leftright-investment

Why should Congress vote to increase the debt ceiling and simply kick the can down the road? Is there some date out there where it becomes politically easier to change the trajectory of spending? If you are really going to slow the rate of spending, it needs to begin now. Those who want a "clean debt limit increase" are also those who want to increase spending levels. Congress should vote no on increasing the debt limit. It has to begin somewhere, sometime. Why not now?

Now what? Having worn everyone out with a fiscal and monetary explosion for the past two years, the Administration and Congress are now faced with an economy going nowhere. While we continue to punish businesses and financial institutions, we wonder why no one is interested in hiring lots of folks and risking their capital in this brave new world. What gets lost in all of this is the question of how people decide to risk their capital and how they decide to hire employees? They do this only to make money, which many in the Obama Administration think is un-American. Until the Obama folks begin to see some virtues in the accumulation of wealth, they will never understand why their economic policies are doomed to failure. Businesses don't just invest to be patriotic and improve Obama's election chances. People take risk to get rich and to accumulate more wealth. The rush by the Obama folks to redistribute wealth and demonize "the rich," just means that there will c...

The KLCI performed as expected as a reasonable stream of results provided a stable floor while strong news flow drove up Bigger Caps. For June, while the 4 upcoming IPOs and the KLCI review may draw some attention, OSK believe all eyes will be on the potential tussle between CIMB and Maybank over the control of RHB Cap. OSK Research Outlook: Possibly not as quiet as expected With a total of 4 IPOs going for listing in June and July, it was expected that the market to be somewhat quiet as investors stored away funds to subscribe to the IPOs or buy into them when traded. Despite concerns that the amount of funds raised by the 4 IPOs, namely UOA Development, MSM Malaysia, Axis International REIT and Bumi Armada, would suck the liquidity out of the market, but the amount of funds (RM7.7bn) is far less than that raised in 2010 with the listing of MMHE and Petronas Chemicals (RM14bn). Thus, there should not be much of an issue on the liquidity of the market post the 4 IPOs. Funds to be ra...

The rumor that the German government is considering endorsing a new bailout package for Greece has sent world stock markets soaring. Don't buy it. All this means is that Germany is willing to throw good money after bad. Along with the German government's ridiculous decision to abandon nuclear energy by 2012 (why not get rid of electricity as well?), the German government continues to live in it's own island of self delusion. Stocks should have a nice run today, but, after that, watch out.

E. J. Dionne, the columnist for the Washington Post must not be reading his own employer's newspaper. Dionne devotes his column today to praising "other countries," who have, in his view, successfully overcome the challenges of health care, budget deficits, and unemployment. Dionne is careful not to list these countries or mention any specific country by name. Which countries is he referring to? Europe? Japan? He must mean China and India where there are no entitlement programs and not much in the way of a tax system. If somehow Dionne thinks that Europe and Japan are doing well in regard to the various items he ticked off in his article, he must have been living in a cave the last few years. Europe and Japan cannot afford any of the things that Dionne is talking about and their economies are on life support. He complains about US unemployment. Most of Europe would trade for our unemployment rate (now, or in the past four decades). Europe is busy trying to dismant...

Do you know that Malaysia now has two types of dividend? In default, listed companies are giving away dividend in cash. But, this kind of scenario has been changed, whereby shareholders are sometimes are given the "share-dividend" instead. Maybank rocks the market last year by purposing a share-dividend plan, in contrary to the usual cash dividend. Then, few listed companies are following the latest trend. Here, let us know more about scheme. Similar to eDividend, one of the main objectives of implementing e-Share Payment is to promote greater efficiency of the payment system which is aligned to the national agenda of migrating to electronic payment. What is e-Share Payment? It is a service provided by all stockbrokers for the purpose of: payment of share sales proceeds by the stockbroker directly into your bank account; and/or providing an option for you to initiate payment via e-channels (e.g. Internet banking, mobile banking, ATM) or to authorize the banks where you ma...

The current discussion of Western European sovereign debt problems are ridiculous. So, too, are the discussions of American sovereign debt problems (state, local and federal). If you spend a multiple of your income every year, would it matter, long run, how much you owed on day one? Eventually, you would go broke regardless of the initial level of debt. In fact, if anyone bails you out now, you will just take a little longer to go broke and the debt will be much, much larger when you eventually do go under. There are not enough assets in the Eurozone to prop up Greece, forget about Portugal, Ireland, Italy and Spain. For that matter, there is no real hope for ultimately paying off the national debts of Germany, France and the UK. They all spend too much relative to their income. Ditto for the US. The Great Experiment, promising future old folks a guaranteed income and free or inexpensive health care cannot work. It's simply a matter of numbers. Debt can postpone the bankru...