's biggest lender to local governments, gets a 6.4 billion-euro state-backed rescue as a worsening financial crisis forces policy makers across Europe to aid ailing banks. Ireland says it will guarantee its banks' deposits and debts for two years.
1-Oct-08 The U.S. Senate approves a revised version of the rescue plan that was refashioned to entice enough votes for passage.
3-Oct-08 The House passes the revised version of the rescue plan. Wells Fargo & Co., the biggest U.S. bank on the West Coast, agrees to buy all of Wachovia for about $15.1 billion, trumping Citigroup's government-assisted offer.
4-Oct-08 U.S. President George W. Bush signs the rescue plan into law.
5-Oct-08 BNP Paribas SA, France's biggest bank, will take control of Fortis's units in Belgium and Luxembourg after an earlier government rescue failed to ensure the company's stability as the global credit crisis worsened.
6-Oct-08 The Fed says it will double its auctions of cash to banks to as much as $900 billion and is considering further steps to unfreeze short-term lending markets as the credit crunch deepens. The German government and the country's banks and insurers agreed on a 50 billion euro ($68 billion) rescue package for commercial property lender Hypo Real Estate Holding AG after an earlier bailout faltered. The Dow Jones Industrial Average falls below 10,000 for the first time in four years.
9-Oct-08 Citigroup walks away from its attempt to buy Wachovia, handing victory to Wells Fargo. The Dow Jones falls below 9,000 for the first time in five years and briefly dips below 8,000.
13-Oct-08 An EU summit meeting is called and most EU nations agree to implement rescue packages for their country's banking institutions. Agreements were reach with regards to guaranteeing inter bank funding, debt, injecting capital into banks and changes in mark to market accounting rules
Every dot on this graph represents an important event during the ongoing crisis. Notice how its almost a line in the last couple of months (From september 08 onwards). Things are happening at a screaming pace.
I think it’ll take years to properly attribute reasons to all that we’ve seen take place in the financial world in the past year. Yes, although grabbing the headlines now, the financial crisis has been making news since April last year believe it or not!. That was pretty much when I joined my current job (July 07). So its been very interesting for me.
In this post I will not do anything other than present a time line of the crisis that I have nicked from Bloomberg as well a graph where you can see at what pace things have been moving of late. Its rather long. I’ve warned you that the crisis has been going on for ages now!
So without further ado, here goes:
2-Apr-07 New Century Financial Corp., which specialized in loans to people with poor credit defaults, files for bankruptcy protection after being overwhelmed by customer defaults.
17-Jul-07 Investors in two Bear Stearns Cos. hedge funds that invested in collateralized debt obligations backed by subprime mortgage loans are told there is no value left in the funds, wiping out $1.6 billion originally invested.
19-Jul-07 Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke tells the U.S. Senate's Banking Committee that there may be as much as $100 billion in losses associated with subprime mortgage products.
22-Aug-07 Countrywide Financial Corp., the biggest U.S.mortgage lender, sells $2 billion of preferred stock to Bank of America Corp., the biggest U.S. bank by market value, to bolster its finances.
14-Sep-07 Northern Rock Plc says the Bank of England agreed to provide emergency funds to ease a ``severe liquidity squeeze'' sparked by U.S. subprime mortgage defaults following the first run on a British bank in more than a century.
11-Jan-08 Bank of America, the biggest U.S. bank by market value, agrees to buy Countrywide for about $4 billion.
14-Mar-08 Bear Stearns Cos. gets emergency funding from the U.S. Federal Reserve and JPMorgan Chase & Co. as a run on the bank depletes its cash reserves in three days.
16-Mar-08 JPMorgan Chase agrees to buy Bear Stearns for 7 percent of its market value in a sale brokered by the Fed and the U.S. Treasury.
1-Apr-08 Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., the fourth- largest U.S. securities firm, raises $4 billion from a stock sale to quell speculation it's short of capital.
9-Apr-08 Washington Mutual Inc. rejected an offer from JPMorgan Chase to buy it for as much as $8 a share, or $7 billion, before announcing it received a $7 billion capital infusion from a group led by TPG Inc., the Wall Street Journal reports, citing people familiar with the situation.
28-Apr-08 The U.S. Internal Revenue Service starts distributing tax rebates electronically as part of a $168 billion economic stimulus plan.
31-May-08 Bear Stearns ceases to exist as the acquisition by JPMorgan is completed.
11-Jul-07 IndyMac Bancorp Inc., the second-biggest independent U.S. mortgage lender, is seized by federal regulators after a run by depositors depleted its cash.
31-Jul-08 Nationwide Building Society, Britain's fourth-biggest mortgage lender, says U.K. house prices declined the most in almost two decades in July and consumer confidence fell to a record low as the economy edged closer to a recession.
31-Aug-08 Commerzbank AG agrees to buy Allianz SE's Dresdner Bank for 9.8 billion euros in Germany's biggest banking takeover in three years.
7-Sep-08 The U.S. government seizes control of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the largest U.S. mortgage-finance companies.
15-Sep-08 Lehman Brothers files the largest bankruptcy in history, and Bank of America agrees to acquire Merrill Lynch & Co. for about $50 billion.
16-Sep-08 American International Group Inc. accepts an $85 billion loan from the Fed to avert the worst financial collapse in history, and the government takes over the company.
18-Sep-08 Lloyds TSB Group Plc, the U.K.'s biggest provider of checking accounts, agrees to buy HBOS Plc, Britain's largest mortgage lender, for 10.4 billion pounds.
21-Sep-08 Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Morgan Stanley receive approval to become commercial banks regulated by the Fed as tight credit markets forced Wall Street's two remaining independent investment banks to widen their sources of funding.
23-Sep-08 Goldman Sachs Group Inc. says it will raise at least $7.5 billion from Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc. and public investors in a bid to quell concerns that pushed up the Wall Street firm's borrowing costs and hurt its stock.
26-Sep-08 The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission ends a program that monitored securities firms' capital after Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs, the only companies remaining under its jurisdiction, became banks overseen by the Fed.
26-Sep-08 The SEC's inspector general releases a report asserting that the agency failed in overseeing Bear Stearns because it knew the firm had ``high leverage'' and was too concentrated in mortgage securities before its forced sale to JPMorgan Chase & Co.
26-Sep-08 Washington Mutual Inc. is seized by government regulators and its branches and assets sold to JPMorgan Chase in the biggest U.S. bank failure in history.
27-Sep-08 Washington Mutual files for bankruptcy protection.
28-Sep-08 Fortis, the largest Belgian financial- services firm, receives an 11.2 billion-euro ($16.3 billion) rescue from Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg after investor confidence in the bank evaporates.
29-Sep-08 The House of Representatives rejects a $700 billion plan to rescue the U.S. financial system, sending the Dow Jones Industrial Average down 778 points, its biggest point drop ever. Citigroup Inc., the biggest U.S. bank by assets, agrees to acquire the banking operations of Wachovia Corp. for about $2.16 billion after shares of the North Carolina lender collapsed under the weight of overdue mortgages. Bradford & Bingley Plc, the U.K.'s biggest lender to landlords, is seized by the government.
30-Sep-08 Dexia SA, the world's biggest lender to local governments, gets a 6.4 billion-euro state-backed rescue as a worsening financial crisis forces policy makers across Europe to aid ailing banks. Ireland says it will guarantee its banks' deposits and debts for two years.
1-Oct-08 The U.S. Senate approves a revised version of the rescue plan that was refashioned to entice enough votes for passage.
3-Oct-08 The House passes the revised version of the rescue plan. Wells Fargo & Co., the biggest U.S. bank on the West Coast, agrees to buy all of Wachovia for about $15.1 billion, trumping Citigroup's government-assisted offer.
4-Oct-08 U.S. President George W. Bush signs the rescue plan into law.
5-Oct-08 BNP Paribas SA, France's biggest bank, will take control of Fortis's units in Belgium and Luxembourg after an earlier government rescue failed to ensure the company's stability as the global credit crisis worsened.
6-Oct-08 The Fed says it will double its auctions of cash to banks to as much as $900 billion and is considering further steps to unfreeze short-term lending markets as the credit crunch deepens. The German government and the country's banks and insurers agreed on a 50 billion euro ($68 billion) rescue package for commercial property lender Hypo Real Estate Holding AG after an earlier bailout faltered. The Dow Jones Industrial Average falls below 10,000 for the first time in four years.
9-Oct-08 Citigroup walks away from its attempt to buy Wachovia, handing victory to Wells Fargo. The Dow Jones falls below 9,000 for the first time in five years and briefly dips below 8,000.
13-Oct-08 An EU summit meeting is called and most EU nations agree to implement rescue packages for their country's banking institutions. Agreements were reach with regards to guaranteeing inter bank funding, debt, injecting capital into banks and changes in mark to market accounting rules
Every dot on this graph represents an important event during the ongoing crisis. Notice how its almost a line in the last couple of months (From september 08 onwards). Things are happening at a screaming pace.
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