My Blog

8am, read thestar for headlines - scan for local political news especially. Usually nothing new because most news already received earlier, no thanks to power of internet.

12pm to 5pm, things start to get hot for the day, browse Malaysiakini and Malaysiainsider for any breaking news.
This week was the most exciting one because according to reliable sources, there will be big announcement on 18TH, 21ST and 23RD. Indeed big news, on 18TH, SAPP decided to motion no-confidence in Pak Lah leadership, then KLSE dipped ~15 points first day, ~17 points again the following day.

5.pm, check KLSE closing price. So pathetic, GENTING 5.25 - new low in 52wks, OGAWA 0.295 - new low in 52 wks, BURSA 7.65 -new low in 52wks. Time to keep your $$$ in your wallet, I think it the safe place. Expect more uncertainty in the local bourse this year due to local political scene and weakening US economics + violent weather and catrastrophe worldwide. If you invested early this year, I think you should be at least 30% below your initial investment, hmmm….not so good.

7pm, watch NTV7 news. - maybe a visual repeat of what already known through malaysiakini.com.
7pm, watch TV3 news again.

10pm, check US stock market performance, down again, this week it US DOW JOES INDUSTRIAL dipped below 12000 again, hmm….good for them for spending money without thinking twice. Then up to date, a total of 1,400 hedge fund managers were arrested by FBI for investigation, this week 2 were indicted, haha, finally law caught up with these irresponsible people but I think many still at large.

10.30pm, watch ASTRO AEC “xin wen bao bao kan”. This one is fun, watch them reporting all the criticism from all quarters…

11pm, check THESUN, Cristiano Ronaldo said he is leaving again, boring…want to leave, so just leave, oppss Sir Alex wont let you leave like that, obviously Ron didnt study history, he forgot of Paul Ince, Stam, Nistelrooy, Beckham story….let you rot in reserves for a year, see how much you still worth and whether REAL still wants you. As for 50 mil, I think we can do pretty well without it. As for defending the trophy and champions league, I think we will do ok too - in fact we should stop depending on you selfish forgetful bastard, and “ham sup” too, always order “chicken” …
12pm, finally the day is over, but thinking on my bed whether SEPT 16TH set by Anwar is a good bluff or will become a reality. Days after days, it looks like more and more real.

EURO starts in the wee hour, not interested anymore. Portugal just lost to Germany in quarter final, haha….Scolari + Ronaldo, now the Man Utd fan No.1 enemy.

Yes, how on earth did this shit happened.

Pulau Bath Puteh, 25.8 nautical miles from Singapore, 9 nautical miles from Johor. International law said any country deserved the right to any island or natural resources within the 12.8 nautical miles maritime border.

So who owned that island? Even kindergarten kids know that, it should be MALAYSIA! Yes, albeit the ICJ ruled it to Singapore.

What the heck…why? Because the Johor Government didnt act to claim any right over that island, or the sickening tidak apa attitude. What the hell, might as well give the whole Johor to Singapore, replace the government sekali gus.

As much as I think our current government is incompetent, my heart still lies in Malaysia. But the Malaysia today just makes me feel not right and frustrated sometimes, brain drain, no development, no progress, stupid ideas, no aggressiveness to protect own IP, give everything to people.

Dare some people said this is a win-win situation, this is all because of no aggressiveness, ill advised, and poorly written report. 

I want Malaysia to be successful, Malaysian to be respected. Not like some third level citizens that I seen contributing around other countries. I feel sad, I would bet IDR is another project doomed to play to other people hand if we didnt control carefully.

Malaysians should be successful in Malaysia, and be able to compete with others at international level.

8th of March, I will never forget this day. The day that will definitely be written into the book of Sejarah Malaysia, as one of Malaysia most important days.

Actually this election results served as an important lesson to all of us, never be too arrogant and always be adaptive to changes.

Why did BN lost? They simply didnt foresee the wave of changes triggered from the new MALAYSIAN (Not just non muslim) generation, this is the first year for many of us who are provided with good education started to realise our political rights and cast a vote. Ask me 4 years ago, I will still not vote! Not that all of us are anti government, but the past governonce simply is not good enough, not transparent, corruption, no fair treatment in civil service all the way to the price hike etc, Lingam issues, Altantuya issues, Chua Soi Lek scandal etc.

Actually other than election, when come to running a company and managing employees, the management needs to change their way of managing too as younger generation of employees demand opportunities and change. We simply cannot manage like we used to do 20 years ago, talking about loyalty and job security. None of this matter anymore to the new generation workforce, they are more demanding and understand their rights.

So opposition won, are they really that good? Actually I doubt that. If they ever grow too powerful, I bet they will become complacent too. So we need to ensure the vote will swing again to the other end. In fact I think we should always keep the vote this way and a so called "balanced government" rather than "weakened government". 

Am I a hardcore DAP, PKR, PAS, BN supporter? Hell no? If you are not effective, I will use my 1 vote to do the talking. Be sure starting from now, there is no more dictator in Malaysia and democracy will prevail, so to all opposition MPs and state assemblymen better hit the ground and start working, do ensure what you had promised is realised.

I am happy not because DAP won or PKR won, I am happy because democracy is alive in our country and it definitely had restored my faith into MAlaysia which once was recognised for its draconian law and childish government remark. Malaysia is reborn, give the new state government a chance, give Malaysia a chance, give yourself a chance! cheerssss……..

I had a lot of thought about investment lately. Although I didnt really have enough capital to be involved in real big investment, but I had been doing some small investment and also virtual investment.

There had been a lot of tips about how to invest whether is from friends, parents, gurus, analysts, books but I have always been searching of my goal in investing, what do I really want? After giving much thought, I think I roughly know which path I am heading towards and had developed some rule of thumbs based on advice from gurus. (Esp Warren Buffett)

First, when you invest imagine you are buying into a business. Understand high level how a business work first before investing. This can be further separated into 4Ps. Understand its product (profit margin, competitor, price competitive or durable competitive), its people (good management, good manager, good culture, good working environment), its potential (what is the possible area for growth for coming 5 years), its  predictability (what will the business like after this, what factors can affect profitability). I am not a businessman and therefore I can never be good at valuation, what I get is from financial and press report. However I can compensate this  by talking with employees working at the company to understand working environment and do more background research, continue to scrutinize my own valuation (we tend to believe that our decision is the best and right, beware of that). I am still learning this…..For example a simple fact that as an employee of my current company, I know I can speculate in my company stock but not long term investment because the business is unpredictable, it needs people to make right decision and people dont always make the right one, and the product profit margin is ever shrinking from premium to commodity. Additionally, the growth potential is unclear. No one can value my current company more than me as an employee of my company. It is funny sometimes when we made a decision to buy a stock, we dont scrutinize our own decision making process, we just buy and "hope" we made the right choice and get lucky…..like buying 4D….if we lose money, then hai…lets try again. I tried scrutinizing some of my friends decision recently and initially they plan to buy but when I start questioning, they cannot answer, then they change target. So dont believe yourself too easily although being confident is good, try presenting your thinking and valuation to someone close to you, and get input. 

Second, never diversified and rather put all your eggs in one basket, but make sure you choose the right basket and have a hawk eye on that basket. Diversification is a myth of modern economy, I think in the long run, is a try of luck, and most likely you wont get lucky everyday and winner will cancel out loser. Diversification might work for you if you are into the market for one time deal, meaning after you make money, you never return to the market. The worst, when market plunged or go into a real recession, even when you want to take eggs out from basket, no body is free to entertain you. Believe me, you remisier wont pick up your call during market turmoil when you are going to tell him/her to sell over 30 counters with different selling price….haha. You are on your own buddy….

Third, be patient when it is investment. If you cant keep your money in a business for 10 years, dont even hold it for 10 minutes. Some business no matter how wonderful it is, you simply have to wait. You cant make a baby come out in one month by making nine women pregnant. (Warren Buffett quote) Time is the friend of wonderful business, but enemy for mediocre and bad business. Never sell due to market shortsightedness, causes a company stock price to price at below value, dont buy due to overhyped market sentiment, rather capitalize on market shortsightedness. Just 2007 alone, market shortsightedness had created twice wonderful opportunity for investor to buy into some very wonderful business. some bad business…the price just go down and never recover anymore. No offence, but I think Telekom and Tenaga is one of those that have becoming worse as days go by. Even at monopoly state, they cant make their product interesting or more profitable, their people become complacent and their debt alone…..is huge!!! Unless they start becoming smart, else i dont see any growth for these mammoth companies.

Fourth, it doesnt take a fortune to start investing. Everything starts small, although we dont have money at this age which I am thankful for that (becoz out inexperienced might cause the cash end up as a gift to the cunning foxes), It doesnt hurt to start learning young and when you still have the means to do so. Invest into books rather than invest into stocks first. Spent RM 50 on Buffet to understand fundamental investment, and Soros books on how he short sell market and create rumors, panic. It is more worthwhile then buying stock like throwing dart and end up losing thousands. Try to understand what they trying to tell you rather than just hurry rush through the book and plunge into market and start throwing darts.

My final advice to all, do your homework dont trust analyst completely, dont speculate and dont play stock market. Due to the fact we are all minority shareholders, there is no way you can control the market. When you speculate, there is a 50-50 chance and is not a sure thing. It is better you take your money go to Genting and play big-small, only that the game takes longer to take the money from you. Example back in Feb Proton price was high RM7 and analyst said the target price is RM9 based on book value, speculation was on-going about Proton-Volkswagen merger. But if you understand the automobile business and esp Proton dire state, there is small profit margin, poor product (other than price) and poor people management with unknown future. You also know it will take more than Government to persuade foreign partner fast to come up the partnership because the company is beyond the Government control. If you invest into Proton, you will lose almost 20% of total investment by today when share price is at RM 5. It will take many years of effort to drive the stock value back to RM 7. Unless you are insider but again inside trading is illegal in the world, you will never know the details of the merger. So if I am analyst or someone like Soros, maybe I will create wind of rumors once a while to get your money from your pocket.

Dont try to outsmart stock market, you can outsmart it 100 times but it will take only 1 mistake to wipe off your entire investment. Ask people that "invested" in the 90s, that time even blind people make big money, but it is a market seconds from disaster the minute ASEAN currency start floating with US dollar. Again, you dont have to make many rights, you just need to make a few rights in your life to have return.

This is my sharing and I am still green and continue learning, I still havent make any good return from my small investment yet but I have a positive feeling I am on the right track with positive mindset. With that I have a control over my emotion and better financial planning.

Good luck!      

Just watched transformers (2007 movie, not the cartoon movie in 90s), Malaysians were lucky to have the opportunity to watch it 3 days ahead of people in other parts of the world, even US citizens have to hold their nerve.

I am happy to say the movie is not disappointing, the robot design is truly AMAZING !! The fun part is to watch each character appeared throughout the movie one by one. When BLACKOUT first came out after 10 min into the movie, the feeling is breathtaking! Finally after so many years, someone had finally able to realize the idea of transformation from animated series to big screen, salute!

However there are a few things that could have made the movie experience better. First, the movie pace is too fast, typical Michael Bay’s style, somehow I not really into Michael Bay style, cant argue about the explosions and action scene he presented, but when come to simple storyline and the smoothness of the flow, I think that he is not good at. At times, making the movie flow hard to swallow. Something like when you are reading a book, before you fully understand page 2, you are suddenly at page 10.

Second thing, the transformers too hard to differentiate. The flaw is the coloring, especially for decepticons. Other than starscream and megatron, I cant differentiate the rest when they are moving in fast pace…..because they all have the same kind of color category. It is a bit easier on the autobots end due to the bright color that makes it easier to distinguish one from another.

Third thing, the fun thing about transformers is the transformation process. If you notice in Japanese animated series, why transformers were hot is because when they transform, they transform slowly and so you can follow it and understand the logic. In the movie, they transform like in 1 or 3 seconds, yeah…it is cool, but I dont enjoy it, because it is too fast…….In animated series, normally they will try to slow it down to like 7 to 10 seconds so you enjoy the transformation phase.

The good part, a lot of military technology showcased in the film and Optimus Prime is ORIGINAL! Ironhide and Ratchet rocks! Bumblebee, I love it! Starscream & Megatron not as bad as it looks. Blackout, Barricade, Brawl (Devastator), Scorponok simply leaves you drooling by the end of the movie.  Jazz a little bit disappointing, perished after being torn apart by Meg. Bonecrusher head got unplugged by Prime, just appeared in the movie for 5 min.

Still this is a good transformers movie, i think there is no way another movie can get as close as this one, it will definitely bring back the good memory so guys and fan boys, relish the moment, you gonna love it!

These few days had been the toughest and frustrated one indeed, I didnt realize the transformer toys launch was actually scheduled during school holiday season and public holiday, damn I was pissed off with so many people….I mean I didnt realize that they were so many collectors out there scrambling for the few pieces of transformers. You can count the number still available as minutes go by, I stood by one store in One Utama and I can see Optimus prime figure went from 5 to 1 in just like 10 minutes. After Prime is gone, then followed by the good figures, Blackout top on the list, followed by Barricade…..by the end of the battle which is Monday 5 pm, I think you can hardly find anymore good figures in KL & Penang major departmental store. What left are those sorry figures like swindle (not even in the movie), bonecrusher (second ugliest in the movie) …damn even scorponok is gone (the ugliest), I think people just dont care about the look anymore, it has been an epidemic, you just want to grab some figures on your hand. After these tiring 3 days, I managed to get most of the figures but I missed out on Blackout…..I actually saw that figure in front of me, but I just missed it….dont ask me why, now you can hardly find it anywhere. Blackout is rated 5/5 from most of the reviewers, I thought I could get it like 1-week later after the dust had settled, but looks like the dust settled in 3-days and Blackout has gone.

This is crazy, still I had managed to get some real good figures especially from robot heroes, those were cute G1 non-transformable figures meant for display purpose. I found 1 which is hard to get, Megatron + Ultra Magnus, luckily I didnt have second thought when I grabbed this one.

I have Prime, Barricade from Penang (location undisclosed ..hehe), Brawl, Bumblebee, Ironhide (from Toy R us midvalley), Starscream, Ratchet, Jazz from 1 Utama KL. What I am missing now is Blackout, I trying to skip Megatron, Scorponok, Bonecrusher if possible coz these figures are ugly, unless I have extra $$$ to spare or I want to do business, can do real good business with Megatron. 

These few days are indeed tiring, nothing comparable to few weeks ago when I was searching for G1 Ultra Magnus Titanium (you can hardly find this, trust me) on web, manage to buy it from a cool ebay seller in Malaysia. My luck.

Hope that I will be lucky enough to find Blackout.

By the way, the movie aint starting July 4th in Malaysia, it is earlier. Take a guess when? do you homework! :P   I hate people and queue….shue! shue! 

So happy today, transformers the movie action figures had finally arrived at one of the collectors’ store in Penang, 4 days ahead of official sale day promised by Hasbro (June 2nd). June 2nd will be the worldwide sale date for major retailers like WAL MART, TARGET, TOY R US…..

I bought myself Optimus prime which is the coolest figures out of all and Barricade which actually is a decepticon transformed into a FORD police car. There are some othe figures but cant buy all at one time, the figures are Brawl (Decepticon transformed into Tank mode), Blackout (decepticon transformed into Chopper), Bumblebee (autobot transformed into ford mustang), Ironhide (autobot transformed into a GM pickup truck), ratchet (autobot that transformed into an ambulance), jazz (autobot that transformed into a sports car) and finally scorponok (decepticon that transformed into scorpion - ugliest figure). Overall the figures joint are nicely made and designed, from review I read, Ironhide perhaps is the best figures in terms of the complex transformation. Of course before I forget, Megatron actually got sold out when I arrived at the store, ahead of Prime which is kinda surprised to me, coz Megatron looks more like an arctic Alien than a robot, I think I will skip Megatron unless it changes my mind when I see the actual figure.

The boss figures cost RM 189, while voyager class (ironhide, blackout, ratchet) cost RM 99.90. Some people are stupid enough to sell ratchet and blackout together…boy it take me ages to consider buying ratchet or blackout, both are not really cool figures. Deluxe class is a good buy for beginner, who likes transformer but maybe not thinking of spending too much, it costs RM 49.90. Figures like Jazz, Barricade, Brawl, Bumblebee and err….Scorponok (skip this….) are available.

Boy the movie is going to start soon while the transformers figures going to get me crazy for a while. I am happy I have got prime, that is most important thing, should i get a prime helmet with voice changer? Maybe not, unless i want to wear it while driving or during the movie premier…hehe.

Who wants movie ticket? I will get it 1 week ahead : )

It has been so looooong that I ever come across a quality & good film, most movies nowadays are flooded with so much special effects while all the actors/actresses need to do is just to look good. 2006 year was a year with a lot of disappointments if were to compare to Malaysia KLCI (Composite index) haha, exactly flip side of one to another.  2006 year was the year that I noticed the movie industry had been so crowded with animations that makes me wonder what were all the actors/actresses doing nowadays, but I guessed I was wrong, looks like they were working hard for 2007.

The year 2006 ended with a bang when I watched "The Sinking Of Japan", I LOVE the movie, it was touching and thrilling, although it was flooded with lots of special effects, but those special effects were GOOD ONE! These are the movies that we can start to say the world is flat (a word my gf used a lot nowadays), whereby the superiority gap between west and east is narrowing. But maybe do you all know the writer to the story wrote another book about "The Sinking of The World, except Japan", straight after writing "THe Sinking Of Japan"….haha

2007 was the year I had very few expectations for the movie industry after going thorugh 2006, although there is spiderman 3 for the summer blockbuster but I bet that wont be enough to lift my spirit for 2007. Damn I was wrong, KLCI continue to go strong, and what happened is, the movie industry also rebound!

2007 started with the bloody good movie of one of the actors in my top 10 hate list, Leonardo Di Caprio, because I was not impressed with his titanic act as Jack. But bet I fall in love with Leonardo Di Caprio after this movie and he had immediately rebounced from nothing to something, and now entered to my top 10 favorite list(top 3), his acting had matured sooo much that he is so good in this film and he is COOL - dashing, I think even cooler than "Mr Andersen" (Keanu Reeves) in Matrix. The movie is… "BLOOD DIAMOND".

Before I can take a breath and while my mind still runs riot on "BLOOD DIAMOND", another movie outflanked my position, "THE HOLIDAY". I guessed Leonardo must have ganged with Kate to come back in winter 2006(but it is a 2007 movie in malaysia). "THE HOLIDAY" is the kind of LOVE movie with a hidden message about lives suitable to be viewed by all audiences, but more suited for the female audiences. "THE HOLIDAY" might not be appealing to the audiences who are looking for lots of bang-bang!. Anyway I think it works for the male audiences as well. The trick about this movie is the director try to put 2 different people from 2 different cultures into one film, One in US and One in UK, more interestingly they swapped places under a rental vacation after both had hit a snag in their love life. And the movie took off wonderfully, and ended gracefully. This is the best Movie I had ever watched which involves Jude Law, Cameron Diaz and Kate Winslet. (those are the people in my top 10 hate list) Jack Black also starred in this movie, but he is always my favorite. When "bloody" (UK) clashes with "fxxking"(US), it turns out to be lots of laughters…..and kills off the boredom.

Anyway perhaps the movie industry will take a turn from worse to bloody good in 2007, lets sit tight and hope things will continue to get better!

Is 2007 ! Is new year…new year brings new hope. 2006 for me was not smooth, bumpy but still I get through it unscathed, and a as a better man, when things get tougher, the tough ones get going.

My poor car is the most unfortunate in 2006, all 4-tyres got to change because it is showing early sign of crack and cost me RM 500, then got knocked sideway by a motorbike (I think happened twice), first time hit on the rim, costs me RM50 for rider medical fee, second time hit on the side way, costs me RM300 for the whole compensation package. Then recently my car windscreen has a small hole measuring 3mm in diameter, havent got time to fix it yet, got to cost me another fortune. But still my car rocks, giving me uncompromising performance when I need it most !

My IT department also got the most allocation fund for 2006, I refurbished my desktop after 5 years cycle from Pentium 4 to Pentium D with a powerful GPU. Then I bought myself a 2.9k dell core 2 duo laptop which is quite worth it, coz dell is selling 3.9k now to clear core duo inventory haha.  I also ventured into the XBOX 360 next generation game console which is topping the chart of north america game console now with 9.4 mil sold vs mere 800k figure from PS3. The game console is a power hungry tri-core processor machine but it rocks when online content and its games. Too bad it is a bit expensive for the software content, have to shop smartly.

On the good stuffs, I been to California for the first time, I been to DISNEYLAND which is the best place with my beloved honey, my brother registered this December 9th, I brought my dad and mom to watch their first film in cinema after so many years, I spent more time with my family which is good ( I always want to do that), I spent more money eating good food (which is good also, considering most of the food is nice), and I also drafted my first solid financial plan for 2006 and 2007 which is a start for me and currently all is on-track.

On the Penang development fronts, no improvement other than Queensbay mall which is less than 4km away from my home, NICE & COOL ! I now spent like 5 out of 7 days there. Guess what, I found sold out transformer figures & RM21 transformers collection book here….guess yourself why is it so cheap. ;P

On the supernatural fronts, gosh who would have guessed my hometown in Segamat will ever get flooded in that magnitude (unbelievable). But my family is fine and property damages is minimum but not that fortunate for many of my relatives and friends staying in KG ABDULLAH, I wished them all the best and get all the help possible to get back on their feet. Will go back in CNY to help them in the area I can.

My resolution for 2007, will be to transition myself into the 2nd phase of life which is to settle down by registering with my beloved honey first, start exploring opportunity for financial investment, spend more wisely and reduce discretionary expenses on IT stuffs and "Transformers" department. 2007 will continue to be a challenging year for me mentally and financially, but I strongly believe everything will end up well and I wish all good luck hunting in 2007 !

CJ   

The world political scene is getting more and more uglier, a war against terrorism is quickly spiralling out of control, and when religion is behind it becomes more complicated. Many leaders from various countries are starting to take side, which has no different to the dawn of world war 1 and world war 2.

Just few days ago, Israel started to attack Lebanon in larger scale in an attempt to eliminate or paralyze Hizbollah and Hamas, 2 globally recognized terrorists groups after Hizbollah kidnapped 2 israeli soldiers while Hamas kidnapped one. Israel demanded the safe return of its kidnapped soldiers and Lebanon to disarm Hizbollah. But these 2 demands seems a bridge too far right now. The worst still is Hizbollah and Hamas are suspected being funded by Syria and Iran. If these 2 countries are being pulled into the war, the consequences can be far from worst. Not to forget that Iraq, the country still trying to recover from war is loaded with pockets of terrorists within. While middle east is busy with the war, there comes North Korea who rejected UN solution to its nuclear program within 45 minutes setting all new world record, and vowed to launch more missiles exercises.  Israel starting to shower Beirut and southern Lebanon with airstrikes, killing innocent civilians and driving up their support towards Hizbollah to an all time high, which is not expected.

This is a worrying issues, with its effect far from limited to middle east, gasoline price skyrocketing, creating massive issues for many companies, citizens with the increase in cost and increase in product prices. Companies who are not doing well are started to layoff employees. Watching the leaders of super power expressing their views is a pain in the ass, but you couldnt really blame them because it aint so straight forward, there are many political complications behind. Is world war 3 on the brink ? I can only hope that it will never but it is not up to me to hope for, it needs the whole world to hope in that way and work towards peace…. if everyone can just cool down, put their own benefit aside, put religion issues aside and differences in culture aside, and being objective in discussing all issues and not keeping a blind eye, a long term peace could be possible, but so I hope. Definitely everyone wants to have the right to stay alive, trying to eliminate one and another is never possible. Just like the chinese word said " Yuan Yuan Xiang Bao He Shi Liao".

Being stubborn will only result in more bloodshed in many years to come….everyone has to give and take. Root towards terrorism must be understood and resolved, and not trying to neutralize them, because when someone falls, someone will always rise when the root issues are not resolved.