EU catches cold from Wall Street!

latest headlines about wall street and its implications on Europian market doesnt sound good for proffessionals in IT and finance!

*Financial Services major Citigroup will acquire the banking operations of Wachovia Bank, the fourth largest bank in US!

* In the UK, the eigth biggest mortgage dealer B&B has been nationalised.

* Fortis has been rescued with governments of Belgium, Netherlands & Luxembourg jointly taking a 49% stake.

* In total, six minor Danish banks have beed sold/merged or bailed out in recent months.

After US and UK, would the storm hit Asia?

review : A Wednesday

atlast i watched the movie i was loonging to watch! "amazing movie" is my first comment on it.. its a short movie with only a 100 mins long reel. it talks about the frustration of a common man because of the terrorist activities and how they would or should react! a must watch for people who loves hindi cinema and a good try for people who dont! the movie proved that non-masala stuff sells too :-) anupam kher, nassarudheen shah and jimmy rocked!
for all those who hasnt watched the movie, why dont u guys take some time off and park your ass on a cinema nearby?? its worth the pain!

frozen drive..

when i switched on my system i thought of writing about the movie i saw today. but then, there is a more interesting topic to write.. my frozen drive :-) its not that i drove to himalayas !!

i went for an evening movie with a friend. had a night shift all week and hence hadn gota chance to drive at night for quite long.. by the way i love to drive my bike.. especially when the air is cool.. remember cool. not frozen!

so, we had dinner from a mallu joint [we love this place.. it serves delicious "appam".. and also "karimeen".. at times even "kappa" and "meen curry"..] okie enuf of the menu..

it was close to 10 at night and the wind was so damn cool.. ah.. i din take my jacket again! i forget it almost every time i go out.. so, with the cold wind piercing thru my body i drove at an unbelievable speed of 30kph! phew.. my bike wud have shouted at me if it had lips to speak.. ive never seen the needle so low!! the eight km strech in old bombay highway, were u cud easily race ur bike at speeds above 100, i was literally embarrassed.. did i notice a cycle overtaking me?? uh, that was exaggeration..

lesson learnt: never forget to take your jacket when u go out!

-- poetic --

Translation -> for those who dsnt understand mallu <-

i have no idea what words would substitute most of the adjectives used here. in simple plain english this is what i meant to say:

...

if these eyes are meant to see beautiful pictures, i would live beside her as a light shaded stroke of a beautiful painting! Even if I have to remain in a glass made frame, I have this beautiful lady beside me.. in this path of life filled with worries, what more could bring comfort to me?

mov i wish to see

everyone around seems to love this movie. "a very sensible movie" said one of my friends. its been loong that i actually watched such kinda movie without a big shot hero or an item girl to promote it! i just wish i could watch this movie this sunday! but i never know - its a hard earned leave !!

crisis, crisis, crisis..

The market doesnt look like its gona stand by the bull! U.S. stocks fell for a second day on concern Congress will hold up a $700 billion bank bailout that Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke said is critical to keeping the economy out of recession.

Citigroup Inc. and Bank of America Corp. tumbled more than 3 percent after members of the Senate Banking Committee expressed skepticism about Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson's plan. General Electric Co., the world's third-biggest company, retreated 5 percent as Merrill Lynch & Co. downgraded the stock on ``growing fundamental pressures.'' ConocoPhillips and Newmont Mining Co. slumped more than 2 percent as oil retreated following a record advance and gold and copper prices decreased.

The Standard & Poor's 500 Index slipped 8.74 points, or 0.7 percent, to 1,198.35 at 3:39 p.m. in New York, after earlier increasing 1.2 percent. The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 87.69, or 0.8 percent, to 10,928, erasing a 128-point rally. The Nasdaq Composite Index declined 5.39 to 2,173.59. Two stocks fell for every three that gained on the New York Stock Exchange.

``The credit crunch is going to become far more severe than anybody thought two weeks ago,'' said Tom Wirth, senior investment officer at Chemung Canal Trust Co. in Elmira, New York, which manages $1.7 billion. ``In my opinion this is not understood by the politicians in Washington.''

Barclays Plc, the U.K. bank that bought parts of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.'s U.S. businesses, may cut as many as 5,000 jobs at the bankrupt company, Wall Street recruiters said.

The estimate, based on the $2.5 billion Barclays set aside for potential severance and retention costs, would mean half the Lehman employees transferred to the London-based company may be let go. Barclays, which paid $1.7 billion for the business, said it will decide in three months who will be offered permanent positions.

you know what my worries are..

UBS says costs of closing out LEH exposures below $300m

UBS is aware of a recent research report circulating in markets regarding its exposure to the Chapter 11 filing by Lehman Brothers. UBS confirms that its direct and counterparty exposures to Lehman Brothers, net of hedges, are now substantially closed out. UBS does not expect the total cost of closing out its exposures to Lehman Brothers to exceed $300m.

I trust Marcel Rohner.. That's what i could do now! :-)

ib crisis

the financial world has been witnessing this storm for quite some time. it seems that the hurricane is now on its way! ib-investment banking is witnessing its worst days [hopefully]!! the move made by lehman brothers - filing for bankruptancy could have been seen as an isolated event if it was not followed by the BOA's move of bidding for Merryl Lynch , the dramatic move of Fed to bail out AIG and for the latest - the gossips of Morgan Stanley looking for a buyer for their ib bussiness in US!

So how does this affect you and me?

the financial market worldwide is inter related. So its quite obvious that this turmoil would definitely have its ripples in other parts of the world - india included. As for jobs - to begin with - 25k + employees have been out of their job from LB, 50k + from ML, 2.5K of them from India!
Out of the 5 leading brokerage firms in Wall Street 3 have been shut down, and with this new gossip of Morgan Stanley the future of the fourth is unknown!

Stock markets are witnesing new lows everyday! India, however, has seen the least pressure till now - thanks for the public sectors! It should be noted that even though the banks in india seems to be insulated, the rupee is depriciating to the 2-year low against dollar!

for me the question is : how would this crisis affect me? the question is significant looking at the fact that i work for a europian financial service firm which has significant exposure in US market! Let the market gurus save my bank.. let them save my salary statements!! :-)

Hot News:

I have so much to wirte, but i dont have time!! :-( The hot news is that I am going to visit my parents! Its the festival of Onam.. And finally, I am going Hoooooooome :-)
I would start my journey today and would be back on 21st. That also means that I would not be regular over here cos I dont have a computer at home and trust me, I hate i-cafes.. I am gona miss this world and all my friends here, especially vins, athi and sen..
Happy Onam to you all..

Movie Review - Bachna Ae Haseeno

This movies could be listed as item # 52 in the top "100 ways to waste 100 bucks"! The first half is crap. Siddharth had definitely tried to make the audience[or atleast me] sit during the second half.. Ive always loved emotions.. TZP brought tears in my eyes! Not a cool thing but I am emotional :-) Bipasha rocks in her character, Minissha [never heard of her before] looks cute and acts well.. Deepika, as usual, showed some skin [ive never liked her after OSO, god knows why!]. Ranbir - I hated this guy after Sawariya, but trust me, he is good. He knows how to act afterall!! So guys, those who have not watched the movie, maybe you could take a cd and watch. Its not worthy to watch in a big screen!

Patriotism

I wanted to write a post on a movie which i saw today, but then, i thought i should write about something else before it. Its been ages that ive visited a cinema hall. The last movie i saw was Taare Zameen Par. I missed the aura of the hall so much that i decided to watch Bachna Ae Haseeno. It was a morning show on a weekday, but i was greeted by an unbelievably descent crowd. The show started with advertisements. Warnings and instructions were given which was made mandatory after the rescent bomb blasts. And then something interesting happened! They put the national anthem! I stood up at once. Believe it or not, the entire crowd stood up for the anthem! Though there was a little hesistance and delays at some corner and feeble laughs and whispers somewere, everyone stood with bowed heads. I dont know what I felt, I was definitely happy and proud, but there was a rush of adrenaline, a lil excitement about the whole scene. Salute to my nation, I am so happy to see this respect for our anthem!

rendezvous with death..

i am happy that i am alive and writing this post.. i should have been dead an hour ago carrying with me many other lives..

it so happened that i thought of frying papad for dinner. man.. i am scared of kitchen now!! i kept the pan on stove to heat the oil and was soon busy checking mails! I don't know why, i suddenly thought that i should be checking if the oil got heated or not. Guez what i found in the kitchen! The pan caught fire.. The raging fire was at least 2 feet high and i could not even think of pouring water over it 'cos the oil in it would burst out damaging the whole kitchen and maybe a lot more.. i cant imagine roaming around with a burnt face! i quickly turned off the regulator [thanks for that thought] and my mind went blank. The heat was so immense and the smoke was thick. The fire was raging towards the window pane and i thought the house is gona catch fire soon. my worst thoughts said that soon the fridge[which was kept very close 'cos of the space limitation of the kitchen] would burst out due to the heat or pressure or flames or whatever.. that might result in an explosion of the gas cylinder!! I am quite sure that if the cylinder explodes, the entire building would collapse.. 6 families... were they even aware that their lifes were at stake? this was the first time i am seeing oil catching fire.. i was scared! the only thing i did was to call my friend for help.. thankfully he was there.. thanks for his presence of mind, he threw a floor mat over the pan and poured water over the mat... i could still see the flames raging high with revenge when he poured water.. the entire house was filled with thick smoke.. it was suffocating.. we came out, opened all doors and windows and went in at intervals to pour in water.. finally, there was no fire... its then when i realised that we just misd a call from above!
i don't know how u felt reading the post.. for me.. i am scared to shit... but tell u wut, it was damn exciting!!!
ill never fry papad in my life!!!