Hats Off  

Posted by Ram in


Livid, Disgusted, Frustrated, Fed up am I with the current Ruling Government in India and I am sure that I am not alone. Insensitive and Irresponsible this has got to be the worst ever Government that ruled India. Dr Manmohan Singh the dumbest Prime Minister and Mr.Shivraj Patil, the worst ever Home Minister India has seen so far.

So why or rather for whom should you to Take ur Hat off ? Do it for the "Mumbaikaar" the common man/woman of Mumbai. "City of Dreams" it is called as and i will also add "City Of Resilience". They are not Insensitive like the Government which rules them. They care for their people and yet at the same time they are mighty resilient.Be it the 93 Serial Blasts or the more Recent train bombings the city has always responded in the most extra ordinary manner.

Wonder if there is any city in the world which has been targeted like this....Such is the extent to which Mumbai has been targeted. But every single time the city has risen like a Phoenix from the ashes. At the time of writing this, the rescue operations are still being carried out and i sincerely hope that it becomes a success.

Regardless of the result of the rescue operation, I am however sure that Mumbai will come back much stronger and much better. "Hats off to You" my dear Mumbaikaars. The World can learn a lesson or two from U.

I only hope that the Govt wakes up at least now and as a mark of respect for the resilience of the Mumbaikaars hangs Afzal and starts off the war against terror at least now.

4 comments »

First Step  

Posted by Ram in

"Down and Out" said my friend on the phone. I got really worried and asked him "Why, whats wrong?". He said he was very sad over the stock markets and was wondering how many years would it now take for him to recover his capital?


In an attempt to cheer him up, i said " Yeah the markets are down, but why don't u Invest now in a very systematic and small way for the future?", to which pat came his reply "Who has got the funds?"

I was now really stunned. I had always advocated ( not my original idea though :) ) people not to be fully Invested and retain some cash.  When i questioned him, he said he had bought heavily close to the peak and as soon as the market started to fall he has kept buying hoping to average it out. 

Now please, for heaven's sake never Panic when u see the price of stocks coming down. Check out as to why they are falling. If the factors are very strong and the selling is very heavy WAIT. Wait till u find the selling dries up and all the bad news gets factored in. For example, you can now wait till u see how the US bail out scheme is implemented in case if u r now looking at US markets. Never Panic and buy for the sake of AVERAGING.

Buy because u feel that the business is great and a great opportunity exists. Never buy for the sake of Averaging. In case if u get to know that u have done a mistake, Be bold and try to trim ur losses rather than holding on to the losses.

Remember Investing as they say is like Gardening "Remove ur weeds and let the flowers grow". So don't panic and be patient. Analyse businesses and then hold on. You will definitely hit on a phase when there is not much happening in the market and the market meanders without any direction. That is the time in which u slowly enter and then accumulate during the consolidation phase.

To quote Buffet here "The man who cannot watch his stock beaten into half his price without losing his composure is not good enough to be in the markets" So cultivate Patience and Courage along with Knowledge. Investing is as much about emotion as it is about Intelligence. 

The greatest Investors have all been emotionally very strong.So the first step would be to prepare urself emotionally to be an Investor. Be courageous to admit ur mistakes and trim ur losses. Have the Conviction to hold on to businesses if u feel after ur analysis that they are really good.

Finally Never be tempted to put all ur money in either because the markets are too good or because u want to average. Always have Cash in hand. Savings to cover all ur needs and contingencies and then of the remaining disposable Money, Invest 75% and let the 25% remain as cash. 

I know it is easier said than done, for I am stuggling to fight off these demons of Panic and Greed and hold myself.But remember that when u win over Nature, the rewards are extra ordinary.

P.S: First Step in markets is to prepare Emotionally and the first step towards a peaceful India is to Kick the current ruling Government out of power. Seems like they have forgotten that it is their duty to protect the people of India.

4 comments »

Magic Number  

Posted by Ram in


Whats the Magic Number? Cmon,must be an easy guess.Yep got it folks. Its 700. First it was the USA which was and i must say still is all fixated over this number and now we have a new friend or rather companion for them.


This set of people must be thinking that they are here today in this position because of the mess created by the greed of the financial companies of the USA. I would rather say that this is where they were supposed to have been or maybe a bit better.They had an awesome time because of some of the actions of the ex-President of the USA and also the cheap money that helped inflate asset prices beyond reasonable levels.

Now that the bubble has burst,they are crying, feeling bad for it. OPEC's chief has said that OPEC nations have lost 700 Billion Dollars USD because of low Oil Prices. Low Oil Prices,considering the artificially high prices that were prevailing then. An act ot Terror in Nigeria, problem in Russia or Venezuela, Embassy attacks in Saudi Arabia were all gud enf reasons for the price of oil to go up then,contrast that with today where even 2 production cuts by OPEC nations have not been able to stop the falling price of Oil.

Where has the "Fuel Guzzling" Chinese Dragon gone? What happened to India? the 2 nations who were cited as the main reasons in the media for the start of the upward crude rally. In reality none contributed in a major way, Cheap money which was made available through questionable polices of the FED along with the Iraq war which has made the region a hotbed were the major driving forces in my humble opinion and once the prices started to be pushed upwards, the OPEC nations felt wonderful.

Now the whole party has ended and ended in a very bitter fashion and with Obama not intent on continuing the Hunt for Weapons of Mass Destruction( just to remind readers that, that was the reason for the Invasion cited by Mr Bush) Oil seems to have got into this bear Mode.

Now every single negative report out of the USA and the rest of the world will push the price of Oil Down and it will be a huge challenge for OPEC to boost the prices of OIL now. They will try their best though, as all the nations had a lot of plans based on the money that they thought, they would be getting out of selling Oil at high prices.

But for the moment it seems like the efforts of OPEC are not going to yield much benefits and i personally believe it is very good for the world, as high prices means more Inflation.

P.S: This happy news has got no relevance for India though, the PM of India Dr Manmohan Singh has decided that Petrol prices will not be slashed as the Oil Marketing companies have suffered huge losses and now its recovery time for them. While I do agree that the Oil Companies suffered huge losses, one must remember that it was because of the poor policies of the govt which taxed and taxed and taxed Fuel for revenues. My Question is why should the people suffer even now when things are better?


4 comments »

Finally  

Posted by Ram in ,

 It has happened. A long long wait has ended, more than a decade and a half has Indian Cricket waited for a good captain and it seems like the prayer of the fans have been answered.


Indian Cricket has always had great Individual talents but unfortunately has never had had a good captain, a captain who is both tactically astute as well as a natural leader of Men at the helm. 

Things finally seems to have fallen in place. Dhoni an unassuming, No Nonsense speaking, Calm, composed and sensible person with a wonderful sense of humor and loads of audacity

Motivating other seems to come so naturally to him. Tactically too he seems to be very shrewd and above all his out of the box thinking really impresses me.

No captain would have had the guts to call off a team meeting before a match and even if anyone might have, i bet no one would have the guts to speak about it in a post match conference, for Team meetings are rituals which is to be followed strictly no matter what.

The leader in him shone brightly when he said after losing the IPL finals "I am not going to blame anyone,we played our best and we are happy with this result". Wow, that's a true leader speaking for you. How often have we heard " The boys did not bowl well, bat well, field well, we were 20 runs short and all such nonsense", Not to say that Dhoni is not issuing such statements but he chooses the right occasions to say that. 

More recently when he so boldly came up with the 8-1 field set up, providing us a glimpses of his out of box thinking. A captain who is "truly" aggressive,a captain who lets his actions speak louder than his words unlike some of his predecessors. 

Of course these are early days and I am sure that he will go through rough patches and testing times as does any sportsman or for that matter any human. As they say "Greatness is not about avoiding failures, for failure is inevitable. It is making sure that the frequency of failure is long" and I am confident that Dhoni's greatness as a captain, I am willing to put my head on the line and  predict that here is one captain who will go down in the annals of Cricketing History as one of the Finest Captains of all time.

P.S: Just one advice for U, Do not get occupied with personal prejudices and involve yourself in divisive methods like some of your predecessors did. That will do.

2 comments »

Lip Smacking  

Posted by Ram in ,

I said to myself when i had my Pita Bread with Falafel and Vegetables. Yummy it was. Just as delicious as the Pita Bread and Falafels is the opportunity that we are now being presented with.


Yeah, I m referring to the screaming opportunity that is existing in today's equity markets.

The Market has been pummelled out of shape by FIIs who have been forced to sell their holdings here to shore up their balance sheets to whatever little extent they could.

Since the beginning of this year the Dow Jones Industrial Average(DJIA) has fallen by 27%(in terms of USD) percent, whereas the Sensex has fallen by more than 60%(in terms of USD) in the same period. Notwithstanding the fact that INR has fallen against the USD in the recent times, this is a very huge fall.

Readers must remember that the country which is in Recession is the USA and not India, yet the Sensex has been hit much much harder by this credit crunch, thanks to the FII selling( FIIs have sold 12 billion in USD from the start of this year till date.)

Readers must also remember that this figure pales in comparison with the amount of money lying in Savings and Fixed Deposits. No, I am not advocating for people to put all of their money into the Stock Markets. I do believe and advocate Diversification of Portfolio. But all I believe is that we go on and learn our lessons from our Japanese Friends who have bought into a big way into Stocks during this downturn

Stocks are not going to double the next month,The days when your pan wala provided you with tips and advice on what to buy for a 100% return are gone. Tough Times says the media, but it is during times such as these that you lay the foundation for building up an empire,for creating wealth.

Stocks of good companies, by which i mean companies which have a solid business model and have strong Order books going forward for at least the next three years are available at prices which make them so mouth watering and I request readers to make some research and to start Systematically Investing into the markets, for such Lip smacking opportunities may not come again for another decade or so.

Don't go overboard, start off small and keep Investing consistently and I promise you that you will create a fortune for yourselves.


1 comments »

Stirring Up a Hornet's Nest  

Posted by Ram in ,


Yeah, a couple of people have done this recently through their statements.

Lets start off with the Honourable Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu Mr Karunanidhi, he has taken a swipe at Hindus and Hindu Culture for the Umpteenth time now. The recent one being the criticism of people's habit of wearing a Tilak on their forehead and a community's habit of wearing a thread over their shoulder.

He has gone on and said that Equality is the need of the hour and caste differences need to be uprooted and people should stop fighting over the existence of a Supreme power.

While i do fully aknowledge the need for Equality and the need to refrain from fighting over the existence of a Supreme Power or Not, i do have some questions for the Chief Minister

1. How does wearing a thread or Tilak on the forehead contribute to Inequality? Now why target a community again and again and create the illusion that a particular community alone is responsible for Inequality, when the reality is very different?

2. And why doesn't the Honourable CM speak about the caste differences that exist in other religions in the state? What is preventing him from speaking about other religions? Votes???

The Second Person is one of the most loved cricketers of the modern era, Adam Gilchrist, Following his recent swipes at Tendulkar, Ganguly and Harbahajan, he has gone on record and called Muralidaran a Chucker.

Now the best part about his statement though is that not at one place has he blamed Muralidharan, he has gone on and spoken about how this whole issue was politicised and projected as a Racist Issue, thereby sidetracking from the main problem.

Notwithstanding the fact Racism exists, the recent hype over Obama being the first "Black President" is a live example of how we are still looking at people.Obama's colour and not his credentials have become the biggest talking point and it is something that i feel we must be ashamed of. We still subconsciously differentiate people based on such silly things.

Coming back to our topic, in spite of the aforementioned fact, I have always felt like Gilchrist that Murali's issue was side tracked and projected as an Issue of Racism. Now I am pretty sure that this Statement will create a tremor or two in cricketing fraternity.

Now people all over the world are asking "Why Gilly?"

1 comments »

Never Before Never Again  

Posted by Ram in




Equity Markets bleeding, Commodities tanking, Inflation rising and grimness prevailing might be the situation outside, but step into my room and the atmosphere is of sheer joy, thanks to my wonderful room mate. U might ask me whats so special about him? I must say that he is one of the finest story tellers that i have ever met.

I am really feeling bad for not having met him when i was a kid for it would have been really entertaining then. OK, no more making u wait, here we go, i am listing the gems.

It was a bore and dull evening until my room mate decided to change that with his wonderful story, It was about his story at London Airport, He started off by saying that London Airport is really big and since i have not seen London Airport i did not do anything but to acknowledge it, and then he went on saying that, with 200 terminals it is so huge, I was now shocked, however big an airport might be 200 was a colossal number, but still did not say anything and quietly heard through the rest of the story. Part-2 of this incident was even more funny, he narrated the same story to another set of people the next day and all of a sudden the terminals count became 300.!!!!!!!!!!!. I was dumbfounded, How could construction happen so quickly??? well then i checked it out and it seems that now Heathrow has only 5 terminals,

Surely my room mate cannot be wrong,they must have closed the rest down :)

Second one was when my room mate gave me the most amazing explanation ever given for the rise of USD(US Dollar) against the INR (Indian Rupee). I was having my dinner when he came in and asked me " Did U watch Bill Clinton's speech?", I replied "NO", then he went on and said " It was a great speech and with this Wonderful speech, Clinton has brought an end to the political Instability prevailing in the US and because of that the USD has started to rise".

Never I knew that US was in Political instability" nor did i knew before that " The speech of an Ex-President in support of his party candidate was good enough to move the currency of a nation against other currencies".

Third one was when he enlightened me about how Human Body works. "People moving from Tropical Countries to America and other cold countries can withstand the first winter easily its only from the second winter that these people will start to feel tough" Before i could ask "Why" he came up with the explanation, its because our blood will be hot and hence we wont feel the cold during the first year, but over a period of time it becomes cold and hence we start to feel the chillness from the second year onwards.

I drew a blank face and i did not know how to respond to this. I somehow managed to ask him, Who told this ?, Pat came the reply " A Doctor" but please do not ask me the name of the doctor, for he never revealed that to me " :)

Now don't these incidents justify the title??

4 comments »