Author: stlplace

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Stocks

Not a Pretty Day

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I mean the stock market. Dow lost more than 400 points. My brokage account lost about 10% of its value today. The biggest decliners are Home Inns (HMIN) and Mindray (MR); but Crocs (CROX) and Heelys (HLYS) are not helping either 🙁

Now the question is: is this a healthy correction? Or the beginning of (dare I say) bear market? I don’t have the answer. Personally I feel the market needs some sort of correction, especially in China, where the reality did not support the hefty stock prices. But do I think US consumers and business suddenly hit the break on everything? Probablly not. Same thing can be said else where.

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China

What Happened to Chinese Market?

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Today, Feb 27 Tuesday, the Chinese Stock Market got a huge sell off. You can see some rationale from this Seekingalpha article. This sell off also spread to the US market, not surprisingly some of the Chinese ADRs such as HMIN and MR also dropped 10%. Is it the beginning of a bear market? Or merely a correction? I don’t know. Predicating market trend is very difficult, and it’s not my job. One thing I do know is: investing in solid companies and grow with the company.

I will visit Shanghai in couple days, more first hand analysis of Chinese market will follow.

Categories
Career China

Mindray MR is Hiring

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Mindray, the leading medical device maker in Shenzhen, is hiring. Here is the link in Chinese. Most are R&D positions. And some campus recruiting events. Interestingly, I noticed they are looking for Spanish, Portuguese, German and Russian speaking sales person, as shown in this ad. From this and previous company’s SEC filings we can see the company still depends European (or South America) for the international growth. As you may know obtaining US regulatory approval for their product is a long process, although everyone knows this is the biggest piece of the pie.

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Stocks

Not All Debt are Equal

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Debt is bad. This is what I was told when I grew up in China. I think this is most of my parents generation feel about debt, I am talking about average working people, not the entreprenurs such as Lu Guanqiu, the founder of Zhejiang Wanxiang Group. So when I told my parents I bought a house and got a 15 years loan, their first response was “you will be (my current age+15) years old when you pay off the house”.

We borrow for different reasons. Some are good, some are bad. Buying a house is a good one in general, because it usually has some tax benifits (mortgage interest deduction). Also if we could borrow at a lower rate, invest it and earn at a higher rate, that is also good. We should note one thing though: the cash flow issue, we should have enough regular income to cover the monthly payments for house, food, gas and credit cards, etc.

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China Stocks

Focus Media FMCN is on the Focus

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It will report the earnings after market today. The Street est. earning is $0.62, but I think the whisper number is much higher. In other words, even if it beats the earning, if it issues a soft guidance, the stock may get punished tomorrow. This is the danger of  “playing ERs” with hot stocks. Interestingly, Sage Brennen has this question regarding “does this screen work”. Actually I had same question before, one of the reasons I did not buy FMCN.

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Fun

Memorable Oscar Moment

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It’s Oscar time again. The show starts at 7:30 PM central time on ABC, it’s 5:30 PM at Kodak theater in Hollywood. This is probablly one of the most highest rated TV show in the States, just like the CCTV Spring Festival Show in China. It’s a tradtion. And full of fashion, as you may notice the Red Carpet coverage before the show.

I have watched this Oscar thing for a while. Being a Chinese, I hoped An Li would win the “best director” or “Crouching Tiger Hidden Draggon” would win the “best picture”. That did not happen. But last year his “Broke back Mountain” did win one of the award so I think most Chinese are happy now. Unless you are a die hard Zhang Yi Mou or Ziyi Zhuang’s fan, and want to see them win the academy. Speaking of Zhiyi, I was surprised by her well spoken English last year. I am sure she did not learn from New Oriental 🙂

My most memorable moment, though, was Julia Roberts won the Oscar best actress for her role in “Erin Brockowich” in 2001. I watched her “Pretty Woman” many years ago (1994?) in Shanghai, the movie was in English without Chinese caption. And we all know Julia is “American Sweetheart” but she never got the Academy award by 2001. I remember she was almost speechless when she got to the podium: just like a little girl got a much better gift for her Christmas (than she expected). I think people liked her because she is such an authentic person.   

julia roberts erin brokovich

Categories
China Fun

Chinese New Year Celebration at Olin

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Friday evening I attended the New Year celebration at Olin School of Business, Washington University. It was organized by Greater China Club. Very well orchestrated, although the party is a bit late since New Year was Feb 18.

I remember a few months ago our friends Indian students celebrated their Dawali. I think both groups did well in showing the Olin and Wash U. community the Chinese and Indian culture. It seems to me the business students really know marketing in the States 🙂

Categories
Business Stocks

Apple Leaves Table Smiling

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Apple and Cisco settled the dispute around the iPhone trademark, according to Mac News. One interesting comment I can not stop laughing is: 

“if Apple leaves the table smiling, you better check your wallet.”

Seriously, I agree with the author Cisco guys are smart too. “Consumers are so with Apple these days, it would have been bad for Cisco, because consumers don’t want to see a company that’s going against Apple.”

I want to note that Cisco is going after the consumer markets these days. As you may noticed from the TV ads and Scientific Atlanta (TV setbox) acquisition.

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Categories
Business China

Xinhua Finance Media Limited IPO

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Found this through my friend thesunsfinancialdiary. I briefly went through their F1 prospectus. I had to admit I’m not in best position to evaluate their business: they have 5 divisions providing services from creating adverstisement to customer research. I can think of a St. Louis based privately held company called Maritz which does something similar: they organized conferences for other companies, send promotional gifts for companies like Nissan, take care of the employee reward etc. One way to analyze Xinhua Finance (symbol: XFML) is comparing each division to a public company does something similar, then adding them up.  

On a related matter, the event marketing services in China is booming. About 2 years ago, during my Jiu Zhai Guo tour, I met a senior executive of a conference organizing company  based in Beijing, I learned about three most popular conference places in China: Shanya (Beach), Dali (Yun’nan), and Jiu Zhai Gou/Chengdu.  

By the way, the parent company of Xinhua Finance Media Limited is traded in Tokyo. Also, the CEO and co-founder of the company is Ms. Fredy Bush, not sure if she is related to the George Bush family…

Categories
Stocks

How Did I Find Growth Stocks

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New Oriental (EDU, based in Beijing): every Chinese student came to US for study knows that, no need to say anymore. 

Home Inns (Rujia, HMIN, based in Shanghai): my friend in my hometown told me about this in summer 2004. He is a small business owner and he thinks that Rujia is clean and economical. He would stay there when he visits Shanghai as long as he does not see his foreign clients. I believe business travallers make up more than 50% of Rujia’s business.

Mindray (MR, based in Shenzhen): found out shortly after its IPO. I always liked medical device makers, both from investment and health/science point of view. The barrier of entry is high: unlike English (or IT) training, you put ad on newspaper, hire some English teacher and find students and a classroom, you are good to go. For medical device, you will need R&D talents (hint: graduates from HUST), good sales and customer support, all of which you can not get overnight. The risk: lawsuits, regulatory procedures.

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