The equity casino is going to draw its curtain soon

Agencies reported that Stanchart has announced that it ‘is closing its equity derivatives and convertible bonds businesses.’ This is a follow up on its earlier announcement ‘to axe thousands of jobs globally as it dismantled its stock broking, equity research and equity listing desks.’

What this news is saying is that a big global bank is finding it tough to make money in equities, bonds and derivatives and finds it necessary to close down these businesses to cut losses. Is this move a trend that is also affecting other big banks, and what does this portend for the industry and the stake holders like traders, remisiers, research and backroom staff? Would Stanchart be the Pipe Piper leading a trail of banks and broking houses following behind to close down the same operations and cut staff?

It is strange that Stanchart is cutting down on equity derivatives when this instrument is supposed to be gaining popularity with rising volumes in daily trades. Or is it that Stanchart is underperforming the market and losing money while other players are laughing to the banks? What is the truth?

The truth will come in the next few months if other banks continue to trade happily in equity derivatives or starting to cut cost by axing their staff in equity and derivatives. The analysts and research staff would also be on the laid off list.

Wither the stock market and derivative industry? Is it flying high or sinking in quick sand?

The most frightening thing happened yesterday morning

The NEL MRT broke down in the morning just as the train started to run. And this was the morning of the start of the O and A level examinations, the biggest examinations of our highly stressed school system. The poor students who were caught in the breakdown, after mugging nights and weeks for this day, had another stressful encounter to face, how to get to the exam halls on time. Many were already feeling the stress of the examinations, now to fight for time to get to the exam hall must be very frightening.

How could the train fail on such a crucial day and put added pressure on our students? Sure it can. When a train system wants to fail, it will fail. But this kind of things never happened in the past leh. In the past our trains were simply reliable and could be expected to run and not to break down. Taking the train was a no event. Today taking the train is so dramatic with all kinds of things waiting to happen.

Never mind if this is the new normal, the new standard of efficient Singapore where everything is supposed to work with the push of a button. Ooops. Today, the new normal is to expect failures and breakdowns when you pray that it would not happen, and not on such an important and stressful day when the O and A level examinations were in full swing. Be prepared for the worst and more to come. Be always prepared and don’t take things for granted ok? Students taking examinations must plan for alternative route or means of transport just in case. This is another burden, another thing to prepare in addition to preparing for the examinations.

Sorry kids. Don’t expect everything to work. This is Singapore. You can bet if the results for those taking their exams yesterday would be affected. Poor kids!  The mental stress must be heavy on them. Having to slog and struggle for the examinations were stressful enough, and now this. How many students were late for the examinations?  They must be trembling in fear, yes fear and worried sick. Thank God, today’s newspaper reported that only less than 20 students were late. Is this supposed to be another miracle? Or is it that the students were smart enough to find their ways to the exam hall on time?

The magic wan is running out of tricks. Is this the beginning of things falling apart? The saga of hepatitis C and the number of deaths and people infected is still unfolding like a 3^rd World country.

Shall we call for Harry, Harry Potter?

The Evil of Religious Conversion couple with Deculturalisation

Now it seems is a fashion to be converted to one major religion or another. You can be converted to any foreign religion but you must not let others or allow yourself to be deculturalised from your own culture and tradition. When through religion you are deculturalised because of wrongful or biased concept you are no more what you are, a respectable person because your mind , soul and spirit are being captured and imprisoned by your new converted beliefs . In other words you will think and act the ways whatever religious doctrines or masters want you to believe to toe their line of thinking and behaviour. That's the reason why Western countries and Middle-East Arabic religious orders have been fighting tooth and nail for centuries to convert the world to their respective religions. And they are doing so not because they want to improve your life and make you a better person but because they want to capture your mind, spirit and soul so that they can hold sway over your life and destiny and in this way maintain hegemonic control over the whole world. Why allow the freaks and charlatans in the name of their religion to hold sway over you and your country and through their sham dissemination of fear about their wonderful gods and deities to play havoc with your own lives. They always tell us " Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. " There you see, to them only the poor whether individuals or poor countries can only dream of heaven while the rich and mighty enjoy unlimited wealth and glory in this world because they always pillage all the wealth and riches from other countries at will. They always tell you 'money is evil' but at the same time all the priests and religious leaders will compete endlessly and shamelessly to ask for donations or offerings from the people even from the poorest individuals.

What these major religions preach or taught whether in public, schools or learning centres are always biased against local practices and traditional cultures. In other words they try to stop us from practising our culture, tradition and customs. Many Asians, Africans and Native Americans pay respect to the dead through rituals of Ancestral reverence which is a way of giving the honour to deserving parents or ancestors for all the sacrifices they made for us and for our future generations and thus enable us to learn the secrets to immortality. It is atrocious that Chinese who become Christians are forbidden to hold joss sticks to pay respect to their dead parents or ancestors. However, the priests of Western and Middle-East religious bodies will pour scorn on the practice and twisted the fact by saying that the people have committed sin for they are worshipping the dead. This is far from the truth. The Western and Arabic practice of erecting a stone tablet in remembrance of their dead bears no difference to the aforementioned practice. The difference is that the West and the Arabs have the habit of practising cultural racism attributing every good thing in this world to themselves while blaming others for all the negative things .

Another bad practice is to bestow or adopt a religious name of that faith on the converted person and thus the converted individual become a misnomer in his own country, town or village because he has lost whatever semblance he has with his own countrymen.

It is time that people wake up and allow themselves some deep thinking, self-respect and dignity and not allow religious freaks and governments to hold sway over their lives with the end result the loss not only of their personal selves but also their own countries.

Author - Sun, Moon and Darkness

Oh poor Britain!

‘Some people say spending large sums for luxurious trips is ok for politicians. Others argue that officials have to be modest. But £100,000 for a trip is a way too much… Even for a head of the British government.

A fresh release by the Cabinet Office shows what a pretty penny cost the UK’s taxpayers overseas trips of the Prime Minister David Cameron in the period from July 2014 to March 2015.

For example, a trip to Brussels to attend European Council meetings cost £500 on average. Trips as far as to other continents, like to US or Australia, were charged a bit over £10,000.

But look at the figures, which go under description “To pay condolences following death of King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz”. The Prime Minister used a charter airline and his 1-day stay is valued at £101,792.’

 

The above was posted in Sputniknews. It is so sad to know that the once world super power with an Empire where the sun never set is how living like a pauper. The expenses of a few hundred or thousand pounds for the Prime Minister are now a big issue. Come off it, what is 500 pounds or 10,000 pounds? Our ministers earn that in a couple of hours. One night in a nightclub in Orchard Road or Clark Quay for a Singapore would be many times that.

 

And what is 100,000 pounds for a 1 day stay in Arabia to pay condolence to the King of a past colony? You mean the Great Britain cannot afford that? Mine, how the world has changed. Come to Sin City and see how we spend money. But of course we are different. We are rich, your former colony is rich. We have money falling out of our pockets.

 

Britain must be regretting for letting this jewel slipped out of their control. If they are still in charge, what is 100,000 pounds?I would recommend the Brits replaced their ministers with the super talents from Singapore. Then Britain would be better run, be rich like hell, oops, I mean like Sin City, and their ministers can be paid in millions of pounds. And for all you know, the PM of Britain would then say, ‘No need govt subsidies, I pay for my trips from my pocket.’

Canada pulls out of the F35 programme

‘Canadian Prime Minister designate Justin Trudeau, who was elected on Monday, said his government will pull Canada out of the US-led air operations over Syria and Iraq and will also drop out of the F-35 program.’ Sputnitnews

Read more: http://sputniknews.com/us/20151022/1028904164/canada-f35-jet-trudeau.html#ixzz3pXWOey7L

Canada was one of the 9 rich countries that could afford paying US$200m a piece for this malfunction infested fighters of the future. It had pledged to buy 65 pieces but decided that the money would be well spent elsewhere. And without having to fight a war in Syria and Iraq, there is really no need for such advanced weapons. Actually fighting the rag tag desert rats there is no need for anything so sophisticated unless the war merchants keep on arming them with more deadly and more expensive weapons.

Unless the Americans could create another high tension region or war along the Canadian coasts, there is really no better reason for Canada to want to buy such expensive war machine.

Without the Canadian’s participation, the cost per aircraft would go up by another US$1m. But those countries in the programme are all very rich and throwing away another million is chicken feed. What is clear and present danger to this programme is to make sure that the remaining countries would have good reasons to want to buy the plane. Britain is likely to follow suit as it is no longer a world policeman with Bush and Blair, and the likelihood of fighting a war in Europe is slim. Now it is a matter of time when Britain decides it has had enough of killing the Arabs in Iraq and Syria and wants its troop home, and no further need for the F35s in the drawing board.

This may cause panic in the US and they would have more urgency to start another war somewhere to ensure the remaining suckers did not pull out from the Project. They have been so successful in milking these countries that have signed on the dotted line and have been paying and paying for the development cost that somehow keeps on rising. And the best part, after sinking so much money into this bottomless pit, it would be too embarrassing to cut loss and to pull out. A war in East China Sea would definitely keep the Japanese in the game. A war in South China Sea would keep Singapore and Australia in the game too, to buy an expensive war machine to fight a war they did not want but planned for them.

How’s that for stupidity? The Americans are creating the demand for such a war machine, by raising tension and creating wars and forcing its faithful allies to dig deep into their pockets to buy expensive toys they don’t need. Without having to fight a war, which country would need such expensive toys?