Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Dhoni's Banana on eBay

Following is a piece of online commentary from cricinfo.com during the 1st innings (36th over) of India Vs. Sri Lanka (4th ODI):
A tired Dhoni is down on the ground and is eating a banana. He hands over the banana skin to Ojha who might or might not sell it on ebay.

35.6 Muralitharan to Raina, SIX, There comes the big hit. Almost expected. He cleared the front foot and slog-swept Murali over deep midwicket boundary. The runs are flowing here for the Indians. What can Mahela do?
Good (geeky -?) sense of humor .. :)

Wednesday, August 20, 2008

Russia Georgia Conflict and energy markets

How does the conflict between Georgia and Russia affect energy markets?

The conflict is now phasing from military to diplomatic stage. The conflict broke out on 7 August when Georgia launched an assault to wrest back control of the Moscow-backed breakaway region of South Ossetia, triggering a counter-offensive by Russian troops who advanced beyond South Ossetia into Georgia's heartland.

Following crisis talks in Brussels, Nato's 26 foreign ministers said in a joint statement that they could not have normal relations with Russia as long as Moscow had troops in Georgia.

"The Alliance is considering seriously the implications of Russia's actions for the Nato-Russia relationship," the statement said, read out by Nato Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer. "We have determined that we cannot continue with business as usual."

Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov accused Nato of bias and of trying to save the "criminal regime" in Tbilisi. Russia has dismissed a warning by Nato that normal relations are impossible while its troops remain inside Georgia.

How will it affect the prospects of Central Asian energy producing countries for independent export strategies? Europe will have to pay attention to Russia for the foreseeable future. They are highly dependent on energy pipelines for oil and natural gas. It will be interesting to see if these current problems make a difference in the energy sphere.

"Recent escalation in military engagement between Russia and Georgia poses a threat to certain key oil and gas pipelines which transit Georgia," the International Energy Agency said.

Is Russia's incursion into Georgia an initiation of what will become the slow process of reclaiming the former Soviet Union?

Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Welcome to the Stock Market!

This is one of the nice forward I have ever received:

Once upon a time in a village, a man appeared and announced to the villagers that he would buy monkeys for Rs10. The villagers seeing that there were many monkeys around, went out to the forest and started catching them.

The man bought thousands at Rs10 and as supply started to diminish, the villagers stopped their effort. He further announced that he would now buy at Rs20. This renewed the efforts of the villagers and they started catching monkeys again.Soon the supply diminished even further and people started going back to their farms. The offer rate increased to Rs25 and the supply of monkeys became so little that it was an effort to even see a monkey, let alone catch it!

The man now announced that he would buy monkeys at Rs50! However, since he had to go to the city on some business, his assistant would now buy on behalf of him.In the absence of the man, the assistant told the villagers. Look at all these monkeys in the big cage that the man has collected. I will sell them to you at Rs35 and when the man returns from the city, you can sell it to him for Rs50." The villagers squeezed
up with all their savings and bought all the monkeys.

Then they never saw the man nor his assistant, only monkeys everywhere!!!

Welcome to the "Stock" Market!!

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