Filed in archive markets
by leon on May 13, 2008
Green investment is all the rage. But does it deliver? Does it pay off and produce strong profits for the investor.This piece in the latest edition of The Economist, Backing greens with greenbacks,...
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by leon on May 12, 2008
The problem with the crisis now is that we have this illusion of market fundamentalism, that the markets are ultimately perfect and self-correcting. But that's a religion built on false premises,...
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Filed in archive markets
by leon on May 12, 2008
What to make of the good economic news? Is the lower unemployment rate cause for celebration? And what of the improving productivity figures and shrinking trade deficit? Don't pop the champagne...
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Filed in archive markets
by leon on May 10, 2008
AIG, in combination with the soaring oil price, managed to drag down the US market after it posted a first quarter loss of $7.8 billion on the back of the mortgage-related downturn. And the reality...
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by leon on May 07, 2008
It's been a bad bad week for Swiss bank UBS.First it announces it's on the way to cutting 5500 jobs after losing $11 billion in the first quarter as a result of the US subprime crisis. Most...
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by leon on May 03, 2008
No substance has held as much allure over the centuries as gold. And that allure still seems to hold with gold prices going up to as much as $1000 an ounce in March. The price has dropped back...
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by leon on April 30, 2008
Several weeks ago, I asked whether the Fed's bailout of Bear Stearns raised questions about moral hazard, where certain parties are led to believe they will not be held accountable.Now, we have...
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by leon on April 25, 2008
Earlier this year, I was looking at what shape the recession would be. Would it be a U, V, W or L-shaped?RGE Monitor chairman and New York University professor of economics Nouriel Roubini writes...
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by leon on April 23, 2008
In the past, I have looked at how analysts are not as independent as they claim. There was evidence showing they are susceptible to various gifts and favors.And now the credit crunch and weakening...
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by leon on April 21, 2008
Signs for the US economy are looking bad with Bloomberg reporting that US companies are now getting more pessimistic.All this coincides with reports that sales of new and existing homes in the US...
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by leon on April 17, 2008
Money is better than poverty, as Woody Allen once said, if only for financial reasons.Still, many studies have found that the equation between happiness and money is a conundrum. Average incomes have...
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by leon on April 10, 2008
With the International Monetary Fund warning that the United States will slump into recession following the largest financial shock since the Great Depression, billionaire George Soros now warns it...
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by leon on April 01, 2008
The pricing of initial public offerings (IPOs) always raises one interesting question. Who benefits?Data shows that IPOs in the United States are underpriced an average of 15 percent. Translated,...
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by leon on March 28, 2008
The book by Don Tapscott and Anthony Williams describes Wikinomics as the "new art and science of collaboration". Actually, it actually has strong echoes of CK Prahalad and Venkat...
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by leon on March 27, 2008
If the Fed thought orchestrating the sale of Bear Stearns to JP Morgan for a bargain basement price would make the problem go away, it was dead wrong. The shockwaves from the US-government backed...
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by leon on March 25, 2008
The Fed's bail out of Bear Stearns continues to raise questions about "moral hazard". The term "moral hazard" applies to the situation where a party believes it won't have...
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by leon on March 24, 2008
Worrying news with reports that ratings agency Standard & Poor's has a report that 93 American companies are at risk of defaulting on $53 billion in debts, most of it coming from giant...
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by leon on March 24, 2008
Appalling revelations in the Daily Telegraph over the weekend about how a London-based hedge fund set up a "dirty tricks unit" to manipulate share prices and get information illegally about...
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by leon on March 20, 2008
The credit crisis and housing crunch are hurting the rich, reports The New York Times.The affluent who took out massive mortgages and geared themselves up to lifestyles they could not otherwise...
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by leon on March 18, 2008
There is a certain sense of deja vu watching US Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke pump more liquidity into the US market to try and keep it afloat.In his damning book, Greenspan's Bubbles,...
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