An interesting debate about the approaches that banks have taken to quantify operational risk for Basel II. What have been the problems and what are some of the solutions, is openly discussed in this interview. Really does Basel II work at all? ...[ Read More ]

The acronym GM should be renamed from General Motors to Gross Manipulation and while there are some that reckon I am heavy handed with my criticism of the US government response to the General Motors collapse, I stand by view. ...[ Read More ]

The latest musings on the credit crisis or perhaps the outcome of the event (one single occasion is usually driven by many causal factors), is corporate compensation. ...[ Read More ]

Islamic banking and finance is rapidly evolving from niche to mainstream. Estimates of the present size of the industry vary considerably depending on the source but it is widely accepted to be in the region of USD 1 trillion of assets (with a growth rate of 15 – 20% per annum), with potential to grow to USD 2.8 trillion by 2015. ...[ Read More ]

On the back of the U.S. dollar it says:  “In God We Trust”.

For far-sighted and risk averse investors however, increasingly it is: "In Gold We Trust".

This is a difficult time for just about every company and organization in the world. Almost all companies are seeing less business. Almost all organizations, whether profit-seeking or not, are under budget pressure. Almost all are cutting costs. And in most cases that means cutting people. That means the crisis is also difficult for employees and individuals the world over. ...[ Read More ]

2008 was another exciting year for China’s futures industry.  Having grown 87 percent from the previous year, total volume on the three exchanges in Dalian, Shanghai, and Zhengzhou reached 1.36 billion contracts, which translated into more than 5.5 million contracts a trading day.  ...[ Read More ]

I had the good fortune to attend the 2008 Berkshire Hathaway shareholders meeting at 

Omaha, Nebraska a few weeks back. 

 It was a wonderful experience listening to and learning from the Master Investor- Warren Buffett himself and all I can say is that he stands alone as the reigning deity of financial world's Mt Olympus! 

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Is this title a possible description of what the past few years have brought and what will happen in the future? Financial managers need to make sure that they and regulators do not fall victim to the oldest trick in the book – excess in one direction followed by an equal and opposite excess, in the other. ...[ Read More ]