Category: Fun

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Fun Life

Thankful about…

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Well, except Wall Street, I have plenty of people to be thankful about…

1) My parents and my family members: without you I will not be where I am today. Or maybe I will be an investor banker (more likely a financial analyst) in Shanghai? Just kidding.

2) My wife and her family members: there is something in life that could not be expressed by words. How about “same as above”?

3) My friends over the years (Wuhan, Shanghai, Rolla, STL< =>PVG): you know who you are. For the friendship, understanding and sharing.

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Fun Stocks

Chipotle Mexican Grill: 2nd visit

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We went to the Chipotle yesterday. This is my second visit (see my first visit exp here), and my wife’s first. It did not turn out to be a disaster, but it is obvious that my wife did not like Mexican food 🙁

On the other hand, the stock of Chipotle (NYSE: CMG) continued to do well in past 6 months, although they should have same “rising wheat and meat cost” issues as experienced by Panera, or (to a lesser extent), Starbucks. I think the main reason is, the consumers (black, white, Asian and hispanic) crave for the spicy Mexican food. Not the sandwich or latte from Panera or Starbucks.

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Fun Stocks

Do not touch the stocks

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I usually have a weekly call with my parents. My mom knows I investing in stocks. On today’s call she suggested I touch less on stocks. I think this sums up the sentiment of Chinese stock market very well. After recent drop of the A share market, people are weary of what the goverment will do (further) to cool down the market.

do not touch sign (source: online-sign.com)

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China Fun

Back to St. Louis

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The AA 0288 flight from PVG to ORD yesterday was very much full. The airline offered $600 coupon if someone is willing to give up his/her seat, because the plane is overbooked. As usual I saw more American than Chinese, besides business people and college students, we saw a little girl played ballet in Shanghai, and got back. She (seemed) likes Shanghai.

Couple things I thought it’s interesting:

1) 10 years ago when I first came to the US from Shanghai Hongqiao airport (SHA), at that time there is no Pudong airport (PVG), I noticed St. Louis Lambert airport (STL) is much bigger than SHA. But compare STL with PVG, obviously PVG is much bigger and it’s still expanding.

I believe PVG will join the status of NRT (Tokyo) or Hongkong (HKG) some day, as a important hub for commercial flights.

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Fun

Go to STL tomorrow

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This time I am not travelling alone 🙂

I spent past 3 months here in Shanghai, plus a few months I spent early this year, this year marks the longest time I stayed in China since 1997. I enjoyed my time (for the most part) here. At the same time I learned a lot things: by my own observations and by talking to friends. I already talked a bit in my blog; I will try to touch some more after I come back.

Of course, the most significant thing for me this year, is not Shanghai or China, not my work, or make money from stocks. It’s seeing my wife Ruixian, and getting to know each other better. There is something in life money can not buy. The other day when I talked to friends, we joked the marriage is different from stock in the sense that one doesn’t want to “sell” it.

I know for Ruixian, that’s her first US trip. I still remember much the details before and during my first trip. I hope hers will be unique. And then I can show her some interesting things in the “Show me state”.

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Fun

Quiz when eating moon cake

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Copied from Zhuping’s blog:

一次，诺贝尔经济学获奖者数学家约翰·纳什参加一个数学年会，会间休息的时候，有人就给他出了一道数学题。有甲、乙两人分别从两个地点出发往中间走，这两个地点相距 20公里，甲、乙两人的速度都是每小时10公里。甲还带了一条狗，这条狗的速度是每小时30公里，它先是和甲一起出发向乙走，遇到乙后就折返向甲走，遇到甲后再折返向乙走，如此反复直到甲、乙在中间会合。现在问当甲、乙在中间会和时，狗走了多远。

Two people (guy A and guy B), who are 20 km away from each other, are walking toward each other, at 10 km per hour. There is a dog, which goes at 30 km per hour. She (the dog) started with the guy A first. Because she goes faster than A, so she will meet B on the way. When she meet the B, she will turn around to run toward A, and so on,…until A and B meet. The question is: how much distance did the dog take before A meet B?

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Fun

Starbucks to offer free iTune songs

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Accoring to Seattle PI: “Up to 1.5 million daily giveaways will begin Oct. 2 and run through Nov. 7 at more than 10,000 company-owned and licensed U.S. stores, Starbucks said. When the promotion ends, Starbucks expects to have given away more than 50 million songs.”

During the promotion, Starbucks will pick an artist each day and provide its customers with a complimentary download card that can be redeemed through the end of the year at the iTunes store. Some of the other artists are Joss Stone, Dave Matthews, Bebel Gilberto, Annie Lennox and Keith Urban.

Lombard declined to say how many cards would be available at each Starbucks store, but he said the company would “make sure every store has more than enough cards to provide to customers.”

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Fun Stocks

My investing journey III: 2004 to 2005

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After I got some moderate success on OPSW and GE in early 2004. I got a bit excited.

If I could use one word to summerize what I did my acitivies on stocks in those two years, it’s speculation. I did all kinds of speculations, luckily I did not get into really dangerous zone: margin, short and options. So my loss is still limited (a few thousand dollars each year). I did the following speculations:

1) Bet on earning: from PALM, Redhat (RHT), NetEase (NTES) to more speculative plays such as Look Smart (LOOK), the9 (NCTY), I never made a dime on betting ERs. The common scenario is I bought them right before the earning. The stock price already reflected best case scenario. Even if the company came out with a blow out (good) earning, there wouldn’t be much upside. But in reality 100% of time they did not beat the estimate by wide margin. So…I had to sell the stocks after earning to limit my loss.

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China Fun

Kids, Crocs and Escalator

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First a little update about the Typhoon Wilpa. Shanghai did not take the direct hit, or use my now retired boss words “we dodged another bullet”, he was referring to his condo at Florida during Hurricane season. More importantly, Shanghai suffered minimal human loss because of comprehensive preparation before the storm. More than 290,000 people moved out of vulnerable area. Unlike in the past, human lives are more treasured in China nowadays compared to properties. How is this related to Crocs?

Well, recently there are lots of accicent reports regarding Crocs wearing kids got hurt taking escalators. I read an earlier report and wrote a post about it. But now it seems more and more parents are worrying about the “safety of crocs”. I think they are shooting at the wrong target. I believe the escalator safety is a problem we have ignored from time to time, and now with the kidding wearing Crocs, this problem becomes more obvious.

These days I got more oppertunities to ride escalators because I work at Cloud 9. There is a huge escalator which takes one from the 1st floor to 4th floor. When I took it the first time, I was a bit shaky, because of its height. I don’t have kids, but I think if I ever take my niece there, I will probablly hold her instead of let her ride on her own.

IMG_5405

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