The Boss says.....

What (i thought) the boss said:

1. Growth and the Economy

• Growth in Malaysia will be sluggish for the next few quarters, contradictory to whatever the mainstream media is reporting.
  
• Malaysia is taking a "preventive and preemptive measures" by restructuring 'bad' debts by banks, which most often referred to as bailouts.
• There is active monitoring by the Bank's regulating body and Malaysia should not be hit as hard as those Americans and Europeans.
  
• She however, remain defiant that FDI flow into the country has not decreased over the years.
• The ringgit will remain strong but she did not explain the multi-billion losses in reserve over the last 6 months.
• It is interesting times for the financial sector, so read the newspapers more often =)

2. Politics and the Economy

• The Bank has been playing an NAP role over the years and this will not be different even if there's a change in administration.
• Senior officers have been able to get things around due to their "dinosaur" seniority but once this generation leaves, she implied that she will be proposing the formation of an independent regulatory body (which i believe will be pushed somewhere early next year before Badawi retires for good under the pretext of reform)
• The Boss claimed that she advised the PM to not increase the oil prices so drastically early this year, but the effort was futile (as we all know), emphasizing that such plan has to be done in a gradual manner as to avoid artificial inflation.
  

3. Interest rate and the reasoning behind MOP's decision.

• The overnight lending rate or most commonly referred to as the interest rate will not be revised down or up.
• The Bank will not succumb to the pressure by its European and American peers to raise the interest rate to curb inflation (that is ballooning) or to lower it in the wake of impending recession (which our friendly neighbor has officially declared a few weeks ago).
• The boss reasoned out that there was no justification to have a revision because the inflation is artificial (due to the sudden increased in oil prices) whereas a lower rate will no doubt help growth now, but monetary policies are meant for the long run. The Bank believes that the current rate will reflect the country's economic climate once things are less volatile.

4. The Maybank-Indonesia Bank Bt. Fiasco

• The decision to acquire the Indonesian bank was made after many revisions.
  
• Yes, she admitted that the money paid does not correspond with the worth of the bank now because Merrill and Lehman fell the very next day after the takeover was done but that was due to bad luck.
  
• She, however, holds firm that the analysis done by the Bank leading up to the acquisition was accurate and reasonable at that point of time.
• There were many revisions done before the deal was completed because of the changes and incoherent acquisition regulations by the Indonesia's authorities and not due to the negotiations on the price that were to be paid by Maybank.

5. The Bank's HR, students and scholars.

• The bank would like to, ostensibly, have students who are interested in central banking to consider a stint at the Bank.
• The boss, in her usual manner, was composed (thus i'm not sure whether she expressed her disappointment or disapproval or was surprised or any emotions for that matter although students who raised the issue were rather gung-ho about it) that there were claims on HR inefficiencies in dealing with internship requests and emails, locating scholars in the US for the function, and the lack of guidance, direction and action during the internship stints.
  
• On the issue of scholars pursuing finance bound to the US (where problems are abundant for those who are in the know), she refuted the idea of awarding "major-less" agreements and reiterated that scholarships are given based on the needs of department (and i totally agree with that statement. Those applying should know what they are getting into. Besides, i thought the bank was rather accommodating to "major-changers")
  
• The other issue that was brought up was the Bank's (and i think Malaysians in general) appreciation of degrees related to international relations, psychology or other humanities studies. I'm not really sure what her reaction was, but what i can remember is that the boss side-tracked and said something along the lines of departmental needs.

That basically sums up the conversations we had with the boss over lunch, I probably missed out a lot of other details since i weren't paying attention most of the time. oOoOoOoOooo well...




This is an update from the previous post:

The Boss and I @ Boston..........

Princeton University

My appologies for the immensely late update =(. Been extremely busy the last few weeks trying to rewire my brains et all.

Anyway, I shall continue where i left out with Princeton about 2 months ago? aha..it is that loooOOooOoOong ago....

The fourth oldest college in the United States is the most outstanding undergraduate school in the world simply because :

1. Princeton has the largest castle-quad/dorm I've ever seen in my life with dining halls just a stone throw away.

All their buildings are styled ala Gothic that is synonymous with their ivy tag. They are soo freaking rich that the administration consume money like water.

As an illustration, it seems Princeton hired an enormous bunch of consultants and architects to construct structures that MUST blend into the campus environment and its other Gothic-century old buildings. AND when 1 of the buildings did not cut the grade, they tore it down and hired another bunch of consultants to design and built the whole thing all over again.... .


2. They even have a Gothic-fountain smack right in the middle of classes. Perhaps for cooling purposes? Another show of blatant extravagance.....


3. Oh, and their libraries, each has a distinct characteristic that prominently reflect the department's individual strengths.

For example, the math library which was recently constructed. Any imaginary derivable curves or lines are incorporated in and around the building.

The Firestone library, constructed after WWII, has over 75 miles of bookshelves! For the record, Princeton libraries have the most books per student of any other university in the world.

4. Princeton has a policy of NO frats or sorority on campus. They are BANNED. In exchange, they've "eating-clubs", a very much tone down version of frats (housed in a castle like the one below).

5. Their engineering faculty boasts one of the most advanced underground-labs in the world. And to emphasize on their spending power again, everything is built way bigger than they should be. just look at those those pillars....

6. The most important and probably the most distinguish school at Princeton that heavily contributes credence to its name is the Woodrow Wilson School of Public Policy. Second to none in the world, their scholars are all top-notch, most cited, and influential in the realms of international relations, diplomacy and policy-making.

7. Equally prominent is their natural sciences faculties that consist of 14 Nobel laureates in their rosters whereas their Math department boast 9 Field Medalists. Notable professors include John Nash (the master of game theory) and Andrew Wiles (the math genius who solved Fermat's Last Theorem).

8. Like any other reputable university, Princeton has a culture of itself and their students follow strictly by it. For example, no students walk out of the main gate before graduating, signifying their commitment to the pursuit of academic excellence.

9. Their compound is so surreal that one could actually stop and sit on the lawn to read. The exams are conducted based on the Honor Code, meaning, there will be no professor observing the students while they take the exam. One just need to collect the paper, finish it up at anytime, anywhere within the stipulated time period and hand it in once it's done. Of course, if anybody is caught cheating, they'll be thrown out of the university.


10. They have their own NJIT station that conveniently linked the university with Newark International Airport, New York City, Philadelphia and New Jersey.

11. Princeton placed so much importance on its students intellectual development, creating a buffer zone free of capitalist corruption that there is NO influential presence of corporate firms, starbucks etc on campus. When a company comes for recruiting or if an NGO wants to solicit their students , all their flyers are wholly designed by the students themselves ....and they get paid for it.

12. Finally, who could refuse the tiger? rawr..

=====================================

My laptoppy

My laptoppy just crashed....... =(

The next to fall from grace

The american-financial pandemic has infected europe.

The Guardian

Time runs out for Bradford & Bingley

Last-ditch talks aim to avoid second nationalisation

• Heather Connon and Richard Wachman
• The Observer,
• Sunday September 28 2008
• Article history

The future of Bradford & Bingley is on a knife-edge this weekend, as frantic efforts are made to rescue the buy-to-let lender and prevent it from becoming the next victim of the credit crunch.

The Treasury and the City watchdog, the Financial Services Authority, are seeking a 'white knight' to stave off the possibility that the government will be forced to nationalise the bank in the same way that Northern Rock was put into public ownership in February. A well-placed source said that 'the priority, as with the Rock, will be to protect depositors'.

But there is now a consensus that B&B's days as an independent financial institution are coming to an end, with analysts saying that either a sale, possibly to a 'lifeboat' consortium of rival high street banks, or nationalisation, is the most likely outcome. A break-up sale is also a possibility, as is a combination with Northern Rock.

Although the bank says it is well capitalised, the company is badly exposed to the sickly buy-to-let market and analysts say it may struggle to survive in the current global financial crisis. It was perceived to be 'clearing the decks' ahead of a sale last week when it announced it was shedding 370 jobs, writing off £134m of toxic assets and paying £13m to rewrite the contract under which it had to take on buy-to-let mortgages from rival GMAC. But its share price continued to plunge, closing on Friday at 20p.

Its five high-street banking rivals own 30 per cent of its shares, after they were forced to step in to underwrite its £400m rights issue, and it is believed that the FSA has already canvassed the support of HSBC, Barclays and Santander - which owns Abbey National and has just taken over Alliance & Leicester - to support B&B. While none of the three is likely to be keen to take on B&B on its own, they may be prepared to take on parts of the bank under a break-up deal.

B&B has been under pressure since it launched the rights issue, just weeks after denying that it needed one. Since then, it has revealed mounting bad debts on its portfolio of buy-to-let mortgages - it is the second largest lender in this market - a slump in new lending and a series of asset write-offs. Last Thursday it said that it was removing mortgage advisers from all its branches so that all new inquiries would have to be dealt with at a central processing unit in Bingley.

But the bank denied that meant it was effectively closed to new lending - only a tenth of its mortgages traditionally come from its branches, the remainder through intermediaries. It said that its branches would now concentrate on raising retail deposits.

Bradford & Bingley was formed in 1964 as a result of the merger of the Bradford Equitable building society and the Bingley Permanent building society. In 2000, it demutualised and floated on the London Stock Exchange with former members receiving shares of up to £5,000 each.

Many former building societies that abandoned mutual status have fared badly in the crunch: Santander took over Alliance & Leicester, HBOS was forced into a merger with Lloyds TSB, and Northern Rock went bust.

Economist Review

Malaysian politics

Economist

Bluff and counter-bluff

Sep 18th 2008 | BANGKOK
From The Economist print edition

Playing poker for the right to form a government

EPAFollow me, says Anwar

FOR months the entire country had been nervously awaiting Malaysia Day, September 16th. And not just to celebrate the 45th anniversary of Sabah and Sarawak, Britain’s colonies on Borneo, joining with the Malayan peninsula to form Malaysia. The opposition leader, Anwar Ibrahim, had been promising, since his alliance’s strong showing in a general election in March, that by Malaysia Day he would convince more than 30 parliamentarians from the governing coalition to switch sides, thereby giving him a majority and allowing him to take power. Mr Anwar’s sweeping victory in a by-election last month heightened the speculation that he was on track to keep his promise.

The big day arrived. The prime minister, Abdullah Badawi, and his deputy, Najib Razak, ostentatiously went about their business, ridiculing Mr Anwar’s threat as a “mirage” and a “deception” respectively. Mr Anwar called a press conference to claim that he had “firm commitments” from enough government MPs to win power. He demanded a meeting with Mr Badawi to discuss a smooth handover. But still he did not name the supposed defectors. He has since called for parliament to be recalled from recess to hold a vote of no confidence in the government. Mr Badawi seems unlikely to agree to this or to meet Mr Anwar. The ruling coalition, led by the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO), has run the country uninterruptedly since the peninsula’s independence from Britain 51 years ago. So is Mr Anwar’s boast the bluff of the half-century?

Malaysians might have concluded thus had it not been for the signs of panic from the government over the threat from Mr Anwar, and its deep and widening splits over Mr Badawi’s leadership. The “sodomy” charge brought in June against Mr Anwar by a male ex-assistant looked suspiciously similar to the bogus charges that brought him down in 1998, when he was the deputy, and chief rival, to the then prime minister, Mahathir Mohamad. Eight days before Malaysia Day, UMNO packed off dozens of its MPs on a supposed study tour of Taiwan, a blatant ploy to keep them away from Mr Anwar.

Then on September 12th three thorns in the government’s side were arrested under Malaysia’s Internal Security Act, a relic of British colonial rule that allows indefinite detention without charge. They included a pro-opposition blogger who had made sensational allegations against Mr Najib and an ethnic-Chinese opposition MP whose supposed offence had been to ask her local mosque to turn down its loudspeakers (she denied this).

The third detainee, released after 18 hours, was a journalist who had accurately reported racist comments by a minor UMNO official. The official had called the country’s Chinese minority “squatters” and said they were power-hungry “like the Jews in America”. The unrepentant official himself was not arrested, just suspended from party membership. This prompted the Malaysian Chinese Association, a party in the ruling coalition, to hint that its patience with UMNO’s ethnic-Malay supremacists was close to exhaustion.

The detentions looked like the start of the wider crackdown that some fear a cornered UMNO might yet launch, to save its skin. But they succeeded only in widening the splits in the ruling party. The cabinet’s leading reformist, Zaid Ibrahim, appointed recently to overhaul the politicised justice system, resigned and announced he now had an “open mind” about joining the opposition. Muhyiddin Yassin, the trade minister, called for the prime minister to step down early (he has already promised to hand over to Mr Najib in 2010). Several other ministers openly criticised the arrests.

Dr Mahathir—who has become a bitter critic of his successor as prime minister and had recently quit UMNO in a sulk—marked Malaysia Day by letting it be known he was rejoining, presumably to foment an internal coup against Mr Badawi. The next day the prime minister said he might hand over to Mr Najib early and, in the meantime, would give him the finance minister’s portfolio, hitherto held by himself. Shortly after, the Sabah Progressive Party, a small Borneo party with two MPs, said it was quitting the ruling coalition to go “independent”.

For the opposition, the prospect of Dr Mahathir helping UMNO destroy itself is “exciting”, as Nik Aziz Nik Mat, a leader of the Islamist Party, a member of Mr Anwar’s alliance, gleefully put it. The disarray in the ruling party will do no harm to the opposition’s hopes of gaining power. But it remains unclear if it has pushed enough disaffected government MPs to make the jump to Mr Anwar’s camp. Malaysian pundits think Mr Anwar has lined up a fairly large group of potential defectors. But they reckon he can keep voters waiting only a little while longer before they start to wonder if he is no more to be trusted than the government he loves to lambast.]