The Digital Pipeline

The Digital Pipeline as at 1 July 2008

Ron, my brother from another mother and father, another day has passed and the scoreboard keeps ticking. Many moons have passed since I last wrote on these pages and I am elated to be back to share my thoughts with everyone. So much has happened during my hiatus that I almost do not know where to begin my coverage!

The first half of this year has seen the fall of the Sheriff of Wall Street, Eliot Spitzer, in a blaze of hypocrisy that would have induced rapturous applause from even the most accomplished African liberator/dictator. For those who may not know, Spitzer as New York Attorney General was responsible for bringing many a prostitution ring and the odd corporation to justice yet during his time as Governor of New York he succumbed to temptation by soliciting the services of a high class hooker. Time and time again we see that the people who are the most vigilant in stamping out illegal practices are actually participating in these very activities themselves!! Either way, I have to take my hat off to the prostitute who managed to figure out that the demand for sex with beautiful women is actually insensitive to price – at several thousand dollars a time, she was definitely maximising her profit!

Another highlight has been the US Democratic primary debacle; my interest in this dirty fight waned some time ago so I was glad when Hill finally realised that her fate was sealed and threw in the towel! There is a thin line between persistence and stubbornness – one being the virtue of a survivor and the other being a trait shared with donkeys. That was one popularity contest that turned ugly quickly! If only politicians adhered to the principle of substance over form when campaigning, perhaps then voters could focus on the message rather than the colour, sex, or creed of the candidates. Oh well, here’s hoping…

On a more sober note, the global economy looks like it’s striding towards recession – the UK is actually facing the prospect of stagflation due to generous monetary policy in the past and of course the rise in price of global commodities. In a nutshell, if you’ve been subsidising your lifestyle with cheap credit, you’re screwed unless you started consolidating about this time last year! Interestingly, for those who think the credit crunch is a cereal or will not affect them, last week our inter-bank cricket match with another reputable bank was actually cancelled due to the opposition not being able to field a team as a result of redundancies the previous week! I’ve heard many horror stories about investment bankers being offloaded into the market place at a frightening speed – a close second behind the massacre of the cricket team is the story I was told about another institution’s policy to announce your departure to you in a meeting and then immediately escort you out the building! Now that’s what I call drama… Meanwhile, the CEO of the same institution conducts a conference call announcing his resignation and oh by the way, the bank will pay him a gazillion dollars for the noble act of admitting that he took too many risks when leading it through the gluttonous time of days gone by. Can anyone say WTF?

Having seen that it’s imperative to make CEO one day, the past six months have been gruelling as I attempted to attain three little letters in the form of the CFA Charter. I’ll be back shortly to take you through the emotional journey I undertook during my preparations and to explore the growth in demand for education. For now, just know that I’m back into the swing of things nudging singles and caressing cover drives for a couple of runs here and there, but no extravagant hook or pull shots, the thought of giving away my wicket as a result of recklessness deplores me! As many readers can attest, a balanced and paced approach to most things in life will prove to be the most rewarding advance. Until next time, stay focused!
The Digital Pipeline as at 1 February 2008

Ron, my brother from another mother and father, another day has passed and the scoreboard keeps ticking. Being a perpetual test cricketer and comparable to one of the Spyker Formula 1 drivers, my days are often spent wondering what it would be like to have a strike rate of over 100 hundred runs per 100 balls as well as whether I’ll ever mature enough to get a drive at a team with a decent vehicle! The dichotomy of my situation and that of the unit consisting of the ODI batsman and McLaren driver seems to be just that, mutually exclusive. This has led me to consider whether deeper analysis could reveal some form of overlap between the two sets of circumstances.

However, I figured that insight into my fantasies would be boring to the avid reader; so instead I have decided to tackle the far more interesting topic of the turmoil surrounding world markets this week gone by.

Monday January 21st will go down in history as the day Mr. Copper was dethroned as the world’s number one rogue trader! Wow, €3.5 billion is a lot of cash to be flushed down the toilet; something tells me, this gentleman is a hero among the bank’s c-suite who prior to this were probably waking up in cold sweats in anticipation of releasing statements revealing the extent of their exposure to the US sub-prime circus. At least now someone can take the blame! Could it be plausible that the US Fed actually adjusted for the events that transpired in France by lowering its interest rates? It does seem a little odd that Mr Bernanke would choose to slice rates by a whopping 75 basis points on January 21st when the Fed committee was due to meet before the end of the month and was widely tipped to slash rates then anyway! Wow, the pond is incredibly murky at the moment – everyone and their donkey has an opinion on where bond and equity markets are going, in fact, this past week in Davos Switzerland this was one of the main issues to arise. The financial press is gleefully gobbling up commentary from business leaders seeking to advance their opinions and there has been a rather alarming lack of consistency in these views. Here’s a digital tip – now is the best time to use your contact at the local news station to get an interview and appear incredibly intelligent on TV talking absolute rubbish about what your predictions are for the financial economy.

The one true consistency that has emerged is that no-one knows what’s around the corner! I find this quite amusing since the underlying cause of all this commotion has been the sub-prime debacle and the mass finger pointing that has resulted from this: where have all the good people gone? Everyone appeared to know how to present these sub-prime debt tranches for sale on secondary markets through creative instruments and in so doing elevate themselves into the realms of the mighty wealthy and intellectually astute. Now that the markets have defecated on the fan, individuals and corporations alike have miraculously found ways to detach themselves from the same accountability that once propelled them to stardom!

Such a paradox is not uncommon; accountability is the hot potato of life, it will be passed on to you by someone who can and you will be doing likewise to save your own delicate paws. The people with burnt paws are the ones who grabbed the potato so willingly after being fooled that it was a one way ticket to a full fixture list! Ron doesn’t discuss the importance of the fixture list in his disposition on cricket. One cannot be a test, one day or twenty 20 batsman if you do not have the relevant status issued by the sport’s governing bodies which enables you to seek to fill your season’s calendar with fixtures! No status, no fixtures, no runs to be scored – one could always resort to fine tuning your technique in the nets but the surest way to increase your average is to spend time out in the middle. For me, the quest for playing status and fixtures are the underlying reasons behind the current financial strife around the world!

Right, that’s it; I’ve figured out why markets are plummeting, traders are jumping off of cliffs, central banks are slashing everything in slight, and the tax man is being more generous than ever. It is all to do with the pursuit of fixtures! Monsieur Le Rogue was only trying to impress his superiors at said bank in the hope that his performance would lead to a huge bonus which would ultimately guarantee him status, fixtures, and many many runs all in one go. This, ostensibly, led to CEO, CFO, COO, CSO, CXO, CDHJO to name a few, deciding to divulge details of Monsieur Le Rogue’s trades just in time to blow smoke over the simultaneously released reports on losses from other investments made by the bank. Brilliant! Now messers C… are more likely to maintain there own well established fixture list. Problem solved. No? Back-up plan then; central bank guarantees depositors funds and offers capital support to prevent a ‘major catastrophe’ in the banking sector once again bailing out the rapist that is the corporation and allowing it’s esteemed leadership to parachute into the sunset, the fabric of their harness glistening and gleaming as the suns rays reveal its gilded make-up. Onwards and upwards my friend, we shall wake up to a full fixture list no matter how many potatoes we have to shovel!