Recent Additions to my Blogroll
It is time once again to do a round up the recent additions to Alpha.Sources' blogroll. This time around there are three additions of which two are Anglo phone and all about finance and economics whereas the last one is Danish. Let us look at what we have ...
The first one is one that I have had on the radar for some time but just not gotten around to adding it. It is easily one of the most comprehensive sites out there on financial analysis. I thus represent you SeekingAlpha and as the name reveals this is all about stock market analysis. In fact the site is riddled with RSS feeds and blogs categorized by asset classes, regions, and markets. SeekingAlpha is actually a collaborative site which feeds on contributions from readers to make a very comprehensive resource. This is how the site is presented in the about section ...
'Seeking Alpha is the leading provider of stock market opinion and analysis from blogs, money managers and investment newsletters. ('Alpha' is a finance term referring to a stock's performance relative to the market; it's used more loosely by fund managers to describe beating their index, so every stock picker is "seeking alpha".)
We:
- select the most interesting articles from over 200 contributors,
- edit them to guarantee quality and consistency, and
- arrange and tag them so they can be easily found and subscribed to by stock ticker, sector and theme.
In short, if you are interested in finance and perhaps even a practioner SeekingAlpha is definitely an important bookmark.
The second addition is Steen Jakobsen's blog (Steen Jakobsen's Chronicle) and who might Steen be then? Well, he is no other than the Chief Investment Officer at Saxo Bank Asset management. Steen writes economic commentary and analysis and he is definitely worth a bookmark. Attentive readers will note that I already have Saxo Bank on my blogroll in the presence of the bank's RSS news feed. Steen's blog is of course more evidence that Saxo Bank's staff is well aware of the benefits of web 2.0 although it needs formally to be noted that Steen's blog is a personal journal with no official ties to Saxo Bank. In any case it should come as little surprise that Steen's blog will add considerable value to the econ sphere. I mean, there must be a lot of finance students (or others) wondering what it is really like to be a fund manager and what such people actually do ... now of course you need to look no further. Of particular note is Steen's recent note which takes the pulse on the US economy and more specifically what actually to read into commentaries on the Fed's future course. In short, are we going north or south?
'Well the usual breed of Wall Streeters having tough time this morning spinning last nights FOMC minutes in a positive light.
What was most significant in the statement was the lack of discussion about changing the bias to neutral. A subject which was strongly discussed in the prior meeting. Bottom line is clear: Fed has no intention of leaving neutral mode anytime soon.
What's more interesting is how the FOMC now is in clear INFLATION ALERT risk mode. This is no surprise to us, but it's not something the stock market was even willing to discuss less than two weeks ago.
Embedded in the FOMC Minutes there was some interesting forward looking forecasts from FED staffers:
- Fed staff reduced Q1 growth forecast........
- Fed increased inflation projections.....'inflation is projected to be higher in the first half than the prior forecast'.... though 'would still edge down in rest of 2007 and 2008'
Sure and I will be playing for Man. U in the Champions League Final. Wishing and hoping is for prayers in Churches not for markets.'
Finally, I have a Danish addition to my blogroll and I realize that this might disqualify the vast majority of my readers but if I have some Danish speaking readers I recommend you to continue reading. The blog called Studievirk.dk is essentially a collaborative site/blog based on the network studievirksomhed.dk which is a network of Danish students and businesses with particular focus on entreperneurship. The following is a quote from the 'About section' (in Danish!) which also reveals the associated networks to this blog ...
StudieVirk er blog for aktiviteterne i Netværk for StudieVirksomhed - forum for studerende, undervisere og erhvervsfolk, der interesserer sig for at starte selv ved landets universiteter.
Gå til www.StudieVirksomhed.dk og læs mere om netværket.
Dansk Iværksætter Forening driver & udvikler netværket i samarbejde med Selvstændighedsfonden og Iværksætterakademi IDEA.
In terms of my choice of entry example I have to say that the author is a personal friend of mine which however does not make the content of Mette Mikkelsen's entry any less interesting. As such, Mette introduces the theme of the Develop Solution contest which engages teams in a contest to think up an African business concept tied to one of United Nations Millennium Development Goals 2015. The teams compete for a hefty first price of 100.000 Danish kroner as well as a trip to Africa. This is how Mette presents the competition ... (in Danish!)
'Er det muligt at kombinere en profitabel business idé med udvikling i Afrika? Netop det spørgsmål sætter businessplan konkurrencen Develop Solution, der er en del af Venture Cup, fokus på.
(...)
Konkurrencen, der kører for første gang i 2006/2007, nåede sit foreløbige højdepunkt den 22. marts, da fem kompetente hold gav deres bud på et forretningskoncept, der er med til at fremme udvikling i den tredje verden, med fokus på Afrika. Ideerne spændte vidt - fra en sammenfoldelig papkiste, der skal kunne sælges for 2 Euro, over økologisk, afrikansk-produceret modetøj, til bæredygtige vindmøllefarme i Egypten.
Buddene blev vurderet af fem dommere, alle med en baggrund indenfor udvikling. Mads Kjær der er direktør for C4 World, Tina Nørgaard, direktør for Emunio, Hans-Jørgen Nyegaard fra Industrialiseringfonden for Udviklingslandene (IFU), Michael W. Hansen, professor ved CBS, samt den tidligere formand for Mellemfolkeligt Samvirke, Bent Nicolaisen.'
All in all, three different site/blogs which are nevertheless all well worth a closer look.