From one spreadsheet geek since the early 80’s, to all the others out there … http://googledocs.blogspot.com/2011/10/celebrating-visicalcs-32nd-birthday.html Continue reading It’s the spreadsheet 32nd birthday on Wednesday Nov 2nd 2011

Some stories burning the headlines tonight on MF.  There is a criminality element creeping in here now, which would conveniently make this an outlier situation, rather than evidence of a systemic problem that I believe it still is.    Lets see what the final headlines are tomorrow. http://www.zerohedge.com/news/panic-behind-mf-scenes-company-refuses-disclose-information-regulators-even-death http://www.zerohedge.com/news/someone-going-jail-mf-global-caught-stealing-hundreds-millions-customers http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2011/10/31/regulators-investigating-mf-global/?ref=business http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/8c81053a-03cc-11e1-bbc5-00144feabdc0.html#axzz1cOQ3SoMc Continue reading MF Global story goes Madoff/Enron/ tonight – pick your metaphor

First the Tsunami in Japan and now the floods in Thailand.  There are downsides to sourcing product from world countries with extreme weather capabilities.  The fact the 1/4 of the worlds hard drives come from Thailand and a relatively concentrated area around Bangkok is astounding. Computer makers caught in wake of Thai floods Roughly a quarter of global hard drive assembly facilities are located in Thailand, according to industry tracker iSuppli, which estimates that supply would be constrained at least until the fourth quarter of 2012. Western Digital, the world’s biggest hard disc drive maker, has closed all its factories … Continue reading Weather and environmental factors affect the global supply chain

The Euro leadership and in particular Merkel and Sarkozy deserve some credit for the key Euro deliverable earlier today.  There has been much criticism and most of us would agree that more will be required to be done, but there was an important step taken here. It became a showdown between banks and government.  (For government read taxpayers paying up).  Merkel has been consistently speaking of bondholders taking a haircut for a year now.  The message was clear and she won today.  But is it that simple. Calling Bankers’ Bluff, Merkel Got Europe a Debt Plan | NY Times But … Continue reading Is the Greek debt haircut really a victory?

I have been thinking a lot about cloud computing for a while now.  The advantages are clear.  You never have to worry about data loss, and you can access your information from any device, mobile, laptop or PC. People worry about security, but this is more (to use a banking analogy)  of a cash under the mattress worry.  Lets leave that for the worriers. On a more practical level.  I have a pretty fast laptop (ThinkPad, 2.7ghz, SSD) and I have constant access to decent bandwidth speeds.  Lets suspend reality and assume there is nothing faster. What is in it … Continue reading Hardware design is lagging cloud capabilities

Niall Ferguson on how the Europe situation comes right down to Germany gaining control and the weaker nations (Greece, Spain, Portugal, Ireland) ceding control.  Also the European banks and their need for capital being even greater than the amounts we have heard to date. http://www.businessweek.com/video/#video=xqdTd4Mjp7CxKGmKD9-r0NsqYMqZCmQO Continue reading Niall Ferguson on European Sovereign-Debt Crisis | Blooomberg

Banks are required to hold capital relative to their assets (loans).  Different types of loans have different capital requirements, Banks turn to financial alchemy in search for capital So the safest securities, such as US Treasuries, do not count as assets at all for the ratio, but the riskiest – such as long-term structured credit assets – count at double their stated value or more. The result is that banks and the most outspoken hawkish banks are quite outspoken about it are actively managing their balance sheets to minimise capital requirements resulting in a classic case of unintended consequences and … Continue reading RWA (Really Weird Accounting) otherwise known as Risk Weighted Assets

We are getting closer to the dose of reality in Europe, and it is becoming abundantly clear why it is taking Germany and France so long to decide.  Once you start looking at write offs of 60% it is s slippery slope to a) more than 60% on the thinking that can Greece even repay the 40% remainder, and b) write offs for other Euro countries. EU looks at 60% haircuts for Greek debt The financial effect is to raise the amount required to $252 Bn versus the $109 Bn predicted earlier. For impacts to consider, here are a couple … Continue reading Banks prepare for the impacts of sovereign debt write offs in Europe