stlplaceLast Updated on June 23, 2008 by stlplace
It seems the market is not the only thing that is testing our mind/heart/nerve/will, the midwest flood has also caused substantial demage to WI, IA, IL and the Show Me state. Couple days ago the levee at Hanibal broke. Don’t know if the Mark Twain museum there has been demaged?
Last Updated on June 19, 2008 by stlplace
WuXi Pharma Tech (NYSE:WX) continued to slide, during my absence. One (main) concern is heavy insider selling (source: seekingalpha) lately, after the secondary offering was suspended on May 4.
I double checked the F1 filings for secondary offering (principal and selling shareholders), and found its CEO Dr. Ge Li was going to sell 8 million shares, and he unloaded 200,000 shares on May 30 according to AOL finance. BTW, it is a bit strange I could not find those transactions at SEC web site. Adding insult to the injury, United Overseas Bank (UOB) said it was going to sell 2.1 million shares at $18.4 each, according to Reuters. I guess they must need cash badly (hint: sub-prime trouble). Seriously, from its F1 it appears to me UOB is a venture investor in WuXi, and I am not surprised to see it wants to cash out some (note it intended to sell those shares in the now aborted Secondary). In other words, UOB still sells the shares planned in the Secondary, but the Wuxi management did not.
Last Updated on June 19, 2008 by stlplace
Bread and gas
Panera officially raised the price of Asiago cheese bagel, from 97 cents to $1.25, which is expected as I read it from news couple weeks ago. The regular unleaded gas is $3.999 in STL. Cheaper than Salt Lake city, but more expensive than Jackson, WY.
Some random thoughts about the trip
Chevlet Impala is good. Dodge Avenager is a piece of xxx.
Mount Washburn and Teton pass (WY-Idaho route 22) are difficult to drive. Perhaps also because I am getting older?
The news I missed
Tim Russert: the number and profile of people attended a journalist’s funeral and memorial service speaks the volume of his legacy. Quote Tim “go to other people’s funeral, otherwise they won’t come to yours”. I will write more about Tim later.
Anheuser-Busch Inbev merger (STLToday): now Buffett is into play because he has 5% stake in A-B. I believe he was incidentally pulled in, because he bought the A-B stock couple years ago mostly out of valution, not speculation on M&A.
Last Updated on June 20, 2008 by stlplace
Finanlly I got the free Wifi here at Jackson, WY, the foot hill town of Grand Teton National Park. The Anvil hotel has free Internet, which is better than the fees starting from $9.95 at Hilton at SLC.
Back in STL, I noticed Chinese politicians, led by vice Premier Wang Qi Shan (note he is the son-in-law of former vice Premier Yao Yi Lin), are signing big trade deals with Missouri (news: STLToday; video: v.ifeng.com 凤凰网). Maybe a direct flight from STL to PVG in the near future?
As to stock market, I noticed 600030 (Citic Securities) crashed, which is expected considering the US broker houses lost big lately. The sentiment on brokers won’t be good.
Last Updated on June 11, 2008 by stlplace
Interesting news: Buffett is put up a one miilion dollar bet for any hedge fund beat S&P in next 10 years. The proceeds (if Warren wins) will go to his charity.
I am going to take a week of vacation from tomorrow, and I may not update this blog during this period.
Meanwhile, I am going to read the chapter 20 of Intelligent Investor (Ben Graham). I already read chapter 6 as suggested by Warren in this year annual shareholder meeting (Q&A): it’s about knowing the risk of investments. Chapter 20 is about margin of safety.
Last Updated on June 10, 2008 by stlplace
It was not too long ago (April 18 to be exact) Shanghai Composite Index hit a low of this year. Shortly after that Chinese goverment issued new policies trying to stablize the market. Well, it looks like we need the goverment do something about the market again: on June 10 the Shanghai composite dropped 257 points (7.73%), and closed at a new low of 3072. More than 1000 stocks dropped 10% in Shanghai and Shenzhen markets (see below).
(source: finance.cn.yahoo.com; full size picture here)
Last Updated on June 10, 2008 by stlplace
Dan Bin (但斌, blog) is the founder, CEO of Shenzhen based Eastern Bay Asset Management Co. He admires Buffett and is value minded, although I don’t agree with everything he says “such as buy China Ping’an blindly” (remembers me of Cramer). He was on Shanghai First CaiJing TV interview recently. The interview is in Chinese lasts about an hour, and the videos are in 2 parts.
Interview part 1:
财富人生：东方港湾资产管理 但斌_上(Use this link if embed player does not work)
Last Updated on June 9, 2008 by stlplace
I planned to write more about China telecom re-org (revamp, reform) after the recent announcement. Now the CFA test is over, I have more time to think about this.
A few days ago I read this interesting Chinese article which describes some foreign investment banks actions after the re-org news (Appendix). Let me try to explain in simple words. The China telecom re-org is widely anticipated to happen this year, the conventional wisdom is the decesion will be made after August Beijing Olympics. Those investment banks created many warrants (European options) in HKSE with expiration date in August, thinking the annoucement of re-org will make the China Mobile, China Unicom, China Telecom and China NetCom stocks trades in Hongkong have a big swing. They can make money from that.
Last Updated on June 8, 2008 by stlplace
(Update June 8 ) Read couple interesting blogs on yesteday CFA exam. This one from Singapore, and another one from China (in Chinese).
(Original June 7) After came back from the Hilton hotel testing center, I went directly to Schnucks store, to get the Stella Artois beer, and 3 oranges. Why 3 oranges, because I saw 4 for $3. Apparently my mind is still stuck in the CFA exam: caculation on net income, cash flow blah blah blah. When I first saw the receipt shows $2.25 for 3 oranges, I laughed to myself: under normal circumstance I would just buy two for $1.50, much easier calculation. Anyway, if you came here looking for test specific things, I am afraid you will be disappointed 🙂
But I still like to write down some of my thoughts for the test and in general.
(Grading paper for CFA test, source: CFAInstitute).
1) More people attended the test than I thought
In the grand ballroom at Airport Hilton, I counted there are roughly 300 (14*2*12) people for level I and II candidates. Why so many people and what is the composition of test takers? I saw both new graduate, MBA students and professionals. I am the rare amateur. Let me quote the press release from CFAInstitute which shows growth of CFA candidates in year 2008 vs. year 2007:
Last Updated on June 6, 2008 by stlplace
CFA level I exam
It’s here. I have already sharpened the H2B pencils; prepared the backup battery for calculator. I will check out the test place today. Tomorrow I am going to spend the whole day for the test.
NBA final and European championship soccer
I don’t care too much about the NBA final these days. Although I like Celtics (KG, Allen, Paul) to win. The reason I don’t like NBA is the commericalization, and referees apprearent involvement. On the other hand, I have not watched European championship soccer for a long time, especially after I came to the US. This year ESPN will broadcast the soccer. Here is the TV schedule.
Vanke May 08 sales, Wang Shi apoligize
I have a Google speadsheet to track Vanke monthly sales. May 08 number was down compared to May 07. Also Wang Shi apologized more than 10 times in the annual shareholder meeting for poor choice of words in his blog.
Hillary’s bill
