Capitalogix

Some Good Sunday Reading Links

Here are some of the posts that caught my eye. Hope you find something interesting.

Business:

• Wall Street’s Need for Trading Speed: The Nanosecond Age.  (WSJ)
• Fed Cuts Growth Forecast; No Hint of More Support.  (Reuters)
• Ignored Greek Default Risk Makes Bank Stress Tests ‘Irrelevant’.  (Bloomberg)
• Firms Sitting on Record $800 Billion Of Cash - But Still Won't Hire.  (CNBC)
• Will Google Ventures Disrupt Venture Capital?  (On StartUps)

Lighter Ideas and Fun Links:

• Visionaries Need Not Be Mad … But It May Help.  (FT)
• CIA Website Taken-Down By Hackers. How Safe is Yours?   (Reuters)
• iPads Consume 400% More Wi-Fi Data Than Other Mobile Devices. (Mashable)
• Researchers Nose into the Smell of Sickness.  The Clues Are On Your Breath. (Wired)
• The Big Business of Synthetic Highs.  Real Profits from Fake Drugs. (BW)

Here is a Simple Test of Attention and Focus I Bet You'll Fail

In my experience, managing attention is harder than it seems.

Let's start with something easy ...  Do nothing for 2 minutes. 

Here is a link to a website that will let you try to do that.

 

Focus can be pretty fragile if it isn't a conscious choice.

OK, Let's Try Something a Little More Challenging.

Controlling your body by doing nothing is one thing; but, controlling your mind is something else altogether.

To get a sense about this, here is a seemingly easy challenge ... simply listen to a favorite song.

The challenge is how you can truly do that without losing focus and having other thoughts intrude (for example, without thinking about your to-do list or other songs that you like, or who you're going to meet with later in the day, etc.)?  For me, the answer was not that long.

Sometimes it feels like modern life causes attention deficit disorder.

Attention Deficit Can Be Dangerous If You Aren't Aware of It.

Yet, losing focus while trading, in business, or even during a simple conversation - can have serious consequences.

When you are not aware of your focus, I bet it wanders.  Mine does; I get distracted easily. 

It didn't take long for me to realize that this happened to me while talking to my wife, while listening to a telephone call, even when ordering food at a restaurant. How can I lose focus on the waitress while I was ordering? Apparently, quite easily.

How about you?  When you're listening to someone talk to you, are you really listening to them - or are you checking e-mail, texting, browsing a website, watching TV, playing a game, or thinking about what you're going to say? 

Be honest with yourself; how often are you fully present?  For me, the answer was not nearly enough.

Practice Mind Control.

Try listening to one song with your full attention and focus. 

Now, imagine how different a conversation with someone important to you would be if you were consciously aware of your intent for them to experience being heard the whole time they were speaking to you.

Maybe it is easier to recognize how different it is for you when someone is truly present and focused on you when you talk with them?

If you want to explore more activities like this, pick up a copy of Dianne Collins' book "Do You QuantumThink".  It has dozens of clever ways to wake back up and operate on a higher level.

 

Some Good Reading Links That Caught My Eye

Here are some of the posts that i found interesting recently.

Business:

• Bill Gross Says QE3 Unlikely; Still Shuns Treasuries.  (GlobalEcon)
• Playing Chicken with the Debt Ceiling is a Dangerous Game. (Fortune)
• Collapse In Philly Fed: Weakest Since 2009, Biggest 3 Month Drop Ever. (ZeroHedge)
• Millionaires Control 39% of the World’s Wealth.  (WSJ)
• The U.S. Postal Service Nears Collapse: Can It Re-Invent Itself?  (BusinessWeek)

Lighter Ideas and Fun Links:

• Gut a Feeling? Bacteria In The Body May Affect Mood.  (MSNBC)
• All You Need to Do When Dealing with Difficult People.  (PsychToday)
• What Happens When the Cloud Crashes? (Brivo)
• E-Mail Hack Attack Targeted White House. (WSJ)
• Company Offers Free Sports Car (with Jet Purchase). (WSJ)

Interestesting Graphic Showing Foreclosure Backlog

Millions of homeowners in distress are getting some unexpected breathing room — lots of it in some places.

In New York State, it would take lenders 62 years at their current pace, the longest time frame in the nation, to repossess the 213,000 houses now in severe default or foreclosure.

 

Clearing the pipeline in New Jersey, which like New York handles foreclosures through the courts, would take 49 years. In Florida, Massachusetts and Illinois, it would take a decade.

In the 27 states where the courts play no role in foreclosures, the pace is much more brisk.  For more on this, see the full article.

Related articles

• RealtyTrac: Foreclosure Activity Increases in March, Down in Q1 (calculatedriskblog.com)
• More Worries About the Foreclosure Overhang (nakedcapitalism.com)

Venture Deals Are Picking Up

An increase in Venture Capital funding is typically a good indicator that more growth is coming.

CB Insights Quarterly Venture Capital Report for Q1 2011 highlights the recent positive momentum.  It reports about $7.5B invested across 738 deals.  The following chart shows the top states based on deals and dollars.

The full chart details Q1 deals in 39 different states.

So, who is doing the deals?

Top Venture Capital Firms of 2011 Based on Deal Activity

Kleiner Perkins was the most active venture capital firm in Q1 2011 participating in 23 new and follow-on financings in US-based companies followed closely by New Enterprise Associates.  It was a busy quarter for many VC firms with 27 firms participating in at least 7 financing deals in the quarter.  Note: You can get the entire Q1 2011 63 page report here.

Below is the list of the top dozen most active VC firms in the US.

Investor	# of deals	Rank
Kleiner Perkins Caufield  & Byers	23	1
New Enterprise Associates	20	2
500 Startups	14	3
First Round Capital	14	3
Sequoia Capital	14	3
SV Angel	14	3
Charles River Ventures	12	7
Bessemer Venture Partners	11	8
Spark Capital	11	8
DAG Ventures	9	10
Founder Collective	9	10
General Catalyst Partners	9	10

See the entire list here.

Related articles

• Venture Capital Slowly Trending Up, But Gains Mostly Limited to Silicon Valley (coydavidson.wordpress.com)
• Some Thoughts On InvestorRank (avc.com)
• Web IPO Boom Marks VC Haves from Have-Nots (businessweek.com)

A Look at the Recent Increase in IPOs: What it Means and Who it Benefits

There have been a number of high profile Initial Public Offerings lately, including LinkedIn, Pandora, and soon Groupon and Facebook.

Here is a clip where Silicon Valley pundit, Andy Kessler, talks about the recent increase in tech IPOs and what the that means ... and who they benefit.

 

Here is a link to the transcript.

Related articles

• This Isn't 1995 (slopeofhope.com)
• Pandora Fizzles After Hot IPO Debut (minyanville.com)
• CONGRATULATIONS WALL STREET AND PANDORA! A Hot Tech IPO Is Finally Priced Correctly (businessinsider.com)

Money Is Flowing Into Asia

I have spent the past few days in Jakarta, for meetings; and I'm impressed

 

 
The World Economic Forum is having some sessions here ... and the city is bustling.

There is much new muscle and confidence here about Asian economies and money-flow into the region.

Even the local tech fair surprised me.  It felt like I was in Vegas.  It was huge, packed, and everyone seemed to be buying something.

 

His shirt labels him as a Technophile.  Well, everywhere I looked, there were iPads, Androids, Blackberries, and mobile hotspots. 

Just like cellular helped this region leap-frog the lack of landline infrastructure, wireless Internet seems to be re-shaping it yet again. 

It certainly made the traffic jams more tolerable and productive.

Some Good Reading Links That Caught My Eye Recently

Business Posts Moving the Markets that I Found Interesting Recently:

• The Ranks of the World's Millionaires Expanded by 12 percent in 2010.   (Bloomberg)
• Indicators Point to a Small-Business Rebound.   (Entrepreneur)
• Measuring the Net's Growth: The Internet Is Now a Big Part of Global GDP.  (McKinsey)
• Airline Industry’s Profit Forecast Slashed to Less than a Quarter of Last Year’s #.  (FT)
• A Game Changer:  The Average Duration Of Unemployment.   (BizInsider)

Lighter Ideas and Fun Links that I Found Interesting Recently:

• The Optimism Bias: Why Most Believe the Future Will Be Better than the Past.  (Time)
• The Risks of Quantification: Can Numbers Really Describe Reality?  (HBR)
• Technological Prophecies - Predictions Ahead Of Their Time. (Money)
• First Quantum Computer Sold: Defense Contractor Pays $10MM For It. (TechReview)
• Think Twice Before Reaching For A Caffeine Boost. (NPR)

Using Mind-Maps in Business - Part 2

Mind mapping tools have been around for many years. However, I'm starting to see a much wider adoption of mind mapping throughout my company and with the wider business audience.

Part 1 of this series, Using Mind Maps, examined mind mapping and why you might want to use its "radiant thinking" process.  Here, in Part 2, we will look at some specific business uses for mind maps.

Below are four examples where mind mapping has proved useful to me recently.

Meeting Agendas: A mind map provides a great graphic overview of everything relating to the meeting, from attendee lists, meeting notes, web links, documents, to-do items, and parking lot issues.

 
Using the map during the meeting helps the team move above the details to keep the bigger picture in mind.

Employee Reviews: A mind map is helpful during the complete review life cycle.

• First, it's a great place to keep notes on how someone's doing and areas for improvement.
• Second, it's a great template to prompt the reviewer to look at the whole picture in a  fair and balanced way.
• Third, the map is easy to share and revise.

In addition, while you may take the notes based on business categories like performance, potential, flexibility, and attitude  -  you might deliver the review based on a "Green", "Yellow", and "Red" metaphor that makes it easy for the employee to understand and act upon.  Here is an example of that type of map.

Business Planning and Project Management:  This was one of the first areas where mind maps proved useful. It's a great tool to see the forest and the trees. 

Here is a simple decision-making template.

You will find that a mind map is a great tool to use interactively during meetings. It gives the team a common focus, yet allows the facilitator to adjust that focus efficiently and effectively.

In addition, Project View makes it easy to see the plan as a GANTT timeline or task table.  This is a terrific added capability.

Communication and Presentation Tool: Mind maps allow great flexibility an structure during presentations. This facilitates a logical and organized presentation, as well as ad hoc interactive discussions.

More experienced mind mappers tend to use fewer words, opting to use images and the heuristic structure itself as a catalyst and reminder for deeper meaning.

An added bonus of using mind mapping software to present your ideas is that the map can be updated and re-ordered while you are using it.  The map becomes the common-focus for an interactive discussion.

Cool special effects, like 3-D Views, turn your map into a 3 dimensional object, allowing you to glide around it from different angles, zoom in on different areas and transform presenting mind maps into a whole new experience.  Here is an example.

 

 

 

Obviously, there are many other things you can do with mind maps.

Here is a link to Buzan's Gallery of Mind Maps and here is a link to BiggerPlate's Mind Map Gallery.  In addition, here is a link to product tutorial videos.

The current generation of mind mapping tool is considerably more powerful, yet easier-to-use, than its predecessors. It's time to try it for yourself.

Related articles

• 7 mind map ideas to unlock creativity and innovation in your business - plus 14 free tools (krishnade.com)
• Mind-Map Your Way to Successful Projects (pcworld.com)
• Use Mind Maps for Better Notes and Ideas (ismckenzie.com)
• BiggerPlate.com mind map gallery adds support for iMindMap (mindmappingsoftwareblog.com)

Want to Know What to Invest In? Watch the U.S. Dollar

Image via Wikipedia

Typically there are a few major inflection points in the year where assets either switch gears and reverse their prior trends or undergo an acceleration of their current trend.

One of the key predictors of these inflection points, over the last few years, has been a reversal of the general trend of the U.S. Dollar.

Consequently, determining whether the Dollar is at a major inflection point may have considerable implications for asset allocation (bonds, stocks, commodities, currencies) and sector allocation (cyclicals, non-cyclicals) strategies.

Here Is Why the Dollar Can Tell You What to Invest In.

Many traders believe that when the Dollar is weak, the following general relationships are seen:

“RISK ON” Trade

• Stocks outperform bonds
• Investment grade and high yield bonds outperform US Treasuries
• Foreign stocks outperform US equities
• Commodities are strong
• Commodity currencies outperform USD
• Cyclical sectors (Technology, Cons. Disc., Materials, Energy) outperform non-cyclical sectors (Cons. Staples, Utilities, Health Care)

When the dollar is strong, you typically see the reverse of the above relationships.

You can see these themes in the data below. 

 

 

Notice that US stocks (S&P 500), commodities (CRB Index), and emerging market equities (relative to the S&P 500) tend to have an inverse correlation with the Dollar. In the chart above, the USD Index is shown in green (and inverted for directional similarity).

In general, when the USD is rising (falling in chart) commodities and the S&P 500 are weak, and emerging market equities underperform the S&P 500 (2008, early 2010).  As stated, the converse is also true (e.g., 2009, late 2010-early 2011).

So, the question is whether you think the Dollar is bottoming?

For more, visit Financial Sense.

Related articles

• U.S. Dollar May Weaken on Debt Ceiling Breach, Citigroup Says (businessweek.com)
• U.S. Dollar Index Components & Swings (ritholtz.com)
• The Nosedive In The Dollar Is Ending And The Currency Is Going To Zoom Higher (businessinsider.com)