Mahant!

On a warm summers evenin on a train bound for nowhere, I met up with the gambler; we were both too tired to sleep. So we took turns a starin out the window at the darkness til boredom overtook us, and he began to speak. He said, son, Ive made a life out of readin peoples faces, And knowin what their cards were by the way they held their eyes. So if you dont mind my sayin, I can see youre out of aces. For a taste of your whiskey Ill give you some advice. So I handed him my bottle and he drank down my last swallow. Then he bummed a cigarette and asked me for a light. And the night got deathly quiet, and his face lost all expression. Said, if youre gonna play the game, boy, ya gotta learn to play it right. You got to know when to hold em, know when to fold em, Know when to walk away and know when to run. You never count your money when youre sittin at the table. Therell be time enough for countin when the dealins done. Now evry gambler knows that the secret to survivin Is knowin what to t...

A major tectonic shift in money flow and black market economies A simple statement, a confession, made under immense duress to survive: but what an impact it will have on the banking systems world over and huge, more-than-you-can-imagine impact on the financial markets and criminal behavior. UBS under tremendous pressure to survive the life draining losses of last year has agreed to (or close to agreeing, depending on which news article you read) to reveal the account detials of its secretive holders. The problem for these biggie holders is that they have to now: Holders will have to churn their portfolio i.e. take the money away and stash it somewhere else Invest or hide the money in different (and hidable) formats. [Gold bugs have known something for a long time now hmmm] Is the money going to other safe havens OR would other safe havens also open up (or forced to open up) after Swiss disclosure This has undoubtedly triggered a wave of new scams that will brew over next years or may ...

If there was ever a time when entire humanity relied on one word, it was 2000 years ago when Joseph prophesied the arrival of Messiah to relieve them of their pains and sins, the arrival of Jesus Christ. Today the word was Obama but soon eclipsed by an obscure word in the dictionary. Well, my English teacher certainly missed the whole point and power of the word stimulus. When looked at the standard dictionary term it seems quite ordinary but then dot.com was extraordinary compound word (not even a word at all). But look Ms. Rosy whole world is waiting for him, he is far more popular than Britney Spears! St Stimulus now carries all the burden of correcting the sins and pains of the world. For decades economists and printing bankers have lived without the fear of God or retribution from general public, and now when their game in nearly up (or so it seems) they have got St Stimulus to help them in their need. Can St Stimulus really help us and especially the poor US taxpayers (and gettin...

Related post: Update 2 , Update 1

Update on the Portfolio Management tool. This version takes care of the bug that existed in the calculation of loans and its repayment. Download

I have, at various times, wanted to download the data from financial websites for prices, calculation or tracking or some other purposes. I distinctly remember when I wanted to download the Soyabean prices and quotes from NBOT (which were not publicly downloadable and intra-day charts/data is still not available), and ended up creating a resource hogging monstrous excel which had more downsides than any use. But almost all the times, have only found frustration in not being able to download the data. Even if the stock data could be downloaded, they were not in the format that will help easy calculation with help of MS Excel. It was in this search that I came across Gummy Stuff and Mr. Ponzo's remarkable macros that helped us download the data from Yahoo Finance. But the only problem was that it could only download the EOD stock prices or market related information. Downloading the fundamental data from the sites like Reuters and Yahoo Finance looked near impossible. Then came web q...

A wonderful visualization by Guardian that gives a dimension to the magnitude of the asset inflation that we are are witnessing. The link of Guardian visualization.

The next big thing is something that happened when you were watching yesterday's news on CNBC. :)

One of the easiest way for India to beat the slump is to get Thomas Friedman to be in India for next 6 months :) It is no-brainer his book 'World is Flat' was a key influencer to many decision-makers as far as outsourcing in concerned. Well, fortunately he is in India now and blogging his heart out, with lots of praises for India and Indian IT companies [*sigh*] I just hope he outgrows his crush on Indian IT, the second post is a good sign of hope. Open Door Bailout Yes, they could. So they did. [A much better take on India than myopic Silicon-valley view]

Not much change in the numbers but a cleaner chart; tracking its progress, this is interesting. This is Prashanth's idea of course.

Just posting an updated version of the market snapshot. Actually, this version takes away most from the previous one, but just makes for a cleaner presentation. http://www.filefactory.com/file/af0b3bd/n/Morning_Snapshot_V2_xls

BusinessWeek seems to have flagged off this years’ fall-over-each-other parade for business schools. Business schools, it is widely known, sometimes use their own medicines and do make a good case for them, even if it takes bending few rules to stay ahead. The accompanying chart is the business school alumni’s salary survey, and to say the least is very interesting. The chart is the salaries charted out for Top 15 B-schools for 2009. The survey seems to lack some really concrete that’s because the numbers seem to be rather skewed. 1. The salaries of the Top 3 schools Harvard, Stanford and Wharton seem to far surpass the schools of UCLA, Ross and Kelley. 2. What could possibly explain the plateau of the salaries in first five years, even decline in some cases; to plateau after 15 years? Are we to assume that only period of growth is the career between 5th to 15th years? 3. The survey shows the salary growing 100% over the period of 20 years. That is simply improbable because a ...

Prashanth wrote mentioning Sensex (and Nifty) have retraced from the 89SMA many times within this fall, which has taken the shape of channels. Will the markets drop back again from these levels?

Hope is something that motivates a person to keep going in tough circumstances, against all odds, fighting despair and struggle; even if the person knows he would not be any better placed than the person next to you. There are no words that sum up the fate of mankind like now immortal phrase of John Maynard Keynes: "in long run we are all dead." Nothing has occurred since to change the nature of the quote but with each passing day, it’s just getting prophetic. Just like other prophets before him, Keynes has lots of support from economists to laymen. The inauguration of Obama was the most anticipated event of 2008, the wait for Promised Land, the change to help us ashore on the drifting waters, the one who can fill the position of the great leader for the world. Such, was the anticipation of change that many expected Obama's inauguration, and timely triggered rally to be the end of all the chaos and plague that was wrecked on the people by last and apathetic administrati...

I am amazed by the speed and reach of Twitter. Joined on new year's day and already addicted to this. Would I have got a front seat at TED or TOC? With Twitter I have following people like Tim O'reilly, Nancy Duarte, Sarah Jones at TED; Dave Gray totally stole the show at TOC. There sure was lot more happening in between these tweets but wow, I got it real-time!

Commodities are given up for dead. Its bust. It should go back to its decade or multi-decade hibernation. They are worst performers. Yeah. Some commodities have given up more than they made but then look at the long term charts. They never made it. Right? So, who says the bull run has even started?! Give it time, watch the space. And while at it, invest.

ACC has moved up to meet its resistance lines around 540, there are lots of resistances at these levels but it is likely that ACC would be able to break above them (on the back of positive divergences across all momentum indicators). We should expect ACC to move higher over a short period to 650 levels.

Who can forget the days in mid-September 2008 when hundreds of billions became an household word. In a world where billions still live under-a-dollar a day, Senate went ahead to give largess of unbelievable $700 billion to greedy bankers. In many ways, this bailout, that taking money from commoners pocket to feed the rich, was inevitable. Inevitable because there was no option to decline. It was accept or you accept. The fervent pleas of Paulson and his 'dire consequences' reverberated through the air. Billions have flown out from people to bankers, administration has changed but not the 'if else, otherwise' attitudes of lawmakers. "If you don't give up few billions from your purse whole world will be afire." Use words like Armageddon or Catasrophe in the newspaper headlines and you will get billions sanctioned. Where is the change, Mr. President? The fact is we are all dead, it is just that they are delaying the inevitable. There is no way the world'...

What do Indians use the internet for? Though I don't have the % data as Mashable, general interpretation is pretty simple. These are sure to be on top usage patterns 1. Emails 2. Social networking 3. Job search 4. Education & Job (application, exams and results) 5. Entertainment a. Films b. Music c. Cricket 6. News You just have to track the most searched items on Google Trends to get a confirmation.

This is a story of how a boring afternoon turned into an action packed thriller - real life, real time. It’s been a slow day till lunch when we came back from lunch there was some seemingly absurd comments from tweeterers on a Bentley car chase. I ignored most of it, but to ignore you got to read it, so in-between reading all these micro posts, the constant stream of news flow emerged and gave me almost full dimension of news - as it happened. And this when I hadn't checked the TV and Google news didn’t carry a thing. Entire Twitterverse was on the stadium watching as hundreds if not thousands of people commented on what was happening. This is a tough-to-beat proposition for news channels. Only a chaotic organization can allow this kind of freedom and there is not way the systematic organization can beat people who can type 140characters in less than 20 seconds to the finish line. Google may loose its relevance as real-time search but it will retain prime spot in near-real-time sea...

The prices of Silver has risen on back of its breakout but very interestingly and as mentioned in earlier post the momentum between Silver and Gold seem to be diverging with Silver leading the charge. While the momentum of Gold has sagged with tough resistances around 900 levels Silver has kept up the momentum. The next resistances for Silver are seen around the area of $14. What happens if Silver breaks above this level would be a very interesting guess. Most probably it will rocket.

The chart pattern which looked like a channel breakout in our last analysis still stands, however the momentum has dropped off the cliff and it is prudent to expect some form of retest of the breakout before further uptrend occurs. The prices are likely to drop perhaps for a short period to the range above 850, and hopefully will hold above the trendline (drawn in blue). The series of resistances that exist at the levels of 900 will hold the prices and momentum down till renewed energy is gained from this rest. The prices are likely to touch 980 - 1000 levels once this retracement is completed. The longer term bullishness seen in Weekly chart is unchanged.

For past many trading session the Dollar Index has moved within a tight range of 86.50 and 84.00, so the question is do we call a top at this juncture? As much as we would like to and believe to call it a top of this retracement, prudence suggests that we hold back our horses until at least the break below the range of 84.00 is suggested. The real problem in calling the top actually lies in the fact there is so much activity on the fundamental aspect, and with increasing number of banks, brokers, traders and investors taking a hard stance on dollar the upside seems rather limited while the downside could be propelled at fast pace. Trades can only be suggested in small lots as its is very much probable at this juncture that the first 'stop loss' region around 86.50 could easily be taken out by option-barrier trades, hence the ideal stop loss levels are at 88.5 and 89.00 levels. The more bearish aspect would be made if the prices breaks above 86.50 and breaks down, making a bull ...

Blogger started the revolution by enabling easy creation and publication of blogs, it was a revolution. Now the Blogger product team has opened its own account at Twitter, while this is interesting this just confirms that this space is too attractive to keep any one out, even Google. Google has always been mocked at for not being actively part of Twitter or create platforms similar to Twitter. Many have started writing epithets for Google's search, some of the reasons are well made and well observed. It is time Google comes up with something else they may miss out something. Check out an interesting discussion here

Am I happy with Twitter, I must say I am overwhelmed by it. Its too good. I am just having fun with Twitter and I have also done some serious learning using that. One thing that really puts me off is that it is like a giant real time social bookmarking with microsecond life. There are lots of useful applications coming up. Give it some time. You never know what this app will be in a year or two, but one thing for sure it will be fantastic, game changer and extremely useful. Related posts: Twitter as productivity app Threaded threadless world For Tweets, life is a open book

For all the people who think Twitter is a waste of time, Tweeps have just one thing to say - you just don't get it. Apart from it being still in its infancy, Twitterverse will only become sophisticated and whole range of applications will develop in Twitter ecosystem. Check out the below article by Elliot, a worthy sample of how Twitter can be used for enhancing productivity. Live Inside Twitter and Still Stay Productive

The disruptive powers of new technologies are rarely acknowledged by the persons in the trade, more often than not and unfortunately they are the last persons on the horizon who realize the change has happened. Since these technologies are having massive impact on media it is imperative that first ripples and waves are felt in traditional media and its archaic business models. The powerful advantages that made new media a very powerful and some what unstoppable tide is the ability to enable millions of people to contribute on never-ending range of subjects without any limitation of physical borders and publish these views, opinions, content at almost absolutely no cost. In other words, media will become the playground for these disruptive to play out. People either ride the wave or get hit by them. Photography Cameras were a luxury a decade ago, today everybody has several of them. The Photographers, in good old times, carved out a niche for themselves because th...

Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant! Let the dead Past bury its dead! Act, act, in the living Present! Heart within, and God o'erhead! - LongFellow

“The Sun, with all the planets revolving around it, and depending on it, can still ripen a bunch of grapes as though it had nothing else in the Universe to do.” - Galileo Galilei

Sometimes markets become unreasonable, kind of unfair. The logic doesn't work anymore and we are left looking for a reason for occurrence. There have been accusations of PPT team working overtime to manage markets, haven't checked it though. But something seems amiss see today's NYT edition. Yeah, 800billion stimulus package is a good reason for markets to cheer but world doesn't buy it. Force shites on Reason's back - Ben Franklin

Did you see that?! :-o

The article started as a curiosity: It is a bizarre tale of a bedding company, a megalomaniac businessman and a make-believe currency. Then it headed towards a now familiar teritory suspected of defrauding hundreds of thousands of investors of at least $1.4bn (£1bn) over the past eight years. Well, this is not much when you have Bernie's big money and his glam clients hogging the limelight. More will come, no big surprise. Article continues and what it says next totally rocks! Those who paid at least ¥100,000 (£770) also received an equivalent sum in Enten - or Paradise Yen - a virtual currency Nami claimed would become legal tender in a post-recession era in which he would be "world famous". I couldn't stop laughing at this. This guy had nerve, too bad that scheme failed. Wait, isn't that exactly what US and Federal Reserve and Every other Central Bank in the world are claiming. When is their house of cards crumbling? When are they going to be hauled up? What hap...

Above is the chart of Gold in Indian Rupees. Do you see a deflation there? What I still don't get it is, why people still don't get it?!!!

1. First and most imp, the music of CNBC is bad bad (very bad) for mental shanti you need to think. According to my estimate, 5 minutes of exposure, can ruin as much as 50 mins to 50 hrs. 2. The 98% of the views offered on CNBC is crap. The 2% which may be good, may not fall on your ears. 3. They show the obvious (what went up and what went down) and add a lot of noise to that. 4. The analyst over hype and show too much emotions which influences you into making bad decisions. Like say "mkt is strong" when going up and "mkt is weak" when going down. Class Nursery kids can also say this, plus talking to them gives you pleasure. 5. Many of the analyst who appear on CNBC have a tarnished image. All the more dangerous. 6. Schemes like Power Your Trade which was pushed very aggressively during previous bull run in april-may 2006 was a catastrophe. More such schemes may come. 7. The channel is used by many analyst and fund managers to "showcase" themselves. 8. CN...

I watched Samson and Delilah, no matter what people would say about it I liked it. I think Lamarr was looked absolutely fantastic, Victor dull but inspiring. Apart from the fact this is based on Bible, there is one Act which I liked very much. When Delilah asks Samson the secret of his superhuman strength, Samson reveals it to her but it unlike what you would ever expect. Following is the quote from Judges 16: So he told her everything. "No razor has ever been used on my head," he said, " because I have been a Nazirite set apart to God since birth. If my head were shaved, my strength would leave me, and I would become as weak as any other man." The point is every strength of man comes from his devotion to God. And this devotion takes the form of conviction, a conviction that is set upon by himself/herself. If that conviction is broken the bridge that connects him God is broken, for the moment. At that point the "Shield of his strength is gone" I have seen ...

They got it right! and so so wrong!! [Via BoingBoing ]

Continuing with January barometer, both Dow and Sensex ended negative. Dow: Sensex:

This free historical stock prices download utility you to download historical stock prices from Yahoo for free. You can also download the prices of commodities, futures, mutual funds, forex and any other instrument tracked by Yahoo for free. Download the file here Adapted from Gummy-stuff.org.

Market snapshot tool enables you to download historical stock prices from Yahoo for free and updates the averages, price trends and pivot levels. Download the file here Adapted from Gummy-stuff.org.