PAP Youth Wing coming online

Yes, Teo Ser Luck is leading the YPAP into cyberspace. This is reported in the old media today. The YPAP forum, P65, PAP facebooks and what not, will be given a revamp and a big boost, a big bang into cyberspace. This is good news for the new media. This new position of PAP is the best sign of approval that cyberspace is going to be here for now and tomorrow. We will have more views, more pro PAP and pro govt views to balance the current negativity in cyberspace. There will be more exchanges and debates over issues, and this will liven up the discussion. The army of young PAP activitists have been released into the cyberspace playground. No longer will they be leased or kept within their closed doors to chat among themselves. The first thing I did was to take a peep at the YPAP forum this morning. No change yet. Still the same as it was before. I am truly excited and looking forward to the change. At the very least they will delete all the pornography being posted there. Now, will the PAP activists take on the challenge of the cyberspace guerillas, warts and all, and return the same compliments?

Top 10 highest paid politicians in the World 1. Lee Hsien Loong - Singapore Salary in dollars - $2.47 million Salary in local currency - S$3.76 million 2. Donald Tsang Yum-Kuen - Hong Kong Salary in dollars - $516,000 Salary in local currency - HK$4 million 3. Barack Obama - United States Salary in dollars - $400,000 4. Brian Cowen - Ireland Salary in dollars - $341,000 Salary in local currency - €257,000 5. Nicolas Sarkozy - France Salary in dollars - $318,000 Salary in local currency - €240,000 6. Angela Merkel - Germany Salary in dollars - $303,000 Salary in local currency - €228,000 7. Gordon Brown - UK Salary in dollars - $279,000 Salary in local currency - £194,250 8. Stephen Harper - Canada Salary in dollars - $246,000 Salary in local currency - C$311,000 9. Taro Aso - Japan Salary in dollars - $243,000 Salary in local currency - Y24 million 10. Kevin Rudd - Australia Salary in dollars - $229,000 Salary in local currency - A$330,000 The above is an extract from a Times Online article posted in Singapore News Alternative. And my god, the information was so wrong. Shall I correct it? Doesn't Times know who are the top 10 highest paid politicians in the world?

When numbers are Pure Nonsense!

The saga of Liew Mun Leong is still on going. Another article by Lee Su Shyan in ST today questions the logic and ridiculous nature of the way numbers are being used to justified pay and think that it is reasonable and acceptable. Liew Mun Leong's bonus is equivalent to 0.7% of the company's profit which is very, very reasonable. Compare to Kwek Leng Beng's in percentage term, his $20.7m is smaller and thus fairer. Kwek Leng Beng's is 1.1% of his company's profit. Wow, too much! Such use of numbers as comparison and justification is an insult to the shareholders intelligence. And it make a mockery of Obama's pay compare to the US economy of US$10 trillion. Obama should be paid many times more. And closer at home, Hsien Loong's pay is ridiculously low in percentage term to the GDP or whatever national data one wishes to use. When would such cock reasoning be slammed as bullshit and a reasonable compensation formula become the norm in industries? Yes, the shareholders have a lot of questions to ask in the next AGM. They should also ask what the top twenty employees' bonuses were to be fair to Liew Mun Leong. If the top twenty employees are getting several millions each, then Liew Mun Leong should not be the one that is under the spotlight.

Myth 206 - How accessible is our justice system to the poor?

The pride of our judicial system is that it is fair and just and accessible to everyone, theoretically. Everyone must have remembered the NKF cases when a few victims quietly paid up when faced with lawsuits even when they were in the right. They had to pay up, apologised and looked like a fool all because they could not afford the legal fees in a lawsuit. And there have been other cases when the victims simply weighed the cost and find it cheaper to pay and walk away than to fight it out for justice. Motor accidents must have many of such incidents. Is our legal system really accessible to the poor victims? A few who have met the criteria of being shamefully poor may be able to get legal aids and assistance. But many will not fit in. I can safely said that legal justice is available to those who can afford to pay for it or those who are so poor to qualify for aid. In the case of tort or non criminal lawsuits, it is unlikely that legal aids or assistance will be available. Correct me if I am misinformed on this. Is there anyway to make our justice system more accessible to the masses and the victims of injustice? I was reminded of the American 'contingency fee based system' which means no legal fees unless the case is won. I am still disturbed by the fact that this practice is not allowed here? What is so criminal or unjust or unfair to have such a system? Under the present system, like it or not, when a lawsuit is knocking, you have to pay up first. Be prepared to pay and hope to win to claim damages against the other party. No money you lose by default. A 'contingency fee based system' will allow the lawyers to judge a case and take on the other party when there are merits for it. This in a way can stamp the frivolours lawsuits initiated by those with deep pockets. The govt's legal aid can also provide such a service based on the merits of a case rather than on how poor is the applicant. Justice will then be available to the innocent and not innocent and poor. And the cost can be claimed from the other party. It is not necessarily a totally free service. The availability of such a service will level the floors in the public courts and also provide more businesses for the legal profession. Of course spurious and frivolous cases will be lesser as the bully will know that justice is available to the poor and innocent as well.

Time for a petition to the govt

The motorists must do something to prevent the motor insurance companies from reaping them off with the reckless increase in insurance premiums. Many motorists have clean driving records and the NCD is supposed to recognise this by reducing their insurance premium. Instead, their insurance premiums are now ever higher than before. How can this thing be allowed to go on and nothing can be done to it? Is there any govt organisation that can put a stop to this mindless daylight robbery? It is time to petition the govt for action. Innocent motorists cannot just keep quiet and let the insurance companies imposed whatever premiums they deem fit when the high cost is not due to these motorists. Can the govt agencies do something immediately? There is no point in talking cock and wasting time. Action is needed now. At least freeze the rate to last years and talk later.

Victims of ethics

Madam Chiang Meng Lee wrote to ST about her involvement in an accident which was clearly the fault of the other party and a few days later a legal letter came accusing her of being the cause of the accident. I too had such a case in the past when a reckless taxi driver swerved into my lane. And I was accused of causing the accident. This kind of tactic, to point the guilty finger at the other party cannot have come from the drivers but must come from other interested parties. Whoever offered such advice must be totally devoid of morals and ethics. The main intention is to win even if turning the table against the innocent parties. This is how dark our society has become. And if one does not have the money to engage an equally good lawyer and pay through your nose, just too bad. Be prepared to become the victim and pay for all costs, including legal cost. Yes, our judicial system is fair to all, but conditional that you have more money than the other party. Where is the ethics?

Money or your life?

This was the infamous catchphrase of the 60s and 70s when the island was infested with triads and secret societies. It was a common occurrence to find a knife at one's throat while walking alone and the phrase, 'money or your life' would threaten the intended victim. Many would just have their wallets emptied and walked away a few dollars poorer. Today, 'money or your life' has taken a new meaning. The amount is much much bigger. And the victims were not healthy people walking alone at night, but walked with a whole entourage of family members into a posh hospital. There, the extortionists were not the gangsters or triad boss but clean and sophisticated professionals armed with the best medical degrees from the best medical universities. And if the potential victim happens to be suffering from a critical illness, it is as good as hearing the catchphrase, 'money or your life' being repeated. And they are not asking for a few dollars. It can be in the hundreds of thousands, or several hundred thousands of dollars. But there is a big difference between the gangster's demand and the demand by the professionals. After paying the gangster, the victim walked away alive, though a bit shaken. In the other case, they may go home in a casket after paying the huge ransom. There is no guarantee that after paying the money asked for that his life will be safe. Money or your life, or maybe money first, then we see how it will go.

S Chips in the news for all the wrong reasons

Well, after warning about the corporate governance and trustworthiness of S Chips, finally the old media is catching up on this act. Two reports, one in the ST by Yang Huiwen and another in Today by Conrad Raj, posed the same concern about the dangers of playing with S Chips. At the rate the S Chips are turning turtle, just give another couple of them going into the rubbish dump, I think it will be enough for the investors to dump them completely. They are looking to become so wild, as wild as the days of Malaysian Clob shares. Be warn. Tread with care. We have very little control and knowledge of what is going on. For those who are not in stockbroking, S Chips refer to Chinese stocks listed here. Now the there is a new version of this which refers the S Chips to Scam Chips.

The ingenuity of Wall Street thieves

They knew that the outrageous bonus game is over. So they have come to terms with it and decided not to pay huge bonuses any more. But pay themselves well is something that they must do, by hook or by crook. Their new game plan is to pay out front. They will raise the basic pay of their CEOs and senior management by as much as 70%. So a CEO who is getting US$180k will have his basic pay raised to $300k. This kind of robbery is only on the personal side. At the corporate level, they have been hookwinking the Obama govt that all of them are going bust without a bailout of several tens of billions of dollars. But the moment the Fed decided that they could not pay indecent bonuses when receiving govt bailout fund, they started to tell the govt they don't need the money, they are starting to make profits, and one even want to return the govt money immediately. These are the exceptional talents of Wall Street. We must be salivating to welcome them on board as shining examples of out of this world super talents. America main street and Europe need a revolution to rid the country of such thieves.

The shifting timeline

We are still hearing complains that above 40 years need not apply for jobs and these relatively young and healthy people are getting angry and desperate. I call them young and healthy because the timeline has changed and many are not realising this. Today's 40 is yesterday's 30. And many of them are having kids in primary schools. So far the only organisation that is taking this into consideration is the civil service. More and more civil servants are working past 60, with some noticeably past 70 and 80. Why is it that the private sector is refusing to acknowledge or recognise this shift? In the 60s and 70s, people get married at 21. Today the marrying age is 30 or 35. Then people retired at 55 and died at 60. Today people die at 80 or 90 but retire at 55 with a few exceptions. Then people started to work at 16 or 18, after O or A level. Today they start work at 23/25 or later, after university and NS for the guys. They used to make babies at 18 or below 20. Now many only do this after 30. The anomaly is now a reality. The prime of a person's life is 60 and he/she can go on to 80 or 90, another 20 years to go at least. 30 is still a child wet behind the years. With improving living condition, food and health, and medical careful, people are definitely healthier today than yesterday. When will the human resource practitioners and employers understand this shift in timeline and adjust their expectations? Perhaps we are in a state of transition. The first batch of healthy 60s will come from the baby boomers, or maybe the later baby boomers. Or shall we bring out all the million dollar 'Yodas' in the public and private sector to prove this point? They are many of these hiding in their top floor or penthouse offices and calling the shots, still alive and kicking in their 70s, 80s and perhaps 90s.

The business of keeping people alive

Mediacorp had a few news clips of the happy senior citizens in the homes or community hospitals over the weekend. They appeared healthy and enjoying every moment of their time alive. What they did not know is the heavy cost to keep them alive. From the look of it, the cost was paid by their children. Obviously they did not know that they were bankrupting their children or straining their financial resources just to keep them there. It is not cheap definitely. Ignorance is bliss but not for those who have to struggle to pay the bills. One is deemed financially able to foot the bills if the household income is above $1,500. Unbelieveable! Khaw Boon Wan has been in charge of the MOH for several years and have been working very hard to keep medical cost down. How successful has he been? Has medical cost come down or still spiralling up? The recent increase of fees in community hospitals is a testament that the cost is just going up. For those who are still healthy, pray not the day you have to be admitted to any hospitals or nursing homes. Many will not be able to afford it even with their Medisave and medical insurance. Some of their savings may not last even one month when the bill can go to tens or hundreds of thousands. With the high cost of hospitalisation and medical fees, everyone who is sick or ageing is a walking liability to himself and the family. And we celebrate for being able to keep people alive to 80, 90 or 100 years.

How to juggle accounts for a bigger bang?

This incident is still vivid in my mind. Quite many years ago I came to know of this group of companies and how well they paid out bonuses according to each subsidiary's performance. Some averaged 3 months some averaged 6 months and the exceptional ones got 12 months. All looked clean and fair, according to the books. Indeed the payout of bonuses was according to the book, actually according to the cooked book. One of the subsidiary companies actually cooked the book, brought in all future sales, WIP, etc and recorded as realised revenue and profits. That year the company was like boomtown Charlie. Every employee got 12 months bonuses. Not sure how many months the CEO and the top management staff got for cooking the book. What happened the next few years, never mind. The boat will straighten as it reaches the bridge. If the next few years lose money, take lesser bonuses. But one good year every now and then is good enough. For good years, the reward is amazing. For bad years, no sweat, the pay is still there. And if the company goes bust, just too bad. Find another company. This is the beauty of being in the corporate world and managing public companies, and being an employee. You never stand to lose your capital nor your pay, except if the company closes down. But when the company chalks up big profits, take as much as you can. Claim all the credits despite the fact that a large part of the profits were money makes money. Does anyone ask how much profit should be generated from the capital invested before talking about the excess profits? As an example, if the company has an asset of $1b, assuming that this money should give a decent return of 10%, given the risk in business, otherwise park in the bank for guaranteed risk free interest, a $100m profit is just about acceptable. Nothing to crow about. Only when profit is in excess of 10% would it be considered a contribution from the management and employees. (Not counting cooking books) It is not uncommon for management of a $1b company to crow about great profits and demand big bonuses even if the profit is less than 10% of the asset and capital invested. Another common practice by hedge funds or fund managers is to measure their performance with market indices. If they perform better than such indicators, they have done well, and need to be rewarded. Thus if everyone is losing 70% of their investment and if one is losing 60%, that one has done well. Clever accounting and clever logic.

Singapore United the way to go

This is the new war cry of Hsien Loong. He is calling on Singaporeans to work together to find solutions to the crisis. How real and relevant is such a call? The work together may be a bit real as everyone has to work to keep the machine running, the economy running. If everyone just plays his part be it a cleaner or a minister, things will continue to move. The part about finding solutions to the crisis is best left to the super talents. How could the less able be in a position to find solutions when the greatest minds in the US are still fumbling along? Even if they have any small ideas, they will quickly be brushed aside by the supertalents. They will be a laughing stock to have the audacity to suggest a solution to such an immense problem when supertalents could not resolve. And if assuming that they could get the idea across, make known to the supertalents. Oh yes, they can write to ST Forum or to Reach with their great ideas. I rather be real. Every one just do their parts well. Let the cleaners do the cleaning and the govt do the governing, the thinkers do the thinking. Hey, this is very Confusion, oops, Confucian I mean.

If looks can heal

I saw this beautiful structure in the Sunday Times this morning. A lot of glass, reminding me of the futuristic glass complex proposal for the Sentosa Casino. Very impressive looking building. This one is actually an artist's impression of the New National Heart Centre. It boasts of great facilities when ready in 2013. What keeps capturing my attention is the fine architecture and the feeling of being in a futuristic and well designed building. It is a great feeling. I think the patients would feel good too, and their hearts will feel better even before any medical treatment. I hope the building design was selected not just on good look but with cost consideration in mind. Otherwise, the cost of building such a great facility will ultimately be carried by the patients' bills. Nice building, and I already have this good sense of well being.

The need to control the beast

We have seen what had happened to the great American genies and how clever they were in bringing down the whole of America, not just the industries or the financial system. America will now be in debt for centuries to come. It is bankrupted many times over. The cause is simply too many clever people who thought they could make a lot of quick money by being too clever. They were not concern about real productivity, providing more goods and services, they were only interested in churning out numbers to represent huge paper profits in the short term, for their own vested interests, for the huge bonuses that they stood to win in the huge bets they put into the financial market. There was no responsibility, no conscience, no morals, no nothing, except how much was in it for them. And the tool that helped them to acquire their ill gotten gains at the expense of everyone, is derivatives. The first giant to fall because of gambling in derivatives is LTCM, or Long Term Capital Management, a hedge fund. Without the US govt intervention, the domino effect would have toppled many more financial institutions in 1998. That was just a warning but went unheeded. In a 2004 Bank Derivatives Report it was stated that the total values of derivatives held by US Banks was US$84.2 trillion. The bank risk exposure was US$804 billion. Today we know the answer of exposing to such high risk. The house of cards has collapsed. But be frighten, be very frighten, not because the America house of cards has collapsed. Be frighten because many are still convinced that derivatives and hedge funds are the way to go into the future. And they are pumping more money into these two beasts. How on earth would clever people be convinced to do so, when all the evidence of the disasters that can happen and already happened, be blinded to go along into the deeper and more dangerous end? They must be convinced by cleverer people that it is safe and the way to go. In relative terms, the clever people are smarter people and the clever people are just plain stupid. Way back in 2003, Warren Buffett had warned that derivatives are 'time bombs, both for the parties that deal in them and the economic system....In our view, however, derivatives are financial weapons of mass destruction, carrying dangers that while now latent, are potentially lethal.' These words were more than prophetic. It has come to reality. At that time Buffett admitted that he could not understand how much risk the major banks were running themselves in. 'The derivatives genie is now well out of the bottle, and these instruments will almost certainly multiply in variety and number until some event makes their toxicity clear. Central banks and govts have so far found no effective way to control, or even monitor, the risk posed by these contracts.' Do we not know the answer today? Do we still want to dabble in derivatives and allow them, and hedge funds to mess around with the financial system and market? We need independent bodies with different interests and missions to control and regulate the financial systems, the banking industry and the stock market. These institutions have their own short term interests to guard and will be blinded by them to take on higher risks than acceptable. Their exploits to grow and make more profits must be reined in by independent bodies whose interests are long term and the viability and sustainability of the system and institutions, and the foundation of a stable nation state. The financial system and the stock market must not be turned into high risk casinos. There is a need to control the beasts before they destroy everyone, every institution and the nation as a whole. The people within the industry are the most dangerous people to be tasked to regulate themselves. There is simply a conflict of interest, and self interest, short term interest will override the longer term interest and interest of other parties.

Promotions, promotions and promotions

Everyone is happy when they are promoted. But promotions do not come free. It means more pay! How much more pay and who is paying? Where are the money coming from?

Would Wee Cho Yaw pay himself $20m bonus?

He owns the biggest bank here. The turnover of UOB is not less than Capitaland. The profits made by UOB were consistently higher than Capitaland. Why did Wee Cho Yaw pay himself a miserable $6m or thereabout when an employee in a public listed company could be paid $20m? My take is that in the case of UOB, there is ownership. When you own the company, when you know that it is your money, you will be more careful. You would not just pay away the profits of the company. If the top guy got $20m, what about the next 10 guys and the next 100 guys? Together, their bonuses will become a bomb, maybe $100m or more. The rot in Wall Street was exactly due to a lack of ownership. The Wall Street thieves and robbers literally robbed their shareholders of their wealth by paying themselves crazily. And the small minority shareholders got the crumbs and paid for all the losses should the companies go bust. The employee CEOs and top management staff will just send in their resignation letters and laugh all the way to the bank. This is the anomaly and injustice in public listed companies, where the employees just dipped into the coffers, legally, all approved by the board of directors. Very familiar isn't it?

UMNO will still be UMNO

I thought after the General Election UMNO will really reinvent itself to be more national than communal. And the PM to be also called for big changes to remain relevant. Yesterday's election of Khairy as the new UMNO Youth chief confirms that UMNO will still be the same UMNO. Nothing will change UNMO. It will be what it was and will be today and tomorrow. The kris was wave and kissed again. It was handed to Hishamuddin by non other than Khairy, who looks like having a higher potential to use it. Good luck UMNO. Good luck Malaysia.

What? Too much?

These seem to be the reaction of the public and the letters to the media forum. They are envious of the huge bonus that Liew Mun Leong has been rewarded. But what Liew got was all legal and just reward for his talent. Come on, what he got is peanuts compare to those in Wall Street or in Fleet Street. If we aspire to be a nation of rich billionaires, we must learn from Wall Street and pay the best talents their just rewards. Then only we can have more billionaires. I hope no one is going to call Liew Mun Leong to return his big bonus or a new law being passed to tax it at 90%. That will ruin our policy of rewarding real talents. All our talents will run away and we will end up as the net losers. In fact we should reward more to those who are underpaid when their responsibilities are much greater than Liew Mun Leong but getting less than him. Let Liew Mun Leong's bonus be the reference point to attract more super talents to our shores. Liew Kai Khuin wrote to the ST about the grotesque 700,000 pounds pension being paid for life to the former CEO of RBS. Why should it be troubling to pay him so much for life when his contribution and merits will be good for life even after he has left RBS? His contribution will continue, everlasting. And the public anger in the US over the bonuses paid to AIG was also raised. But we are different. We are making money, a lot of money! In the ST today it was reported that the homes of Sir Fred Goodwin, the disgraced CEO of RBS, has been attacked. And the attackers warned that it was only the beginning. They called themselves 'Bank Bosses are Criminals.' What is the world turning into? People getting honest rewards, just because the losers think that the rewards were a bit too much to stomach and they want to attack them? The losers must be put in their place. They must be reminded that if they were just as good, they too would be getting the multi million dollar bonuses. Please don't begrudge talents being paid their worth. Can I have some crumbs?

To spend or not to spend

Like real, as if I got all the money in the world to spend, to help the economy. I was planning to go for a foot massage. But now I am not too sure. LKY said, "I've got economists saying you've got to change your system. Wall Street Journal has said, 'Oh, this won't work, consume yourself'. Four million people to consume and keep an industry that supplies the world with top-end goods - it's rubbish." If what we spend, no matter how much, is not going to make any difference, I think I better save my $20.