Friday, July 3, 2009
Credit cards availabe in Singapore as at 15 May 2009
Here is a table showing the credit cards available in Singapore as at 15 May 2009.
Fixed deposit interest rate as at 15 May 2009
Here is a table showing the fixed deposit interest rate offered by banks in Singapore as at 15 may 2009. It is now being updated to show the latest available rates. Hope you find it useful.
Is this negligence?
Take this hypothetical example:
1. You are a senior manager of a bank with several branches
2. An investment bank approaches you to sell their innovative products and offers your bank an attractive commission of 3% to sell the product.
3. As the product looks attractive, you are confident of selling $50 million in your branches in one week. This will give a commission of $1,500,000. After deducting the incentive to your relationship managers (say 1%), you can make $1,000,000 for your bank.
4. You agree to distribute the product and sends your relationship managers for training by the product issuer. This is a short talk covering only the positive features of the product, i.e. "how to sell". It does not cover the prospectus and the negative features (as they do not help in the sales).
5. The product issuer advises you to get a disclaimer signed by the retail customers to waive liability for any loss on investing in the product.
The product turns out to be quite different from what you understood it to be. You realised to your horror, that it includes components such as credit default swaps and collaterialised debt obligations (that your bank or its relationship managers did not realise earlier).
As financial advisers, with responsibilties under the Financial Advisers Act), were your relationship managers negligent in not understanding the product that was sold to the retail customers? Does your bank share in this negligence?
What do you do?
a) Hide under the disclaimer clause?
b) Admit your mistake and offer to share the loss with the investors?
1. You are a senior manager of a bank with several branches
2. An investment bank approaches you to sell their innovative products and offers your bank an attractive commission of 3% to sell the product.
3. As the product looks attractive, you are confident of selling $50 million in your branches in one week. This will give a commission of $1,500,000. After deducting the incentive to your relationship managers (say 1%), you can make $1,000,000 for your bank.
4. You agree to distribute the product and sends your relationship managers for training by the product issuer. This is a short talk covering only the positive features of the product, i.e. "how to sell". It does not cover the prospectus and the negative features (as they do not help in the sales).
5. The product issuer advises you to get a disclaimer signed by the retail customers to waive liability for any loss on investing in the product.
The product turns out to be quite different from what you understood it to be. You realised to your horror, that it includes components such as credit default swaps and collaterialised debt obligations (that your bank or its relationship managers did not realise earlier).
As financial advisers, with responsibilties under the Financial Advisers Act), were your relationship managers negligent in not understanding the product that was sold to the retail customers? Does your bank share in this negligence?
What do you do?
a) Hide under the disclaimer clause?
b) Admit your mistake and offer to share the loss with the investors?
Local Transport Service
We should provide a local transport service to serve a town, such as Ang Mo Kio, Bedok or Tampines. It will create jobs and provide a useful service to other people who are already employed. More details here.
Create jobs to help recovery of Global Economy
Many people look forward to the early recovery of the global economy. There was hope that the stimulus packages in USA, China and other countries would be able to spur this recovery. The bad employment report in USA for June was a big disappointment. It caused a big drop in the stockmarkets.
Several economists said that the situation will continue to be bad for a long time. If more people lose their jobs, they will cut their spending. This will cause more jobs to be lost. It is a downward spiral. I share this view.
For the global economy to recover, it is necessary that many jobs be created and that people are sure that they can find a job, even if it is at a minimum wage, as long as they are willing to work. They also need a way to defer the repayment of their debt until they find a better paying job. My suggestion is set out in this article.
I hope that the governments in some countries will adopt this idea, and other governments will follow, if the idea proves to be workable.
Tan Kin Lian
Several economists said that the situation will continue to be bad for a long time. If more people lose their jobs, they will cut their spending. This will cause more jobs to be lost. It is a downward spiral. I share this view.
For the global economy to recover, it is necessary that many jobs be created and that people are sure that they can find a job, even if it is at a minimum wage, as long as they are willing to work. They also need a way to defer the repayment of their debt until they find a better paying job. My suggestion is set out in this article.
I hope that the governments in some countries will adopt this idea, and other governments will follow, if the idea proves to be workable.
Tan Kin Lian
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)