Saturday, June 11, 2005
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I have been really really lazy in the blogging. I remember one of the earlier visitors cautioned that one can lose interest in blogging quite easily, I guess he is right. But anyway, I figure that I will just blog when I feel like to.
I have moved from US east coast to Hong Kong for about 5 months and have just enough experience to make some preliminary (a word frequently used in bioscience) comments.
1. In general, I feel Hong Kong is a quite livable place for me.
People (in the service business) in Hong Kong is generally a lot more professional and credible than their counterparts from Mainland China and US. For example, I often can get good advice for electronic from those big chains such as Fortress, GoMe and Broadway. Another example is that Hong Kong waiters/waitresses have the fastest speed in setting up the tables and cleaning them up afterwards. When I got time, I will write a separate piece on dining in Hong Kong. I have used taxi quite frequently and a majority of them are very friendly and chatty.
The public transportation is quite good. I was going to buy a car, but decided to wait and see since the public transportation is good and it is doubtful that i can get a parking space from where I work. And it seems that public transportation + taxi are quite economical and convenient.
Tuesday, January 04, 2005
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I have been following Blast (the famous MITBBS blast) for a very long time and i have to say his performance is very good. You can check it out yourself.
Blast Investor Real-time Plus BTW, i have been an investor/trader for almost 10 years. I have seen hundreds of people in chat rooms, forums, etc proclaiming various returns. Blast is the ONLY one that I follow with real money and real return. I personally guarantee that his part year performance is REAL.
Saturday, December 11, 2004
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Very interesting stuff
Links broken :(
Friday, December 10, 2004
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I have a copy of someone else's post regarding what you should do when you lose your cc, I am sorry I cannot find the name of the original contributor.
What to do if you have lost your wallet or purse. We've all heard horror stories about fraud that's committed using our name, address, SS#, credit, etc. Unfortunately the author of this piece has first hand knowledge,
because her wallet was stolen last month and within a week the thieves ordered an expensive monthly cell phone package, applied for a VISA credit card, had a credit line approved to buy a Gateway computer, received a PIN number from DMV to change her driving record information online, and more. But here's some critical information to limit the damage in case this happens to you or someone you know.
Cancel your credit cards immediately. The key is having the toll free numbers and your card numbers handy so you know whom to call. Keep this information where you can easily find it (having to hunt for them is additional stress you WON’T need at that point)!
File a police report immediately in the jurisdiction where it was stolen. This proves to credit providers you were diligent, and is a first step toward an investigation (if there ever is one).
But here's what is perhaps most important:
Call the three national credit reporting organizations immediately to place a fraud alert on your name and SS#. The alert means any company that checks your credit knows your information was stolen and they have to contact you by phone to authorize new credit.
The numbers are:
- Equifax 1-800 525-6285
- Experian (formerly TRW) 1-800-301-7195
- Trans Union 1-800-680-7289
- Social Security Administration also has a fraud line at 1-800-269-0271
Help to limit exposure to others, pass this information along to your family members and friends.
Thursday, December 09, 2004
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The hiddens ones (often bad) for credit cards
- If you don't pay off your balance, your interest charge is more than you would expect.
Suppose you spent $10,000.01 in January, and you paid $10,000 (i.e. with 1 cent unpaid, by mistake, or maybe you just like so), and your annual rate is 24%, guess how much interest you need to pay? Not 0.01*24%/12, but $10000.01*24%/12 ~ 200 bucks for 1 cent not paid!!!
- Be careful of introductory low APR (0% APR).
If you credit changes - maybe you were late to pay another credit card - your APR could jump to 20% or even 30% instantly! You think you are paying this credit on time every time and you are safe. You are dead wrong!
- Late fees, over the limit fees, annual fees, god-knows other fees.
- Some credit cards, although very rare now, have no grace period - i.e. you will be charged an interest the minute you use it.
- Identify theft, internet fraud - be careful of this, and ideally your credit card company provide some favorable terms for you.
- Never leave the balance not fully paid - unless it is truly 0% interest rate and you can be sure the rate won't jump unexpectedly (see above). People like this are called 'dead-beat' by credit card companies - and that's why you want to do that. CC companies made most money from those people who pay minimum balance every time.
Credit card is very important for most people living in the US (and other countries). Recently PBS did a program that revealed many interesting secrets of credit card companies. Combined with my own experience, here is a incomplete (and random) points.
The good ones
Many credit card offer cashback - i.e. you spend $100, they will give you $1 or more (1% of more) back to you. MBNA has 10% introduction cashback rate, citi has 5%, etc.
Catch: cashback has total amount limit, monthly limit, purchase time limit, sometimes the percentage is 'up to x%'.
Your credit card protects you from price drop of the products you purchased. If you buy a certain camera model for $1,000, and its price dropped to $800, the credit card company will reimburse you the $200 difference - sounds good?
Catch: total amount limit, sometimes they only protect you from certain vendors, etc.
- 0% APR on balance transfer or/and purchase for a certain time periond (3 months to 2 years)
Oversea Chinese in the US are experiencing tougher job market, tougher US immigration law and probably some unfriendiness from some American (since they naturally compete with Americans for jobs). For those who have not obtained a green card, the risk of losing a job and being kicked out the country is real. And it is not uncommon that many of them have to put up with low pay, overtime work and scarce chance of promotion. I have personally seen people who lost their jobs look for various ways to keep their status - e.g. fake marriage. I have also seen people who speak broken English, eat ONLY chinese food, and interact ONLY with other Chinese after work. There are a lot of successful stories, of course. But many of them (or rather, most of them) lead a fairly simple life. Most of the oversea Chinese were the brightest among their peers, and they should be able to lead a more fulfilling life if they choose to. So sometimes I wonder, does the US culture change our view of life? Or it is just a result of growing up? Is it because of the infamous 'glass ceiling' that squashes our lofty ambitions?
Wednesday, December 08, 2004
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Just like what TV has done to the world, the internet is changing people's life in a major way! Here is a list of most useful websites (will update the list and your comments are most welcome).
- google for internet search
- gmail for email - or yahoo mail
- yahoo finance and cbsmarketwatch for financial news - make your money work for you
- fatwallet and anandtech for info about how to get bargains
- mitbbs for talking, arguing with your fellow chinese
Monday, December 06, 2004
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I have to admit I did not finish reading the article - my daughter kept 'bothering' me in the library...
But my impression is the article is quite superficial and biased. It went to exuberant length detailing many different types of cheaper Chinese products, yet provides little insight into how the US can fully take advantage of cheaper imports and how US manufacturers should cope with them accordingly.
A chinese verion - can't find who translated it, but I copied from huiguinet.com
据12月6日一期的美国《商业周刊》(提前出版)报道,“中国价格”对美国商界而言是一个令人不寒而栗的词汇｡通常,它意味着比你在美国制造的商品价格低 30%至50%。服装、鞋类、家电和塑料制品的制造商十分清楚，试图与中国价格竞争是徒劳的。数十年来，由于这些商品的到来，美国厂家纷纷倒闭。这是导致美国自2000年以来丧失270万制造业就业机会的一个主要因素。与此同时，美国对华贸易赤字继续激增，创下了新纪录，今年可能将超过1500亿美元。 (海归论坛 www.haiguinet.com)
从未想到自己会为中国价格所困扰的制造商和就业者现在正面临着中国大陆的新挑战。这些公司一度顶住了进口产品的冲击，这主要是因为它们的生产需要先进技术、巨额投资以及接近消费者。其中许多公司属于占美国制造业37%的中小型部门。中国价格现在甚至体现在高科技领域。尽管中国先进网络设备的出口还处于较低水平，但它已经开始影响价格。一些人认为，中国最终可能成为主要汽车出口国。 (海归论坛 www.haiguinet.com)
－－惊人的挑战 (海归论坛 www.haiguinet.com)
美国先前经受住了从日本、韩国和墨西哥进口浪潮的冲击。它抵制了中国20年。但是，截然不同的情况正在发生。长期以来人们一直认为，美国和其它工业化国家将继续引领知识密集型产业，而发展中国家将集中于技术含量较低的部门。这种看法尚有待讨论。哈佛大学经济学家理查德·弗里曼说：“中国的惊人之处在于，我们第 一次有了一个既能以极低的工资、又能在高科技领域竞争的大而穷的国家。这两点结合在一起，美国的问题就来了。” (海归论坛 www.haiguinet.com)
问题究竟有多大？这正是激烈争论的焦点。一方面，美中贸易关系让美国受益匪浅。在经过数年努力打进中国大陆市场之后，从通用汽车公司到宝洁公司和摩托罗拉公司等美国跨国公司最终获得了丰厚的利润。它们在中国生产手机、洗发液、汽车和个人电脑，并将这些产品卖给中国的中产阶层。目前，这一阶层约有1亿人,到 2010年将翻一番还多。 (海归论坛 www.haiguinet.com)
通过将零部件外包到中国，美国公司的资产收益率大幅增长。中国的贸易壁垒将继续降低，这是它2001年加入世界贸易组织时所签署协议的一部分。对美国保险公司、银行和零售商而言，新的重大机遇即将出现。中国对原材料和商品需求的激增促使全球价格上涨，让美国钢材生产商、矿业公司和木材公司发了一笔横财。廉价的中国商品使美国的通货膨胀率一直保持在低水平，同时又刺激了美国的国内消费，帮助美国走出经济衰退，并使全球经济继续稳步增长。 (海归论坛 www.haiguinet.com)
－－棘手的问题 (海归论坛 www.haiguinet.com)
但是，美中贸易关系也使美国蒙受了重大损失。首先就是美国的巨额贸易赤字问题，其中，中国所占比例最大，且增长速度最快。在美国消费者疯狂购买中国制造的商品的同时，美国贸易赤字正接近国内生产总值的6%，创下新的纪录。美国的贸易赤字和预算赤字正使美元币值不断下跌。人们因此担心，全球金融系统将遭受重大打击。中国将分析家们认为币值偏低的人民币汇率与美元挂钩，从而使这个问题进一步扩大。 (海归论坛 www.haiguinet.com)
根据绝大多数人的预测，美国对华贸易赤字将进一步增加。这引发了这样一个问题，即美国的产业基础会沉沦到危险地步吗？迄今为止，遭受打击最为严重的是那些注定要转移到低成本国家的产业。但是，中国正在美国仍具竞争力的较为先进的产业中迅速崛起，将先进技术添加到汽车、特种钢、石化产品和微芯片等产品的生产中去。这些工厂旨在满足中国如饥似渴的需求。但是，这样做的危险之处在于，如果中国经济停滞不前，由此导致的供应过剩就会变成又一股出口浪潮，从而破坏美国整个新产业行业。 (海归论坛 www.haiguinet.com)
对美国而言，这就是中国会成为比上个世纪80年代的日本更加棘手的贸易问题的原因所在。显然，一些中国出口商存在侵犯知识产权、倾销、保护不公平补助等欺诈行为。华盛顿可以更加积极地打击违反贸易法的行为。但是，扩大贸易保护主义的做法毫无用处。实际上，美国现在十分依赖中国供应商，重新设置贸易壁垒只会增加成本，减少中国贸易为美国带来的真正好处。此外，与20年前的日本不同，中国是一个更加开放的经济体。它继续降低关税，甚至与世界各国都保持微小的贸易赤字。在这种背景下，美国对华贸易赤字就显得更加突出了。 (海归论坛 www.haiguinet.com)
－－无穷的优势 (海归论坛 www.haiguinet.com)
人民币升值30%可能对解决这个问题有所帮助。但这是不可能的。首先，北京担心这种变化会严重影响到国内就业和5150亿美元外汇储备的价值。真正的解决办法是，美国依靠自身力量来减少预算赤字和贸易逆差。这与其说是中国的问题，倒不如说是美国自身的问题。
与此同时，美国公司不要再为国内增加大量新的生产力而投资，因为美国工程师队伍正在缩减。相反，中国正在成为最具竞争力的制造业平台。中国最可怕的优势莫过于廉价劳动力，其生产工人月薪才120美元,软件设计者月薪才2000美元。即使在直接劳动成本还不足总成本10%的高尖电子产业，中国的低工资也体现在整个供应链中，包括零部件、员工、货物装卸等。
中国还受到了巨大的国内市场的推动，它带来了规模经济、使价格维持在低水平的激烈的国内竞争、以每年35万的速度增长的工程师生力军、愿意每天工作12个小时且周末加班加点的年轻员工和管理人员、电子和轻工业领域独一无二的零部件和原材料基地以及一股愿意竭尽全力满足沃尔玛、塔吉特、百思买和彭尼等大型零售商需求的创业热情。彭尼公司负责国际采购的副总裁珍妮特·福克斯说：“现在几乎所有家居装饰用品都由中国工厂自己制造，原因在于它们是更好的供应商。美国制造商根本无法与之相比。” (海归论坛 www.haiguinet.com)
福克斯的观点十分重要。中国的竞争优势远非建立在不公平的贸易行为之上。目前，中国出口产品约70%来自主要由台湾、香港、日本和美国等公司拥有的私营企业和外资企业。这些公司带来了外国市场准入、先进科技和管理技术。随着资金大量涌入中国，现代工厂纷纷建起，生产效率大幅提升。 (海归论坛 www.haiguinet.com)
与此同时，中国人继续扩大出口基础。中国的竞争来得很快，几乎不可能通过采用自动化技术或减少供应商等常用战略进行调整。曾协助中国入世谈判的美国前助理贸易代表罗伯特·卡西迪说，日本人、韩国人和欧洲人过去经常要花“四五年时间才能建立其市场地位。而中国征服一个市场的速度之快，甚至你都觉察不到”。
The US is becoming significantly 'foreigner-unfriendly' since 911.
- It is much tougher getting into US - admission of foreign students by US institutions dropped consecutively for the last 3 years (see articles in the Science journal).
- It is much tougher for people already in the US to go back to their native country (or any other country) and come back again. One often 'gets checked' by various US agencies before a clearance is given so that you can re-enter the US. The process can take months.
- If you are a foreinger (or look like one, Chinese/Asia people certainly look different), people tend to be more cautious towards you. Once I rided the subway with a package, and felt a few people were watching me with some sort of vigilence :)