The Route Map

Finally, here comes the route map for our net travelogue, albeit a bit late. The travelogue will take a quick look at the geography, geo political history, resources, demography, economy and art& culture. I will also try to present my outlook on these countries.
we will cover 15 countries starting with Iceland moving into Spain, Egypt, Turkey, Iran, Kazakhstan, China, Philippines, Indonesia, Australia, SriLanka, Madagascar (that's for my kids) South Africa, Brazil and Canada.

World view - on the net ofcourse

Am reading Jim Rogers, Adventure Capitalist. One of the interesting things am noticing is the subtle way he has profiled the economy, opportunities and the country specific issues. This was written in 2003 and his earlier work "investment biker" written during 90's. Jim rogers is a god for some of the country specific calls that he took (like he bet on china and moved out of US and set base in Asia), which really paid off.

I thought we will do a rather less adventurous but more arduous "Net adventure" of following those very countries he visited and relook at them as of today.Two decades have passed since Investment Biker came out and that is time enough to figure out whether the promises have been delivered or has remain hollow.

we sill start with Iceland tomorrow.

Long hair, LSD, psychedelic rock, sexual liberation, anti-establishment are some of the symbols which i used to identify with the hippie culture until i read the experience of Fritjof Capra. His take is that it was a major youth movement which challenged conventional wisdom, held non-violent protests against political policies and promoted a new wave of art, culture, thinking - majorly influenced by eastern philosophy. Across university campuses, coffees shops the youth of the world in the 1960's started of the hippie revolution.

If it was in the US that 1960 movement started, in 1900's Germany saw a similar youth movement. Will the eastern philosophy inspire the Indian subcontinent also?

I think the next couple of years will see another possible hippie movement, probably e-hippies (eppies)who will create a new sound of music, art, politics and thinking and the it will move away from the coffees shops to Internet and blogs.

I can see the signals - as i am blogging i see my twin boys taking off their shirt and jumping around our apartment to the tune of Rahman's Masakali, deliriously happy and i realise they could be the one of the eppies.

Its all the same in India and USA

The Markopolos testimony in the Madoff case has turned out to be scandalous, with Markopolos slamming the SEC for absolute incompetence and lack of will in investigating the high profile scamster.

The youtube video is quite a watch. Dont miss it.

Mercury, Saturn & Mis-statemement

Folks, i have not been able to blog as frequently in the last week , i guess because Mercury on my sign was retrograde and Saturn was on top of my business. I am feeling it all easing up a bit. Coming back to business, two things encouraged me to blog about the most famous discussion on accounts - mis-statements. Earlier this week i had a chat with the CEO of a wellness company and while discussing accounts he admitted that he knew, as a business head of "India's largest Retail Company", that the Inventory was always overstated by the bean counters to get the profit numbers right. The other one that got my mercury back in line was the PURPORTED (i doubt its authenticity - world has become an unreliable place!) research report by First Global which is attributed to - Le Grand Fromage, where he writes as to "why are we so surpirsed about Satyam". Read this link, pretty interesting. (http://toostep.com/insight/a-new-perspective-to-satyam-fiasco#corporate-governance)

Ok, i am not surpirsed because i always felt that the Reliance, ICICI and half of those "best presented accounts" were all form without substance, for the simple reason that this quarter to quarter growth are all just good reporting, its near to impossible. Please forgive the negativity it is all due to the transit of saturn :)

GCC Boom has ended?

The global financial turmoil has ended the boom cycle in most GCC states, research by Gulf Finance House (GFH) said. The steep fall in oil prices from their peak last summer, output contraction across other key economic sectors, tight liquidity conditions and the fall in asset prices will make 2009 a challenging year for the GCC. The fallout from the global financial crisis, coupled with the plunge in oil prices, has effectively ended the six-year economic boom which began in 2003 on the back of high oil prices that allowed strong government and private spending. The hydrocarbons export revenues are likely to fall by about 60 per cent to $200 billion (Dh734bn).
The outlook for various sectors are
Banking: Most GCC banks will see profit contractions as a result of slower growth in business volumes. Some banks will need to recapitalize or merge, and, in the process, cut back on credit expansion to improve capital adequacy metrics.
Petrochemicals: Downside risks remain high in the petrochemicals sector due to the build-up of excess global production capacity, declining global demand, lower prices and higher financing costs.
Real estate: Anecdotal evidence suggests that speculators are unable to exit long positions except after a long period and at significant discounts. In this environment, property flippers will be obliged to hold on to property and meet payment obligations, raising the likelihood of an increase in default rates in 2009.
Construction: The weakness in the GCC construction sector is a natural outcome of the weakness in the real estate sector, which will suffer from delays or cancellations and tighter access to credit.
Telecom: Although profitability growth of telecom companies will likely decelerate in 2009 due to already-high penetration rates, slower growth in subscription and intensifying competition relatively strong profitability and cash flow metrics present a buffer.

Contributed by Rajesh

IFRS - Primter

Comparison-USGAAP,IGAAP, IFRS

View more presentations or upload your own.