Saturday, December 19, 2009
Tuesday, December 08, 2009
Pigou club
Monday, November 23, 2009
Thursday, November 19, 2009
Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy
Schumpeter's theory is that the success of capitalism will lead to a form of corporatism and a fostering of values hostile to capitalism, especially among intellectuals. The intellectual and social climate needed to allow entrepreneurship to thrive will not exist in advanced capitalism; it will be replaced by socialism in some form. There will not be a revolution, but merely a trend in parliaments to elect social democratic parties of one stripe or another. He argued that capitalism's collapse from within will come about as democratic majorities vote for the creation of a welfare state and place restrictions upon entrepreneurship that will burden and destroy the capitalist structure. Schumpeter emphasizes throughout this book that he is analyzing trends, not engaging in political advocacy. In his vision, the intellectual class will play an important role in capitalism's demise. The term "intellectuals" denotes a class of persons in a position to develop critiques of societal matters for which they are not directly responsible and able to stand up for the interests of strata to which they themselves do not belong. One of the great advantages of capitalism, he argues, is that as compared with pre-capitalist periods, when education was a privilege of the few, more and more people acquire (higher) education. The availability of fulfilling work is however limited and this, coupled with the experience of unemployment, produces discontent. The intellectual class is then able to organise protest and develop critical ideas.
In Schumpeter's view, socialism will ensure that the production of goods and services is directed towards meeting the authentic needs of people and will overcome some innate tendencies of capitalism such as conjecture fluctuation, unemployment and waning acceptance of the system.
(Wiki)
Online Optimization
http://www.bestechvideos.com/2008/12/05/adaptive-algorithms-for-online-optimization
The first is what I do, but in perfect condition. The later is what I learned at school. Thought of it a few months ago on how to apply portfolio mgmt technique on traffic and optimization.
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
The Lords of Finance
Friday, October 30, 2009
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Monday, October 12, 2009
"It is part of the merging social science"
The challenge is to design institutions, mechanisms and incentives that move us in the right direction.
Economics is not really fundamentally about markets, but about resource allocation and distribution problems. Markets appear because they operate effectively to handle a subset of these resource allocation challenges.
And Andrew Lo, who proposes the adaptive market hypothesis says EMH is not incorrect, it's just a part of a puzzle.
Wednesday, October 07, 2009
philosophy and economics
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
living in the time of financial crisis
But will I be out, or in with Finance, where I thought I would be?
This month, people have been talking about the event after one year since Lehman collapsed.
Wall Street's new shape
In the end, if it's not money, it would be also hard to tell what will benefit the society if you're not in an NGO (and do NGOs bring benefit?)
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
Karl Marx was prescient but philosophy is eternal, anyway
Nevertheless, all politicians should have the knowledge of culture, of philosophy which is the root of culture before playing on the international stage and make intervention of human right in other countries and cultures, in my own opinion.
As a system of government, communism is dead or dying. As a system of ideas, its future looks secure.
WHEN Soviet communism fell apart towards the end of the 20th century, nobody could say that it had failed on a technicality. For decades past, in the Soviet Union and its satellite countries, any allusion to the avowed aims of communist doctrine—equality, freedom from exploitation, true justice—had provoked only bitter laughter. Finally, when the monuments were torn down, statues of Karl Marx were defaced as contemptuously as those of Lenin and Stalin.Karl Marx was defaced because communism, which Lenin who followed Marx picked up and built the government was done in Europe, where people's freedom, democracy, humanity were rooted and have been the subjects for thousands years. Contrary to the Western values, Eastern values, which are Hinduism, Confucianism for examples. Norms, values, moralities in the East nowadays still can be seen to have had a lot of effect from Confucianism. People, I believe should follow the society where they are living, with some of the values of the society they have the root. But those who keep the root I don't think get along with the environment they are living. It is self-struggle to keep the best of values from different cultures. Confucianism, after all are a few values which can be exchanged or altered if we found other values better.
Marx and communism could have been used as socialism once the world seeks equality. But that is an ideal condition. Marx and communism can be indeed, applied to China, Vietnam, Asian countries where people are born and are raised to follow the rules.
People in the West, their judgment not impaired by having lived in the system Marx inspired, mostly came to a more dispassionate view. Marx had been misunderstood, they tended to feel. The communism of Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union was a perversion of his thought. What happened in those benighted lands would have appalled Marx as much as it appals us. It has no bearing on the validity of his ideas.
Because people in the West, from Socrates time have a different view of learning, teaching and acknowledge the world. Socrates taught people by putting questions to them and make them realize themselves that they did not know a thing. To him, a true insight can only be gained by the individual. Again, values should come from the true self and that individual's insight once he/she has the ability to know what's right and what's wrong. The insight do not need to come from the society (but since it's not easy at all to know what are right or wrong, a lot choose to follow social norms.) However, especially in developed society, when every one has their own values, should the following be necessity after the individual has gained education, knowledge and perception to make decisions and bear responsibility for that?
(P.S: Socrates himself was a true philosopher to know that he knew nothing.)
Indeed, it is suggested, Marx was right about a good many things—about a lot of what is wrong with capitalism, for instance, about globalisation and international markets, about the business cycle, about the way economics shapes ideas. Marx was prescient; that word keeps coming up.
Adam Smith, one might say, stands in relation to liberal capitalism, a comparatively successful economic order, roughly where Marx stands in relation to socialism. Smith is way out in front—interesting, given that Marx saw himself as an economist first and foremost. Elsewhere in the social sciences and humanities, the reverse is true. Smith is rarely seen, as you might expect, though in fact there is far more in Smith than just economics; whereas from Marx and his expositors and disciples it seems there is no escape. It is the breadth of Marx's continuing influence, especially as contrasted with his strange irrelevance to modern economics, that is so arresting.
Still, four things seem crucial, and most of the rest follows from these. First, Marx believed that societies follow laws of motion simple and all-encompassing enough to make long-range prediction fruitful. Second, he believed that these laws are exclusively economic in character: what shapes society, the only thing that shapes society, is the “material forces of production”. Third, he believed that these laws must invariably express themselves, until the end of history, as a bitter struggle of class against class. Fourth, he believed that at the end of history, classes and the state (whose sole purpose is to represent the interests of the ruling class) must dissolve to yield a heaven on earth.
View of an philosopher. The first point perhaps shows that Marx was a person who had a fixed view about things or in another word, had vision toward things which can happen. The second views shows him as a materialist. The third view: class struggle which will remain for a long time in human history. 4th view: idealism which is the purpose of philosophy, seeking something eternal.
Aspects of his thought do impress. However, his assorted sayings about the reach of the global market—a favourite proof that “Marx was prescient”—are not in fact the best examples. The 19th century was an era of globalisation, and Marx was only one of very many who noticed. The accelerating global integration of the past 30 years merely resumes a trend that was vigorously in place during Marx's lifetime, and which was subsequently interrupted in 1914.
Marx's ability of foreseeing the future in economics, capitalism.
Marx was much more original in envisaging the awesome productive power of capitalism. He saw that capitalism would spur innovation to a hitherto-unimagined degree. He was right that giant corporations would come to dominate the world's industries (though not quite in the way he meant). He rightly underlined the importance of economic cycles (though his accounts of their causes and consequences were wrong).
... the things Marx most deplored: private property, liberal political rights and the market.
The core idea that economic structure determines everything has been especially pernicious. According to this view, the right to private property, for instance, exists only because it serves bourgeois relations of production. The same can be said for every other right or civil liberty one finds in society. The idea that such rights have a deeper moral underpinning is an illusion. Morality itself is an illusion, just another weapon of the ruling class.
But property right has been proved to be necessary for development. Refer to Alan Greenspan, Ayn Rand.
... Never ask what a painter, playwright, architect or philosopher thought he was doing. You know before you even glance at his work what he was really doing: shoring up the ruling class.
Marxist thinking is also deeply Utopian—another influential trait. The “Communist Manifesto”, despite the title, was not a programme for government: it was a programme for gaining power, or rather for watching knowledgeably as power fell into one's hands.
He did once say this much: “In communist society, where nobody has one exclusive sphere of activity...society regulates the general production and thus makes it possible for me to do one thing today and another tomorrow, to hunt in the morning, fish in the afternoon, rear cattle in the evening, criticise after dinner, just as I have in mind, without ever becoming hunter, herdsman or critic.”
Again, would people who are very fixed often like to be so spontaneous?
And anti-globalists have inherited more from Marx besides this. Note the self-righteous anger, the violent rhetoric, the willing resort to actual violence (in response to the “violence” of the other side), the demonisation of big business, the division of the world into exploiters and victims, the contempt for piecemeal reform, the zeal for activism, the impatience with democracy, the disdain for liberal “rights” and “freedoms”, the suspicion of compromise, the presumption of hypocrisy (or childish naivety) in arguments that defend the market order.
Anti-globalism has been aptly described as a secular religion. So is Marxism: a creed complete with prophet, sacred texts and the promise of a heaven shrouded in mystery. Marx was not a scientist, as he claimed. He founded a faith. The economic and political systems he inspired are dead or dying. But his religion is a broad church, and lives on.
Religion remains eternal, which ppl who have faced a lot of changed or they themselves change a lot do need.
Monday, August 17, 2009
Perpignan - Port Bou - Barcelona
Being with unknown people are sometimes nice and sometimes not. To women, it's better to have a companion during the journeys.
Being with someone does not mean you are limited to see the world. Being accompanied can enhance the opportunity to discover the world.
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
still a Depression to be expected?
Martin Wolf on the recession and the Great Depression
Sunday, May 31, 2009
Are u in favor of Ayn Rand?
in her politic, economic ideas and her opinion toward life and sharing.
Sunday, May 17, 2009
Saturday, May 09, 2009
Capital inflows in emerging markets
The financial systems in emerging economies also include institutions that are not as yet able to deal with major increases in capital inflows. As such, some of them make bad decisions, often with significantly negative results for them and for the system as a whole.
The unfortunate irony is that countries may end up actually worse off after a period of sudden large capital inflows. At first, this sounds counterintuitive. After all, these inflows are beneficial inflows. Surely, at worst, the countries will simply be no better off. How can they be worse off?
A recent IMF study has shown that the risks of developing countries’ winding up worse off after experiencing large sudden capital inflows are particularly elevated for countries that run large current account deficits. The reason is that the surge in capital inflows enables a set of activities that are inconsistent with the countries’ fundamentals. As such, the economies’ underlying vulnerabilities increase. These risks are especially acute for those countries with weak banking systems and inadequate supervision and regulation.
(From When markets collide)
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Monday, April 27, 2009
Personality test
(Following another QA, Do Quoc Anh's blog.)
I share this test on Facebook to test if there would appear this information on people's profiles. I expect there will be and the results will be different from the result from ppl who might take this from this site. The number of people who will take this test I doubt, will be more if I put my own result on Facebook rather than sharing only the link.
Just keeping it here for myself and for few interested. Cheers!
Travel with the Dow
Sunday, April 26, 2009
Vietnam and China on The Economist
The issue has arisen a lot of dicussions and angers among Vietnamese, especially the community of bloggers (Everywhere Land is an example). Now it appears on The Economist, April 25th 2009.
'With foreign direct investment 40% lower in the first quarter of 2009 than it was a year before-and most rich nations short of cash-Vietnam needs Chinese money now more than ever.' So will Vietnam be a colony, in one way or another way, in the end? The issue is to which country it chooses to be a colony to!
A sour conclusion: 'But reality is that in straitened economic times, beggars cannot be choosers'.
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
The Crisis and Emerging Markets
Some statistics prepared for CIB class to put together with the report from the Financial Stability Report April 2009, first chapter.
Large outflows experienced in 2008 from emerging economies. It is predicted to still in their outflow in the coming years.
Emerging economies (will) suffer badly from global crisis, especially exporters in East Asia. Take a look at this article.
Monday, April 20, 2009
Summer Reading List
- Milton Friedman, Capitalism and Freedom
- Robert Heilbroner, The Worldly Philosophers
- Paul Krugman, Peddling Prosperity
- Steven Landsburg, The Armchair Economist
- P.J. O'Rourke, Eat the Rich
- Burton Malkiel, A Random Walk Down Wall Street
- Avinash Dixit and Barry Nalebuff, Thinking Strategically
- Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner, Freakonomics
- John McMillan, Reinventing the Bazaar
- William Breit and Barry T. Hirsch, Lives of the Laureates
Hanoi stays in the first place for searching 'blog'
Rankings in regions and in languages
Google Trends uses IP address information from the server logs to make a best guess about where queries originated. Language information is determined by the language version of the Google site where the search originated.
From seeing trend and analyzing figures on a daily basis, a lot of things can be done to project (and prevent) some future events.
'Fluctuations in the frequency with which people search for certain words or phrases online can improve the accuracy of the econometric models', argues Hyunyoung Choi and as Alan Greenspan's work in his early career. (He's not popular with the belief that the market is right and can self-correct at this moment. Yet there are always something to be learnt irrespective of right or wrong.)
Saturday, April 18, 2009
American banks' liquidity ratios
Graphs were drawn based on figures from the Board of Governor of the Federal Reserve taken from November 2008.
Core deposit on the balance sheet of Citigroup has been very low since 2005 yet there was only problem to be seen when it came to the instability in the market.
Liquid assets comprises of trading assets, securities and papers, which could also explain one of the main sources of income in JP Morgan, Citi... who are active in buying and selling these papers.
The gap between the red and blue columns can be a measure in liquidity risk. And look at the red column, net loans and leases over core deposits of Citi!
Again, Citi with a very high non-core funding dependence, the ratio to measure the degree to which banks fund long-term assets with non-core funding.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Some figures on Money Laundering
Scale of Money Laundering: 1,500 - 2,850 bln USD each year ( around 20% GDP of the US)
Overview by country:
Countries active in ML by rank order:
- Luxembourg
- United States
- Switzerland
- Cayman Islands
- Austria
- Netherlands
- Lichtenstein
- Vatican
- United Kingdom
- Singapore
- Hongkong
- Bermuda
Countries potential for ML:
- Bahamas
- Cayman Island
- Cook Islan
- Dominica
- Israel
Types of financial instruments reported on the SAR
Many types of financial instruments were involved in the suspicious activity reported on the SAR-SFs (Securities & Futures Industries)
Types Of Financial Instruments Reported | SAR-SFs | Percentage of |
Cash or Equivalent | 276 | 49.7 |
Other | 101 | 18.2 |
Money Market Mutual Fund | 45 | 8.1 |
Stocks | 37 | 6.7 |
None | 35 | 6.3 |
Mutual Fund | 33 | 5.9 |
Bonds/Notes | 25 | 4.5 |
Other Non-Securities | 13 | 2.3 |
Other Securities | 6 | 1.1 |
Commercial Paper | 1 | 0.2 |
Warrants | 1 | 0.2 |
Foreign Currencies | 1 | 0.2 |
Thursday, January 08, 2009
The Leadership Code
1. Shape the future: be a strategist
2. Make things happen: be an executor
3. Engage today's talent: be a talent manager
4. Build the next generation: be a capital human developer
5. Invest in yourself: work on your personal proficiency