Thursday, January 29, 2009

Bad Assets on Bank books (Bad Assets Bank?)

The Bad Banks plan to start unclogging the banks balance sheets is in the talks -- and now there is so much discussion on what to pay for these bad bank assets? The banks want a "fair value" of it (which is ofcourse much higher than what the current market value is and incidentally the least amount of money loss) and the Govt doesn't want to pay a value which will cause the tax payers harm or even too low a value which would hurt the banks!

How do you value something that pretty much can't be valued in todays market? How about take the last known value (or in cases where you can value it - that value) and buy it at that value - with a caveat. If the Government makes over 20% (insert your favorite number here - but I say 20%) of profit on selling that asset, then the Banks can have a share of it. The rest of the profit goes directly into shoring up social security. The principal + 20% should go towards paying off the debt.


What do you guys think?

Books...

The Borders close to my house was closing, so I ended up buying quite a few fiction books. Needless to say - I've been reading them faster than anticipated!!! An ex-colleague of mine writes about the books he reads and I thought I'd take a page out of his blog postings and do the same :-)

The latest book I just completed is The Tenth Justice

It starts off with a newly hired Supreme court clerk leaking a multi-million dollar decision accidentally and goes from there. While the story is a little implausible, it was a good quick read and page turner and I enjoyed it.

I also recently read The Wheel of Darkness which was a very good read. The author takes you all the way from Tibetan monks to a story that ends on a luxurious cruise ship.

The two other John Sandford novels I just finished are The Devils Code & The Hanged Mans Song. The Devils Code is pure torture, and feels like the author published the book before removing all the unnecessary parts. He could have taken out about 30 pages and still made the story well, and probably a little more entertaining.

The Hanged Mans Song on the other hand was a good read and was a little redemption for John Sandford after the Devils code book! Both of them delve start off from some sort of hacked computer / hackers and keep it there, but at a really high level.

Wednesday, January 28, 2009

WTF - House of Reps voting on the Stimulus Bill

One of the most important bills was supposed to be passed today in the House of Representatives. It was the stimulus bill. The President (Mr Obama) did his duty and did more than his predecessor (mr decider) did in the past 8 yrs in trying to woo the opposition party as well as his own. For all that effort - this is what he got from them.


The 244-188 vote was not what Mr. Obama had hoped for. A week of presidential wooing -- including a visit to the Capitol, a return visit to the White House by moderate House Republicans and a bipartisan cocktail party Wednesday night -- did not yield a single Republican vote. The president also lost 11 Democrats.



That is most disturbing. While they may have differences, the fact that the entire Republican party didn't vote for it, showed how partisan this has become. I for one, hope that this bill is a huge success, and everyone who didn't vote for it, especially in the house gets crucified in the upcoming elections. They dont deserve this kind a president. I hope Mr. Obama decides that enough is enough and really does play politics with these guys. Then they'll come back to earth!

It's unfortunate that Mr. Obama has got this splat right on him at the start of the Presidency, but he's got to take it as it comes!

Wednesday, January 21, 2009

Aarghhh - Hold on Geithner and Clinton


I dont know what more can be done other than move the US economy to the brink (some would argue it's already past the brink) and 2 wars and everything else to get the Republicans to act with a speck of decency, urgency and f'ing sincerity.

All around, they say - they expect the Treasury secretary pick & Sec of State pick to be confirmed. Why the hell can't they confirm it for the first day of the presidency? Do we really need to go another 2 days without these 2 people taking up their posts? For that answer - look at the damn markets and the damn world!

Seriously - yesterday (1-20-09) the markets were in a tailspin because they were worried that the US would nationalize all major banks and wipe out shareholder value. My question is - why can't someone put out a statement indicating otherwise or indicating what is going to happen? How about the treasury secretary? - Oh wait! We don't have the new one confirmed yet!

Seriously - how about we all work together at a time of national calamity and then you guys can start being your own f'ing selfish, backstabbing self - Please? Pretty Please?

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

1-20-2009

Today - the end of an error!

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Israel vs Palestine

For a country that was formed about 60 years ago, they have a lot of clout, military power and definitely, better life for their citizens. However, their neighboring state (?) is forever in turmoil.

Conflicts are everywhere, and some of them are steeped in history. Whats disturbing right now is the fact that it's so one sided or in fact biased.

If there were about 500 deaths on the Israeli side and more than half of them civilian - what would the US be doing right about now? I don't care for terrorists, however, the US has this history of supporting some terrorists and its come back to bite us. I just hope that the US is not so short sighted that our foreign comes back to bite us in the ass again. Here's to hoping that Obama and Hilary will be different!

Friday, January 09, 2009

Ideas without Marketing = Death?

I recently started a small company. We have a product, launched it in Alpha, got some feedback. We're working towards a Beta. However, our biggest hurdle is the lack of someone to help market it. Let alone market it, someone to help us to understand how to market the product. Some products are very straightforward - you need a telephone, you love the iPhone etc.

Some products, you need to change the mindset - in some small way or the other. There needs to be a reason for people to like your product- whether it makes their life easier - or adds value to their everyday life. Some may argue that if you can't see the value immediately, then it's probably not going to take off. I disagree! I take a simple example of my former employer - Blackboard. 20 years ago, people would say - what - why online courses - today students want it that way. Same with many other products.

Right now, we're in a spot where we definitely need someone to help us market it - or make those contacts!

With this experience - I have learnt one thing though (even though I probably knew this all along but was naive enough not to accept it) - marketing / market validationn is a lot more important than a new cool feature. If you don't have people to use those new cool features - it's probably not going anywhere. You need someone who can think of a way to sell your product or it's probably all for nothing - even with all these startups coming online!

My reader(s) - your comments are most welcome!