Tuesday, December 27, 2005

The MySpace Generation

An article under that name was posted two weeks ago in the businessweek magazine http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/05_50/b3963001.htm. Reading this article I realized that my youth days are definitely over. The youngsters today are getting used to the technological progress much better that we do (oopps, talking on myself, you can join me if you feel the same), and many of them (my 2 y/o son for example – who already know to use most of the TV remote keys) have been born into this digital world and therefore feels much more comfort with it than we do. Rapid growth of Internet communication and the potential of exponential growth of social networks are the seeds for establishing better ways for collaboration and information search in a way that will reduce operation time and time to market of whatever we the human produced dramatically.

Creativity & Innovation link

I have found the following link http://www.corante.com/ideaflow/ to be interesting and refreshing.

It deals with ideas, innovation, strategy, marketing and whatever goes with it – very interesting

source of information that can fits to this blog.

Enjoy!

Saturday, December 17, 2005

Global Investment Strategy - Asia

One of the recent suggestions I have received from several investors is to adopt a global investment strategy. What is it, you may ask. In short, it is a strategy that divides the investment into multiple markets, making use of globalization in order to do so in low rates, giving the investor the opportunity to reduce his risk by depending on multiple markets instead of one. In most global strategies that I have heard so far there is a clear weight to the Asian markets, namely China and Japan, but not only, the Turkish market also show good signs.
The domestic consumer demands in China causes it to overtake the US roll in that section in the short coming months. As for Japan - The last year might be a turning point in Japanese economy which suffers for more than a decade now. The unemployment is at the lowest rate in the last 7 years, real-estate value starts to rise in some places, which is a rare situation in the last 10 year, there are some economical signs that can be observed as an initial process to build an inflation - after a decade of deflation. All the above might be interpreted as a signal to put more attention on the Japanese market.
How to invest in Japan? The most easy way is to use an index that follows this market. EWJ for example is a stock that represents the Japanese Index and follows about 85% of the market share of most of the public companies in this market.
Other options are to trade Japanese companies that already traded in the west stock exchanges, for example Sony, Honda, Canon, Kyocera and more. However, these stocks represents each a portion of the segment that they are belongs to, and this should be taken into account.

Friday, December 16, 2005

FOREX Starter Kit Sample

In the process of finding reference manuals on investment markets I have found the following link to be useful for giving a nice overview of the FOREX market. I believe it to be a nice starter for those who are not familiar with FOREX at all.

Reminiscences of a stock operator

As part of getting back into investment, trading and technical analysis (see my new blog at http://trademachine.blogspot.com), I have read this book: Reminiscences of a stock operator by Edwin Lefevre. Although this book was initially printed in 1923, it is interesting to see that the psychology of stock traders have not changed much. Nice book with an interesting story. It tells the actual story of the writer which happened to be one of the geratest stock speculators who become a legend throughout his living and also known through the following nicknames: "Daring Kid", "Cotton King" and "The Big Bear". The basic principle of stock trading remains the same, along with the excitement that came with it.

Tuesday, December 13, 2005

Globalization: Western Culture, Democracy and Interests Paradox

Source: Technomarket.
We might think that globalization and trade activities between countries are a key factor for making a meaningful progress in the overall health and wealth. Is it right? Rest assure that this debate can not be covered in this short column, there are too many complex factors involved, among them traditions, cultures, religions, economies, geographical structure, politics, ego, interests and much more. However, I wanted to point out one factor that build up a paradox that the whole world will have to deal with, and from my point of view, it better be soon.
Don't Be Naive !!! The western culture, although being built of democracy, is also built of rules. Our education is based on the common understanding that says that people should act based on a global and mutual social interests, and by applying to the rules we will live peaceful and can expect for having the tools and capabilities to gain more progress in our life, either it is financial, spiritual, educational, or other. It is also common to think that this is the right way to live in order to increase the overall satisfaction and efficiency, just by being collaborative and conforms to the common rules. The democracy gives us the right to choose between alternatives and the ability to show our individualism, as long it is being based on the common rules. This is nice, as long as we are all sharing the same faith, common understanding, and similar education. What happens when we don't? Well, I want to tell you that in the global world this just don't work and that we are all naive (yes, me too. Well - not any more). The western countries are currently facing a critical challenge, their own rules putting them in dangerous and it is time to understand that yesterday's rules does not apply to the future, and domestic rules are different than exterior ones. Also, there must be alternative rules, or better say alternative ways for dealing with situations that your rules does not thought about.
You might ask yourself what am I talking about. I'm talking about terror, terrorism, terrorists and the way the world is dealing with them. I'm talking about the long processes that we have to comply with when we are dealing with evil enemies, those that are not sharing the common understanding with us and are using our own rules cynically to work for them. We give them the tools to publicly judge us under soft eyes of bleeding hearted public, whilst our enemies are not judged at all. Our democracy enforce us to allow open communication even in critical situations. The reporters that can not enter into the other lines and show their actual evil, are busying in showing our own acts with much more criticism that we deserve, leaving no place for doing the "right thing" since everything is under everybody's eyes. - This is naive I must tell you. Some saw says, "When you are at Rome, act as a Roman" - are we?

The "flattening of the world" makes us more vulnerable for being the victims of evil forces since there are much more alternatives for small groups to organize plan and move from one place to another, using basic low-cost tools. Decisions can be made in a distance, and it is relatively more difficult to track such organizations today due to the mass means of message deliveries that exist - this is one of the major cynical ways of using our own tools to attack us, the Internet which was built in the USA is now used against it, and against the modern world.

The United Nations organization supposed to be the competent authority for solving problems such that. So does (maybe) the international justice court in Hague. The problem from my point of view is that both organizations are either using double standards, or not familiar with the situation they are facing with. When each of these organization condemns Israel for its some kind of reaction, and cannot do the same for a suicide bomber, I see it as a brute double standard (without getting into the question whether Israel is right or wrong). If this is the case, how can we expect the suicide bombers to stop doing so? Isn't it supposed to be a trivial act to condemn such kind of "solution"? - When the evil is condemned, it is basically done through a long process. Take the Iraqi crisis for example. Is the long "play" of Saddam Hussein with the UN observers sound reasonable? It took them years to understand that collaboration will not be made. Another sample, the Palestinian authority. Israel through Osslo's agreement started to "pay" by providing its share of the agreement. The Palestinians from the other hand are keeping to educate their children for war, and building a new generation of fighters and suicide bombers, instead of sticking to their side of the agreement - which will bring them new opportunities, prosperity and much more joy and potential.

Call for action: My call for action is to form a new agenda in the political life. A one that is much more responsible and less hesitant. One that will put the interests of well being at the top, and will not use double standards. One that can be controlled and criticized, but not by the overall public in a way that gives ways to the civil enemies to use it cynically. A special body should be built in order to perform such control, but also to enforce proper education that will maintain the overall integrity. Our rules should be apply to anyone that participate in our culture and act under the same rules. All the others, should be treated by a different set of rules, in some cases even with their own rules.

Technology Gadget: BlueTooth Jacket

Source: Technomarket
Burton Snowboards announced on a joint venture with Motorola for the development of a series of technological cloths, among them the BlueTooth Jacket that is expected to be available earlier next year (2006). The BlueTooth Jacket under the name Audex Jacket is expected to function as a media center, enabling collaboration between BlueTooth devices such as Cellular Phone, MP3 Player, PDAs and more. A control panel is stitched to the left sleeve of the Jacket along with embedded microphone and earing in the Jacket's cap.
Price is expected to be around $600.
Information Source

The philosophy of a Trade Machine

Source: TradeMachine.
It is a long time now that I'm playing with the idea of making a Trade Machine. I'm a novice technical trader, using technical analysis tools for making on-the-spot buy/sell decisions. There are plenty of people worldwide that are doing the same, some are more experienced and professional and some even doing it for a living. I am not doing it for a living, but wish I could, and recently circumstances made me some extra time that might help me to get closer to that dream of mine.
So [1] what is a trade machine, [2] why should I want to have one and [3] are there any on the market today?
A1: In simple, a trade machine is an investment "guru" that is programmed to identify potential opportunities in the market and perform actual trade activities in order to take advantage of these opportunities. The trade machine performs "day trading" activities in most cases. Some types of trade machines may be less proactive and more suggestive. Instead of running as "daytraders" and performing the actual buy/sell the machine can suggest you to do it and you will take the final decision. Such machines are more suited to end-of-day analysis since they are not required for on-the-spot decision (the human factor can not be assumed to act at once).
A2: Obvious. Having a trade machine that is callibrated with algorithms that works out is a money maker that no-one would like to loose. Such machine can make you financially free, leaving you the decision what to do with your time. I'm not a lazy guy, but having the option to choose is something that is rarely available ever.
A3: No one would admit it since it might motivate others to try building their own money machines. Too much machines in the market will reduce the potential profit for each one of them and will not do any good. This is why when you are talking with people that have anything close to it, they does not show their cards.

Just created a new blog for Investment Tools

I have just created a new blog for investment tools and mostly for the old idea of making a money machine. Please visit http://trademachine.blogspot.com/.

I also decided that this blog will aggregate all my other blogs. Just to make sure you are in-line with the current list I amintain (only blogger accounts are listed here) here is the updated one:
1. http://trademachine.blogspot.com/
2. http://galgalc.blogspot.com/
3. http://technomarket.blogspot.com/
4. http://gal-books.blogspot.com/

Post Wedding

Well, I have not been here for a while, just wanted to make sure everybody knows that the wedding was perfect. Everybody were happy and lot of food was served.
We all wear new beautiful cloths and I most liked my new suit and the tie, which I don't wear regularly.

Wednesday, December 07, 2005

My brother's wedding

Well, it is tomorrow. I just talked to him today and it seems that he is excited. Due to the miss-fortune and sad story of my grandmother, the wedding ceremony will not include the whole family as planned.
Good night!