BT's International Conference from two weekends ago featured a panel on reforming financial regulation and featured Princeton professor Alan Blinder, economist and investor Peter Schiff, and President of the St. Louis Federal Reserve Bank James Bullard. We just obtained video footage of parts of the panel, and they are included here, here, and here.
Photo courtesy of Flickr.
Thanksgiving weekend has seemingly taken the annual “Black Friday” scramble for senseless sales away with it. Unbeknownst to most all consumers though, retailers have more “tricks” up their sleeves as the biggest holiday season of the year approaches. These include strategically planned promotions until Christmas, finely-printed restrictions limiting the quantity of certain purchases by household, increased and continued application of traditional marketing measures such as BOGO’s (“Buy One Get One”s…), and a tighter rein on inventory to avoid panic-induced last-minute sales that had to be instituted last year. Retailers have also embraced basic items for the house due to a shift in consumer trends and adapted their prices to match those of competitors. To be ahead of the race, check out this WSJ article here.
My article in the latest BT magazine detailed the housing bubble in Dubai and the resulting financial crisis. Well, it turns out the situation in Dubai has suddenly gotten much, much worse.
The central problem was that no one really knew how deep in debt Dubai’s effectively state-owned conglomerate of companies, Dubai Inc., really was. Investors had assumed that debt levels were in the $80-90 billion range, but had hoped that the recent bailout from Abu Dhabi had righted the ship.
The bombshell dropped on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving. Dubai World, one of Dubai Inc.’s major holding companies, asked for a six-month moratorium on some $60 million in debt payments. This betrays extreme financial weakness, and the markets are panicking.
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Business Today's International Conference is currently being held at the Grand Hyatt in NYC, and includes three days of keynote speeches, seminars, an elevator pitch and a recruiting reception for 150 students and 60 executives. On Sunday, BT held a panel on the changing dynamics of financial regulation that included Princeton Professor Alan Blinder, stock broker and economist Peter Schiff, and President of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis James Bullard. During the panel, Mr. Bullard said that the Fed should be able to maintain the power to buy mortgage backed securities should the economy turn bad. Also, check out this WSJ article detailing the fall.
For job-seeking seniors and intern-hopeful juniors, it’s that time of year again as prestigious finance corporations have been reinforcing their presence on campuses across the nation in recruiting efforts. The increase of additional manpower invested into information and networking sessions despite high national unemployment rates has been quite noticeable; even Goldman Sach’s lead man (a.k.a. Chief Executive Officer), Lloyd Blankfein, showed up at GS’ Princeton University recruitment event. He delivered a brief and light speech to a packed room of students, detailing his fortuitous entry into Goldman after the unexpected acquisition of his former employer, which reinforced a main message of the synergism of preparation, talent, timeliness and a bit of sheer luck in the finance industry. A handful of questions were made by the audience, including two inquiries on what aspects Mr. Blankfein personally enjoyed and “most wanted to change” about the dynamics of his company.
Forbes’ Sramana Mitra, cited in the Online Journal’s Nov. 14th post, isn’t the first to worry that Wall Street is a drain on economic innovation, moving our best and brightest away from actual productive innovation into the realm of financial innovation. No less than Nobel laureate Paul Krugman has supported this notion; when asked during a recent Princeton book signing what he thought of Wall Street’s social use, he said, “I guess I fall into the parasite camp”.
The so-called “parasite camp,” however, isn’t nearly as extreme as another emerging school of thought which actually blames the increasingly intellectual nature of the financial industry for both increasing instability and the 2008 crisis. Calvin Trillin advances this view here.
For those who haven’t heard of UWIRE, it’s a popular online service that aggregates university articles written by students and for students concerning global events and issues. However, you won’t be hearing from UWIRE anytime soon perhaps: all voices once amplified on the website have now fallen silent in the last month or so, since UWIRE became suspended “indefinitely”. Employees have not disclosed much information on the suspension, but it is speculated to be a result of inadequate financing as can be inferred from the unhappily unpaid (for the month of September) student reporters hired by UWIRE.
UWIRE was started in 1994 and previously owned by CBS before being sold to Palestra.net, another college student news network service in March. Rarely any drastic changes took place after the turnover…that is, until now. The economy has already seen signs of recovery, but is a lagging effect in work at UWIRE? For now, the only answer is the deathly quiet.
They can be seen in the pockets of most college students, seen on the ears of millions. When Apple’s iPhone hit the market there was a major craze, with over a million being sent the first weekend. This seemingly perfect device has hit America, and is likely to continue to change the way our society functions.
With the success of iPhones, its other component, Iphone applications also continue to develop. With many trying to hit the market and create a successful application, the competition is rising. Along with Princeton students’ recent diabetes application, there also comes a myriad of others. One such application allows customers to order ahead at Chipotle. Due to the surge of use, Chipotle workers were unable to keep up and had to disuse the application.
Check out this article in Forbes, where Sramana Mitra writes about why the present system of capitalism is rewarding the wrong set of individuals and who should really be prospering.
Photo courtesy of Flickr.
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