17.08.2007

• Cost audit waiver
• The ministry of corporate affairs is planning to do away with cost auditing requirement for a host of industries. It intends to retain it only for those industries that produce essential commodities.
• The rationale behind this move is that in a de-regulated, free and competitive market, corporate houses themselves are very conscious of their cost of production, quality control, raw material consumption and capacity utilization. The government need not keep an eye on it.
• The global market meltdown
• The current situation arising out of the US sub-prime mortgage market meltdown, is seen as being more similar to the East Asian financial crisis that happened a decade ago.
• That crisis began with Thailand and eventually pushed 40% of the worldwide economy into recession. In August 1998, Russia became the latest victim, devaluing its currency and defaulting on part of its foreign debt. That led to a severe credit crunch that toppled a giant US hedge fund, LTCM (Long Term Capital Management) and sent panic through US credit markets. The result was a virtual halt in trading of many debt instruments.
• Then Fed Chairman, Alan Greenspan and his colleagues pushed ahead with a series of one-quarter percentage point rate cuts in the fall of 1998. The moves were enough to get financial markets working again and keep the US economy from recession.
• While the current situation has not become as dire, analysts said it could quickly develop into a full-blown credit crisis if there are more announcements in coming days of serious credit problems in major hedge funds or banks.
• The Quattrocchi saga
• The Italian businessman, the sole remaining accused in the Bofors pay-offs case, has won freedom again and is safely ensconced in his home in Milan, Italy, after a six-month long legal battle in Argentina against extradition to India.
• After Mr. Quattrocchi’s extradition plea was rejected on ‘technical grounds’, the CBI had ‘assumed’ that an automatic appeal would be filed in the Supreme Court in Buenos Aires. It was caught unawares when the UPA government decided not to file one.
• The above is what is reported in papers. Need I say more?
• Look at Abdul Kalam’s alternative measure to GDP
• He calls it the NPI – National Prosperity Index.
• According to him, it should reflect the quality of life, economic growth and time tested value systems like joint family.
• Some of you wanted me to explain a little about hedge funds sometime back. I found an excellent piece that appeared in today’s Hindu.
• Take a look at it. It is here.
• Shanghai Cooperation Organization
• It comprises of Russia, China, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.
• The group has decided recently to increase their cooperation in defence and keep out outside players in Central Asia.
• Viking raids
• More than 1200 years ago, hordes of bloodthirsty Viking raiders descended on Ireland, pillaging monasteries and massacring the inhabitants.
• The first Viking raiding parties arrived in Ireland in 795 AD, targeting wealthy monasteries on outlying islands. By 841 AD, Vikings were over-wintering in fortified settlements such as Dublin, Wexford and Waterford.
• Now their descendants, the Danes, are saying sorry for the Viking raids on Ireland.
• I am left to wonder, why don’t ever Muslims say sorry to India for raiding it? Should not Germans also say sorry to us for the Aryan invasions? Can you remember anybody else along the way? Just kidding.