Don't ever let anybody deter you from buying a share because its trading volume is restricted. Think only of under-lying value.
When I first bought into FDC, a small pharmaceutical company, at Rs. 30-odd, trading was a few thousand shares a day. Today, it traded over 2 million shares on NSE alone, closing at Rs.112.
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
Equity analysts tend to be full of bull
http://av.r.ftdata.co.uk/files/2010/08/20100517-overoptimistic.jpg
Sunday, August 29, 2010
Chief Ministers and the PDS
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Gegong-Apang-arrested-in-PDS-scam-case/articleshow/6425976.cms
The fate of whistle blowers
A comment on an Indian Express site:
http://expressbuzz.com/cities/chennai/tn-whistleblower-found-dead/199577.html
RTI activists are being killed all over India. All RTI activists needs to be careful as the criminals will resort to killing. Some form of anonimity needs to be adopted to protect by these RTI activists as governments are not bothered or police is of little help.This year so far some nine whistleblowers were killed . Maharashtra tops the list with four killings. Other murdered RTI activists are Amit Jethwa in Ahmedabad in July 2010. Datta Patil of Kolhapur in Maharashtra was killed on May 31, 2010, Vitthal Gite of Beed district, Maharashtra, was killed on April 21, 2010. Sola Ranga Rao of Krishna District, Andhra Pradesh, was killed on April 11,2010. Arun Sawant of Badlapur, Maharashtra, was killed on February 26, 2010. Shashidhar Mishra of Begusarai, Bihar, was killed on February 14, 2010. Vishram Laxman Dodiya of Ahmedabad, Gujarat, was killed on February 11, 2010. Satish Shetty of Pune, Maharashtra, was killed on January 13,2010.
By bharatian
http://expressbuzz.com/cities/chennai/tn-whistleblower-found-dead/199577.html
RTI activists are being killed all over India. All RTI activists needs to be careful as the criminals will resort to killing. Some form of anonimity needs to be adopted to protect by these RTI activists as governments are not bothered or police is of little help.This year so far some nine whistleblowers were killed . Maharashtra tops the list with four killings. Other murdered RTI activists are Amit Jethwa in Ahmedabad in July 2010. Datta Patil of Kolhapur in Maharashtra was killed on May 31, 2010, Vitthal Gite of Beed district, Maharashtra, was killed on April 21, 2010. Sola Ranga Rao of Krishna District, Andhra Pradesh, was killed on April 11,2010. Arun Sawant of Badlapur, Maharashtra, was killed on February 26, 2010. Shashidhar Mishra of Begusarai, Bihar, was killed on February 14, 2010. Vishram Laxman Dodiya of Ahmedabad, Gujarat, was killed on February 11, 2010. Satish Shetty of Pune, Maharashtra, was killed on January 13,2010.
By bharatian
Tech fixes don't fix corruption
My piece for Yahoo India, that goes up today:
No Silver Bullets
“People starving and thirsting, grain elevators are bursting.
Oh you know it costs more to store the food than it does to give it away.”
Legendary songster Bob Dylan sang these words in 'Slow Train Coming', in 1979. Over a quarter of a century later, in 2006, Indian economist Arvind Virmani concluded pretty much the same thing in a paper he wrote for the Planning Commission*.
Though not quite as lyrical as Dylan's words, Dr. Virmani's several pages of facts, figures, and analysis allow one conclusion to ring out clearly – our current food and fertiliser subsidies are doing a horrible job of serving the poor. If we wound up these two subsidies, and gave the same amount of money away every year, it would be enough, not just to tackle their hunger, but to lift all the poor in the country above the poverty line. If we added to this governmental expenditure on welfare programs under the heads, 'Rural Development', 'Welfare of SC, ST and OBCs', and 'Social Security and Welfare', there would be as much money all over again; perhaps, Dr. Virmani suggested, this could be used to pay for the government's administration costs and system leakages.
Subsidies and welfare programs alone cost us twice as much money as required to eliminate poverty completely. And then there's NREGA. Yet, poverty persists: in writing the conclusions above, Virmani estimated that 30% of Indians lived below the poverty line. Every year, we spend twice as much money as should be required to keep all of India's poor out of poverty. Yet less than 1% actually cross this 'rekha' every year, whether through welfare measures, employment or other means of material advance. Clearly, Rajiv Gandhi was being hugely charitable to the Indian government when he famously said that 15% of the money meant for the poor reached them.
Now that the Indian government's fiscal deficit has become a matter of concern, one of the expenditure heads that is being questioned is the food subsidy. To better target the recipients of subsidised grain, government agencies have been talking about introducing smart cards, which would carry coded information about the card-holder of the card and his entitlement of subsidised grain, sugar, kerosene and other essential items. This technological fix, it is hoped, will reduce the leakage from the system.
Madhya Pradesh had run a pilot project based on a smart card concept in 2009, but found it unsuccessful. Press reports suggest that shopkeepers were reluctant to use the machines provided. Now the state intends to achieve similar objectives by linking the Unique Identification project to food coupons. This poor UID project – even before it has been birthed, it is being loaded with all manner of expectations. According to Wikipedia**, it is believed it will help address everything from rigged elections to “widespread embezzlement that affects subsidies and poverty alleviation programs such as NREGA.” Not to mention, illegal immigration and terrorist threats.
Wow, I'll have 1200 million of those please!
Hey, but wasn't the Right To Information Act supposed to solve the problems of embezzlement and corruption? That was UPA Mark I. The UID is UPA Mark II – new, improved, and tech-savvy.
Forget it. Technology is no cure for corruption. The Indian Railways has been there, done that. The computerised railway ticketing system was supposed to eliminate touts and black-marketing in railway travel. When seats are aplenty, the system is a treat. But at the first hint of a rush, seats disappear. During the holiday season, tat-kal tickets disappear before the first home-user can log in. But, contact a reservations clerk at the originating station, and the same ticket is produced, for a service premium over and above the 'tatkal' premium.
Technology, in other words, can be fixed. And will be, in an environment where the stakes are high, the ethical milieu supports it, and the guilty are never brought to book. Leakages are a political and cultural phenomenon, not a technological one.
In his paper, Dr. Virmani mentioned that he had proposed a smart card to streamline the PDS in 2001. At the time of his writing, no state government had taken it up, “as it had the potential of dramatically reducing leakages and administrative costs”. The under-stated implication is clear – state governments didn't want to reduce leakages and administrative costs.
You're welcome to believe that the nature of our governance has drastically changed since then. I don't.
*http://planningcommission.nic.in/reports/wrkpapers/wk_pov106.pdf
**http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unique_Identification_Authority_of_India
No Silver Bullets
“People starving and thirsting, grain elevators are bursting.
Oh you know it costs more to store the food than it does to give it away.”
Legendary songster Bob Dylan sang these words in 'Slow Train Coming', in 1979. Over a quarter of a century later, in 2006, Indian economist Arvind Virmani concluded pretty much the same thing in a paper he wrote for the Planning Commission*.
Though not quite as lyrical as Dylan's words, Dr. Virmani's several pages of facts, figures, and analysis allow one conclusion to ring out clearly – our current food and fertiliser subsidies are doing a horrible job of serving the poor. If we wound up these two subsidies, and gave the same amount of money away every year, it would be enough, not just to tackle their hunger, but to lift all the poor in the country above the poverty line. If we added to this governmental expenditure on welfare programs under the heads, 'Rural Development', 'Welfare of SC, ST and OBCs', and 'Social Security and Welfare', there would be as much money all over again; perhaps, Dr. Virmani suggested, this could be used to pay for the government's administration costs and system leakages.
Subsidies and welfare programs alone cost us twice as much money as required to eliminate poverty completely. And then there's NREGA. Yet, poverty persists: in writing the conclusions above, Virmani estimated that 30% of Indians lived below the poverty line. Every year, we spend twice as much money as should be required to keep all of India's poor out of poverty. Yet less than 1% actually cross this 'rekha' every year, whether through welfare measures, employment or other means of material advance. Clearly, Rajiv Gandhi was being hugely charitable to the Indian government when he famously said that 15% of the money meant for the poor reached them.
Now that the Indian government's fiscal deficit has become a matter of concern, one of the expenditure heads that is being questioned is the food subsidy. To better target the recipients of subsidised grain, government agencies have been talking about introducing smart cards, which would carry coded information about the card-holder of the card and his entitlement of subsidised grain, sugar, kerosene and other essential items. This technological fix, it is hoped, will reduce the leakage from the system.
Madhya Pradesh had run a pilot project based on a smart card concept in 2009, but found it unsuccessful. Press reports suggest that shopkeepers were reluctant to use the machines provided. Now the state intends to achieve similar objectives by linking the Unique Identification project to food coupons. This poor UID project – even before it has been birthed, it is being loaded with all manner of expectations. According to Wikipedia**, it is believed it will help address everything from rigged elections to “widespread embezzlement that affects subsidies and poverty alleviation programs such as NREGA.” Not to mention, illegal immigration and terrorist threats.
Wow, I'll have 1200 million of those please!
Hey, but wasn't the Right To Information Act supposed to solve the problems of embezzlement and corruption? That was UPA Mark I. The UID is UPA Mark II – new, improved, and tech-savvy.
Forget it. Technology is no cure for corruption. The Indian Railways has been there, done that. The computerised railway ticketing system was supposed to eliminate touts and black-marketing in railway travel. When seats are aplenty, the system is a treat. But at the first hint of a rush, seats disappear. During the holiday season, tat-kal tickets disappear before the first home-user can log in. But, contact a reservations clerk at the originating station, and the same ticket is produced, for a service premium over and above the 'tatkal' premium.
Technology, in other words, can be fixed. And will be, in an environment where the stakes are high, the ethical milieu supports it, and the guilty are never brought to book. Leakages are a political and cultural phenomenon, not a technological one.
In his paper, Dr. Virmani mentioned that he had proposed a smart card to streamline the PDS in 2001. At the time of his writing, no state government had taken it up, “as it had the potential of dramatically reducing leakages and administrative costs”. The under-stated implication is clear – state governments didn't want to reduce leakages and administrative costs.
You're welcome to believe that the nature of our governance has drastically changed since then. I don't.
*http://planningcommission.nic.in/reports/wrkpapers/wk_pov106.pdf
**http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unique_Identification_Authority_of_India
Monday, August 16, 2010
Tops Priority for Obama
A key clarity in defining strategy is that you need to focus. Strategy is as much about what you DON"T do, as about what you do.
Somebody needs to tell that to Obama:
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Somebody needs to tell that to Obama:
President Obama hard at work on his real top prioroty.
Kudos to CBS News, of all places. They noticed that President Obama has a tendency to say everything is a top priority. And we meaneverything.
Perhaps that’s why he’s flailing and failing. No focus.
ECONOMIC RECOVERY: “Our top priority is to recover and rebuild from a recession that has touched the lives of nearly every American.” (6-15-10) Address to the Nation
JOB CREATION: “Creating jobs in the United States and ensuring a return to sustainable economic growth is the top priority for my Administration.” (3-11-10)
FREE TRADE AGREEMENTS: “…that’s something that’s going to be a top priority.” (4/27/10)
ENERGY SECURITY: “And that’s why my energy security plan has been one of the top priorities of my Administration since the day I took office.” (4/28/10)
EDUCATION REFORM: “To train our workers for the jobs of tomorrow, we’ve made education reform a top priority in this Administration.” (2/24/10)
STUDENT LOAN REFORM: “This is something that I’ve made a top priority.” (2/1/10)
EXPORTS BY SMALL BUSINESSES: “This is going to be a top priority.” (12/3/09)
HEALTH ASSISTANCE TO 9/11 FIRST RESPONDERS: “I’m not just talking the talk, we’ve been budgeting this as a top priority for this Administration.” (2/3/10)
END HOMELESSNESS AMONG VETERANS: “I’ve also directed (Veterans Affairs) Secretary Shinseki to focus on a top priority: reducing homeless among veterans.” (8/17/09)
HURRICANE PREPAREDNESS: “Our top priority is ensuring the public safety. That means appropriate sheltering in place or if necessary, getting as many people as possible out of harm’s way prior to landfall.” (5/29/09)
H1N1 FLU VACCINATIONS: “And throughout this process, my top priority has been the health and the safety of the American people.” (5/1/09)
SUPPORT FOR MILITARY FAMILIES: “These military families are heroes too. And they are a top priority of Michelle and me. And they will always have our support.” (5/30/09)
STRENTHENING TIES WITH CANADA AND MEXICO: “We’re going to make this a top priority…” (10/16/09)
CONSUMER PROTECTION: “During these challenging times, the needs of American consumers are a top priority of my Administration.” (2/11/09)
ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION: “So this is going to be a top priority generally improving our environmental quality.” (11/5/09)
Fact is, President Obama, if everything is a top priority, nothing is a top priority.
Perhaps you should follow one of the rare pieces of advice given by the IHTM Editor’s illustrious farmer father — “Pick one thing and do it well.”
One thing other than socializing the American economy, that is.
Source: CBS News
Inflation easing?
Our economics leaders keep saying inflation will fade after the monsoons. As if our price levels depend on agriculture! Only 15% of our current index is accounted for by food articles, and this will probably get revised downwards in August. Another 11.5% is accounted for food products (processed foods) but agri materials don't account for the majority of input costs here - thinking packing materials, fuel and electricity, freight, and distribution margins. Manufacturing margins have got squeezed, and firms are llooking to up prices wherever they can, so we could see these prices go up.
As to prices elsewhere in the manufacturing sector, overall numbers for Indian companies show the same tendency to margins being squeezed, so there is an upward bias in prices.
One interesting little sidelight I found when digging into data - official data for vanaspati prices, which are the single largest sub-component of edible oils, show the level to have been stagnant for much of this year. This doesn't figure - palm oil is the single largest ingredient, and prices are up from Rs. 363 per 10 kg in April to Rs. 422 yesterday.
As to prices elsewhere in the manufacturing sector, overall numbers for Indian companies show the same tendency to margins being squeezed, so there is an upward bias in prices.
One interesting little sidelight I found when digging into data - official data for vanaspati prices, which are the single largest sub-component of edible oils, show the level to have been stagnant for much of this year. This doesn't figure - palm oil is the single largest ingredient, and prices are up from Rs. 363 per 10 kg in April to Rs. 422 yesterday.
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