How China Is Eclipsing Japan in Asia

May 13, 2014

How China Is Eclipsing Japan in Asia

China’s latest tangle with Vietnam plays into Japan’s bid to ramp up influence in Asia, as Tokyo offers leadership to counter Beijing’s saber-rattling. (Herehere and here.) Read more of this post

Learning from New York City’s open-data effort: Finding the technology needed to make data truly open is easy. Breaking down barriers to change and helping users understand the information takes work

Learning from New York City’s open-data effort

Finding the technology needed to make data truly open is easy. Breaking down barriers to change and helping users understand the information takes work. Read more of this post

Alibaba’s Jack Ma: “The relationship between investors and entrepreneurs is like a couple’s, nobody can say who is taking advantage of the other”

Alibaba’s Jack Ma: investors and entrepreneurs like husbands and wives

3:17am EDT

BEIJING (Reuters) – Jack Ma, the founder and executive chair of Alibaba Group Holding, said investors and entrepreneurs can fall out like domestic couples squabbling over their children in a blog post published late on Monday as the Chinese e-commerce juggernaut prepares for its blockbuster initial public offering. Read more of this post

Taxing times for pachinko as Japan considers casino gamble

Taxing times for pachinko as Japan considers casino gamble

10:43am IST

By Farah Master and Nathan Layne

OSAKA/TOKYO (Reuters) – Moves towards legalising casinos in Japan have reignited a debate over the legal status of pachinko, with a potential new tax mooted for a $200 billion gaming industry that has existed for decades on the fringes of the law. Read more of this post

Beijing plans new $14 billion airport to ease congestion at its overcrowded air travel gateway, already the world’s second-busiest

Beijing Plans to Spend $14 Billion on Second Airport

New Airport Expected to Open in 2018

JOANNE CHIU

May 13, 2014 8:17 a.m. ET

HONG KONG—Beijing plans to spend around US$14 billion to build a new airport in the outskirts of the nation’s capital to relieve congestion at its overcrowded air travel gateway, already the world’s second-busiest. Read more of this post

China demand for luxury furniture ‘decimating rosewood’

China demand for luxury furniture ‘decimating rosewood’

Monday, May 12, 2014 – 21:06

AFP

BANGKOK – Runaway Chinese demand for luxury furniture is spurring illegal logging across Southeast Asia, stripping the region of precious Siamese rosewood and driving a chain of cross-border corruption and violence, environmentalists said Monday. Read more of this post

10 Cognitive Biases that Can Trip Up Finance; CFOs should urge their teams to consciously try to overcome these dangerous predispositions

May 22, 2014

CFO.com | US

10 Cognitive Biases that Can Trip Up Finance

CFOs should urge their teams to consciously try to overcome these dangerous predispositions.

David McCann

Because CFOs are not actually superhuman, but just people like everyone else, they too are subject to a lengthy list of cognitive biases that influence our decisions and actions. In the corporate finance context, these biases, if unchecked, can have devastating consequences for company performance. Read more of this post

Special report: The power struggle behind China’s corruption crackdown

Special report: The power struggle behind China’s corruption crackdown

8:46pm EDT

By Benjamin Kang Lim, David Lague and Charlie Zhu

BEIJING/HONG KONG (Reuters) – Liu Han seemed to thrive in the company of officials.

Even a birthday party in 2011 for Liu’s primary-school aged son drew a crowd of bureaucrats in Chengdu, the capital of China’s western Sichuan province where the flamboyant mining tycoon was based. “There was a mayor of a nearby city with a population of three or four million,” recalls Australian political lobbyist John Halden who helped win approval for Liu’s mining investments in Western Australia and was invited to the October 15 celebration. “There were senior people from the provincial treasury and about seven or eight officials from the city of Chengdu.” Read more of this post

VCs eye big cloud software returns despite dwindling valuations

VCs eye big cloud software returns despite dwindling valuations

6:41pm EDT

By Sarah McBride

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – A cloud software boom has nudged startups into unlikely realms such as dairy farms, yoga studios and back-of-the-building loading docks, leading venture capitalists to hope for stratospheric returns. Read more of this post

China’s Rising ‘Working Class Insurrection’ Problem

China’s Rising ‘Working Class Insurrection’ Problem

Tyler Durden on 05/22/2014 20:27 -0400

Last week we highlighted the stunning images of China’s “fists and daggers” police force training for a “working class insurrection.” It appears to be good timing, given last night’s terrible blasts in Urumqi. The chart below shows the worrying escalation in social unrest in China – at a time when the leadership is pushing a “strike first” anti-terrorist policy that appears to be failing badly. The “serious violent terrorist incident” that occurred last night in Urumqi, killing 31 and injuring 94, was the worst in years and prompted domestic security chief Meng Jianzhu to vow to strengthen a crackdown on the “arrogance of terrorists,” but, as one analyst warns tightening controls on the Uighur region may be “smacking them in the face.” Read more of this post

“Our Industry Is Absolutely Crazy”: The Subprime Wolf Of Wall Street In 125% Interest Clothing

“Our Industry Is Absolutely Crazy”: The Subprime Wolf Of Wall Street In 125% Interest Clothing

Tyler Durden on 05/22/2014 18:07 -0400

The last time we wrote about the number 125% it was in the context of the return of that old Subprime 1.0 staple home loans that cover more than the purchase price of the home (because one must always have some leftover cash for improvements), i.e. 125% loan-to-value mortgages. Today 125% comes back and again it is in the context of subprime, only this time it is about the second coming of the credit bubble when, as Bloomberg writes, a certain group of distinguished individuals is now offering loans to troubled Americans at the whopping annual interest rate of 125%. Read more of this post

Thinking & Writing: CIA’s Guide to Cognitive Science

Thinking & Writing: CIA’s Guide to Cognitive Science

by VW StaffMay 21, 2014, 9:03 pm

This CIA Monograph (re-released in 2010 by Robert Sinclair) presents “the implications of growing knowledge in the cognitive sciences for the way the intelligence business is conducted – in how we perform analysis, how we present our findings, and even its meaning for our hiring and training practices”. In other words, this paper is about, “thinking and writing [and] the complex mental patterns out of which writing comes, their strengths and limitations, and the challenges they create, not just for writers but for managers”. Via simoleonsense.com Read more of this post

Charlie Munger’s Favorite Human Misjudgment

Charlie Munger’s Favorite Human Misjudgment

May 21, 2014, 3:15 pm

Notes on Charlie Munger’s favorite human misjudgment by Whitney Tilson Via Value Investing World

Charlie Munger’s Opening Remarks

I feel a duty in these later years to talk a little bit because so many of you have come so far and therefore I’m going to talk a little about current change conditions in corporate governance, the investment world, how we’re adapting at Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE:BRK.A) (NYSE:BRK.B) and WESCO International, Inc. (NYSE:WCC), and how you might face these challenges. Read more of this post

Joseph Finder Explores the ‘Alien Worlds’ of Business and Drugs; Joseph Finder’s latest novel ‘Suspicion’ juxtaposes the world of posh private schools with drug cartels

Joseph Finder Explores the ‘Alien Worlds’ of Business and Drugs

Joseph Finder’s latest novel ‘Suspicion’ juxtaposes the world of posh private schools with drug cartels

STEVE DOUGHERTY

May 21, 2014 2:24 p.m. ET

To write his thrillers, author Joseph Finder usually does a lot of research. Best known for suspense novels set in the business world, he’s never worked for a large company, but sees himself as “an anthropologist exploring an alien world.” Read more of this post

Online Retailer Flipkart Acquires Myntra; Deal Will Give Flipkart Control of Roughly Half of India’s E-Commerce Market

Online Retailer Flipkart Acquires Myntra

Deal Will Give Flipkart Control of Roughly Half of India’s E-Commerce Market

DHANYA ANN THOPPIL

May 22, 2014 5:24 a.m. ET

BANGALORE—Flipkart Internet Pvt., India’s largest online retailer, agreed to acquire its rival Myntra Designs Pvt. in a $400 million transaction that will give Flipkart control of roughly half of the country’s e-commerce market. Read more of this post

Child of Light a shining example of indie innovation

Child of Light a shining example of indie innovation

May 11, 2014

Calum Wilson Austin

Chances are, if you take a look at any bricks-and-mortar video game store, you’re going to find a lot of death, destruction and explosions. So many explosions they soon become meaningless. On the other hand, online game distribution platforms such as Steamare inundated with simpler – but no less effective – indie experiences usually created on a budget of paint fumes and dreams. The indie development scene is generally limited to a certain type of game, often side-scrollers, due to their financial situation. It’s strange that, until recently, large publishers have not taken advantage of the relatively smaller budgets, (compared to most AAA top releases)and potentially larger profit margins, these games afford. Read more of this post

Online cycling retailer Wiggle in float rumours, valuing the company at around £440m; The company made pre-tax profits of £12.3m on revenues of £140.7m

Online cycling retailer Wiggle in float rumours

May 12, 2014

Wiggle was sold to private equity group Bridgepoint in 2011 for £180m ($192.4 million). Photo: John Veage

Wiggle, the privately owned online cycling retailer, is working with advisers at boutique investment bank Rothschild on a potential flotation. Read more of this post

Read, Kids, Read: It’s not a chore. It’s a path to fulfillment that fewer are traveling

Read, Kids, Read

MAY 12, 2014

Frank Bruni

As an uncle I’m inconsistent about too many things.

Birthdays, for example. My nephew Mark had one on Sunday, and I didn’t remember — and send a text — until 10 p.m., by which point he was asleep. Read more of this post

Follow the Money, China-Style: The economy’s mystery of surplus currency yet low inflation may be a result of the piles of cash hoarded by corrupt officials

Follow the Money, China-Style

MAY 11, 2014

Yu Hua

BEIJING — Since China introduced a floating exchange rate on July 21, 2005, the Chinese yuan has consistently risen in value against the United States dollar, from a low of 8.28 yuan to the dollar in July 2005 to a high of 6.06 in January of this year. But the appreciation of the yuan has failed to convince ordinary Chinese people that their money buys more; on the contrary, they feel it’s worth less. Read more of this post

The Problem With Confidence: The best advice for self-confidence is not “believe in yourself” but rather “look at what you’ve done in the world.”

The Problem With Confidence

MAY 12, 2014

David Brooks

The current issue of The Atlantic carries a fascinating summary of “The Confidence Code” by Katty Kay and Claire Shipman. The essay runs through the evidence suggesting that women tend to have too little self-confidence. When asked how well they did on tests, women tend to estimate that they got fewer answers correct than they actually did. In one British study, a business school professor asked students how much they would deserve to earn five years after graduation. The women’s estimates were 20 percent lower than the men’s. Read more of this post

A Closer Look Inside IBM’s Cloud Challenge: IBM is finally moving with real urgency in the cloud computing market. But can IBM win over enough of its mainstream corporate customers?

A Closer Look Inside IBM’s Cloud Challenge

By STEVE LOHR

MAY 12, 2014, 9:00 AM 5 Comments

IBM, after a sluggish start, is moving with real urgency in building up its cloud business, as I noted in a recent article.

“IBM has made big moves and done some really good things,” said Daryl Plummer, an analyst at Gartner. “But the question now is, can it win business and make money in the cloud business?” Read more of this post

Scientists Warn of Rising Oceans From Polar Melt

Scientists Warn of Rising Oceans From Polar Melt

By JUSTIN GILLIS and KENNETH CHANGMAY 12, 2014

A large section of the mighty West Antarctica ice sheet has begun falling apart and its continued melting now appears to be unstoppable, two groups of scientists reported on Monday. If the findings hold up, they suggest that the melting could destabilize neighboring parts of the ice sheet and a rise in sea level of 10 feet or more may be unavoidable in coming centuries. Read more of this post

%d bloggers like this: