50th Post - DEDICATED TO YOU ALL

I just realised that I have made so far 49 postings in this blog and want to dedicate this 50th post to YOU ALL. I feel really happy and thankful to you all for the support and guidance all throughout this 9 months. Of late, I have made it a point to make regular postings to the blog.

The statistics is as follows: 

• First Blog Posting : 25th Jan 2009 on IFRS
• Visitors so far : 5800+
• Indiblogger ranking - 73 (higher the better). Was 49th earlier.

I get lot of mails on Stock Market. So, you can see more posting on that. With the IFRS getting the attention, you can expect more on IFRS in this space.

I could see from the clustrmaps (visitors locations) that I have friends in more countries. The following are the list of locations of the visitors (from 30th Sep 2009, when I added this gadget), in the order of highest number of visits to lower number of visits:

1. India (IN)
2. United States (US)
3. United Kingdom (GB)
4. United Arab Emirates (AE)
5. France (FR)
6. Singapore (SG)
7. Vietnam (VN)
8. Slovakia (SK)
9. Belgium (BE)
10. Canada (CA)
11. Germany (DE)
12. Norway (NO)
13. ussian Federation (RU)
14. Ireland (IE)
15. Korea, Republic of (KR)
16. Kuwait (KW)
17. Oman (OM)
18. Philippines (PH)
19. Malaysia (MY)
20. South Africa (ZA)
21. Saudi Arabia (SA)
22. Taiwan (TW)
23. Asia/Pacific Region (AP)
24. Israel (IL)
25. Australia (AU)
26. Japan (JP)

I thank you once again for your support, without which I would not have got into blogging and becoming an addict. Special thanks to Anand & Bala for forcing me to blog my thoughts (which is the caption for this blog), Raghavan for chasing me to post, Sendil & Yashoda for keeping a tab on my posting and encouraging AND YOU for giving valuable comments and feedbacks.

With more and more requests coming in, it makes me to read a lot before posting.

Cheers,
Gopal

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Getting connected - Power of Internet !!!

Orkut, Facebook, Linkedin, Twitter......you can add sites to the list ! These sites help people to get connected, socially. During my school, college & start of my career, there were no internet facility or emails. We were working on DOS - not Denial of Service, Disk Operating System. No windows even. Because of that, I could not be in touch with most of my friends (School, College, past employements)

Why we need to get connected? You will realise the power of networking and joy of getting connected to your friends, only when you experience it !

With so many friends and lived in pre-Internet, pre-Mobile era and where telephone at home was a luxury, I am trying all my best to get connected to them. Thanks to the internet and social networks.

Had these sites been there.....we would not have a BILLU (the Barber) or Kuselan movie. The way the friends unite after a long time was really touchy.

Till date, I have created so many Yahoo and Google groups to stay connected to my classmates, colleagues of past employment and feel very happy for that. Though networking is my passion, connecting to people whom you know is a pleasure.

In a recent incident, yesterday, my ex-colleague (Siva) sent me a request to connect with me in Linkedin. It was a pleasant surprise, as I was looking to catch hold of my ex-colleagues and could not get much success. From yesterday evening to today, we got connected to about a dozen of our colleagues in that organisation!. I have created a Yahoo group for us, so that we don't get disconnected.

I was searching for a close of mine (who was my CS batchmate) for a long time and found him after a gap of 8 years through Linkedin and we are now united through a group along with out batchmates.

I have created a group in Linkedin for my schoolmates and have many joined (though only 2 from my class). But am happy that we have a professional school alumni in Linkedin.

Friends, be in touch and don't forget to send atleast a mail in a month (it can be a email forward or a special note) to your friends (including me !), so that we can feel the warmth of friendship.

Cheers,

Gopal

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Do you know about ASBA?

You might of seen IPO advertisements saying that ASBA facility available for the IPO. What is this ASBA? ASBA stands for - Applications Supported by Blocked Amount.

It is a process by which your money is in your account only and being blocked  (by your authorisation) to the extent you applied for the IPO. You cannot use the blocked amount, till the allotment is over. Once the allotment is over, the bank will release the amount pertaining to your investment and release the hold on the balance blocked amount.

Features:

• The ASBA process shall be available in all public issues made through the book building route.
• Only certified banks can offer this ASBA facility. To get certified the banks has to submit a certificate in the prescribed format to SEBI. Then the certified bank is called a Self Certified Syndicate Bank (SCSB)
  
• An ASBA shall be deemed to have entered into an agreement with the issuer and shall be required to offer the ASBA facility to all its account holders for all issues to which ASBA process is applicable.

Now, the question arises as to who are all eligible for this ASBA facility?

An Investor shall be eligible to apply through ASBA process, if he/ she :

1. is a “Resident Retail Individual Investor”;
2. is bidding at cut-off, with single option as to the number of shares bid for;
3. is applying through blocking of funds in a bank account with the SCSB;
4. has agreed not to revise his/her bid;
5. is not bidding under any of the reserved categories
   

ASBA helps in many ways:

• Your money is in your account
• It earns interest
• No need to run around for refunds
• Easy to monitor
  

For more details on the ASBA process, please refer to the SEBI circular SEBI/CFD/DIL/DIP/31/2008/30/7 July 30, 2008.

The list of SCSBs are as below. For details of designated branches click on respective banks below:

• Allhabad Bank
• Andhra Bank
• Axis Bank
• Bank of Maharashtra
• Bank of Baroda
• Bank of India
• Citi Bank
• Corporation Bank
• Deutsche Bank
• Federal Bank
• HDFC Bank
• HSBC Bank
• ICICI Bank Ltd
• IDBI Bank Limited
• Indian Bank
• Kotak Mahindra Bank
• Punjab National Bank
• State Bank of Travancore
• State Bank of Bikaner & Jaipur
• State Bank of India
• State Bank of Hyderabad
• Union Bank of India
• Vijaya Bank
• Yes Bank Limited

Happy investing.

Cheers,
Gopal 

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IndiaBulls Power - IPO - Poll results

Thanks for your participation. In all, 14 people responded to the poll and here are the results:

Less than Rs. 41 - 42%

Rs. 42 to Rs. 44  - 28%

Rs. 45 to Rs. 47  -   7%
Rs. 48 to Rs. 50  - 14%
Rs.50 & above    -   7%

I saw today that the IPO price is fixed at Rs.45 (The highest band price)!. This shows the confidence of the company that the shares may get listed at a good price. The issue was subscribed nearly 22 times, with the qualified institutional section subscribed 40.5 times, the high networth individual (HNI) portion 5.8 times and the retail tranche 1.1 times.

In my opinion, it may get a small premium of say5% (~ Rs48) on listing and will go below the issue price soon. With the market range-bound and looking not that good, let us see at what price the share get listed.

Cheers,
Gopal

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Weekly Digest - 25 Oct 2009

Contents

Legal & Tax

• Taxing times ahead for foreign BPOs

Economy

• Top execs of bailed-out cos to take 50% pay cut
• RBI unlikely to alter repo, reverse repo; but CRR may be hiked

Management

• Developing Your Leadership Presence - Harvard Business

Off-beats

• Tirupathi Laddus - caught in controversy
• 6 Indian cities among global BPO hotspots
  

Taxing times ahead for foreign BPOs

The Central Board of Direct Tax (CBDT), the apex direct taxes body,has withdrawn a 40-year old circular, which has the potential to increase the tax that India can claim on a foreign company that has operations in India through a ‘business connection’.
Will it have any impact on the BPO businesses? To know more, CLICK HERE.

Top execs of bailed-out cos to take 50% pay cut

Cracking the whip on the practice of exorbitant salaries, the US government's pay czar has slashed the compensation of top executives by 50 per cent at seven largest bailed-out firms including Citigroup and AIG. The drastic move comes in the wake of widespread criticism of executives being paid huge salaries even as their companies survive on tax payers' money. CLICK HERE FOR FURTHER READING

RBI unlikely to alter repo, reverse repo; but CRR may be hiked

The RBI is unlikely to alter the repo or reverse repo rates at its October meeting, believes Moody’s Economy.com. But a 50-basis point hike in the cash reserve ratio is expected, signaling a tightening bias. Excluding food prices, inflation is at a fairly weak level comparable with the rest of the region. A recent surge in food prices is likely to feed inflation expectations. CLICK HERE FOR FURTHER READING.

Developing Your Leadership Presence

What about when you are pushed in front of the microphone or given very little prep time for something like an introduction of a guest speaker?

This question came from Tonya in response to my previous post on developing your leadership pitch. CLICK HERE FOR FURTHER READING

Tirupathi Laddus - caught in controversy

Early next month, the Madras high court will hear a unique case -- a petition challenging the geographical indications protection given to the famous Tirupati laddu produced by the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanam. CLICK HERE TO READ FURTHER.

6 Indian cities among global BPO hotspots

Six Indian cities are among the eight top global destinations for outsourcing according to a new survey. Manila and Dublin also figure in the top list of 8 outsourcing destinations according to Tholons Top 50 emerging outsourcing destinations survey. CLICK HERE TO READ FURTHER

Cheers

Gopal

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Don't give up - POSSIBLE is within imPOSSIBLE

Yesterday (24-Oct-09), I attended the IIM Alumni monthly meeting. Everytime, the alumni association invite successful people from various spheres of life and they will share their thoughts.

Yesterday, it was little different. They invited Malathi Holla, an international athlete. What so special about it? It is special. She was affected by the deadly polio at the age of one and struggled her way throughout her life. She was trained and educated in a rehabilitation center in Chennai and moved to Bangalore for her PU. She is from Mangalore belonging to a lower middle class and had about 30 odd surgeries todate.

Sheer determination, courage, spirit made her to shine in the sports (both National and International) world and also in her career as a Bank Officer. She is currently Bank Manager with Syndicate Bank, Bangalore. She has won over 300 medals (Gold, Silver & Bronze) at State, National, International levels at the Paralympics , Asian, World Masters, Open Champinships.

She was conferred the prestigious Arjuna, Padma Shri & Ekalavya Awards. Apart from these, she was awarded the KK Birla Award, Women of the year (1999) by American Biographical Institute, USA, International Women of the year 1999 by International Biographical Center, Cambridge, England. In all she has won close to 30 awards.

What came out of the speech by Malathi is that do not look at your weakness, which is there with everyone in one form or the other. Start living your life the way you want. Motivate yourself. You can change the world if you have courage.

She is running an NGO called Mathru Foundations, a Charitable trust for people with disability. For more info on Mathru Foundation, CLICK HERE

What I have written about Malathi is little, for more reading, you can visit http://www.adifferentspirit.com/home-page.html.  "A different spirit", an authorised biography of Malathi K Holla - published by The Inspired Indian Foundation and authored by M.Anantha Krishnan. The part proceeds of the book sale goes to Mathru Foundation and those who were present bought those books for the Unlimited Inspirations of Malathi and for a noble cause.

Thanks to the IIMB Alumni for organising such a wonderful session, which had an attendance of about 100 (including the family members of the Alumni members).

Let us take things in the positive way and always look for our way, instead of depending on others and waiting for others to help us.

Cheers,

Gopal

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