House prices ‘will keep falling’

House prices in the UK and the US are likely to fall for another two years, the chairman of one of the world’s most powerful banks has warned.

Sir Win Bischoff of Citigroup told BBC Business Editor Robert Peston he expects it will take two years for the markets to “stabilise”.

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Pakistani bear market has investors raging in the streets

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Shark Surgery

Shark surgery

Can he switch a man and woman's lower body?

Expect More Crisis

IndyMac has failed. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have been hobbled but kept alive by a government and Federal Reserve rescue.

All of this happened just weeks after President Bush and Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson claimed that the worst of the credit crisis had passed. Don't believe anyone who tells you that the worst is over until the banks, insurance companies, investment funds and mortgage companies that hold securitized debts fess up to what those securities are actually worth. The problem isn't that the securities are illiquid, it's that the prices should be lower than the financial institutions are willing to admit.

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2 + 20, and Other Hedge Fund Math

MANY people would jump at the chance to invest in hedge funds, which have mainly been available to only the very wealthy. But a new study finds that the funds’ high fees make it unlikely that investors will improve their long-term performance by putting money into hedge funds.

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Singapore Property

A Hong Kong based Asia property analyst for a small successful private investment bank was asked if he should buy property in Singapore

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Qipao - a statement of Oriental beauty

SLINKY, elegant, chic (and often practical), the classic qipao was a symbol of trendy Shanghai. The old-fashioned formless dress was nipped, tucked and slit for liberated women, writes Fei Lai.

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Singapore's judiciary system is still third world standard

'If the prosecution allowed their own witnesses to see their statements, I can't see why they should deny it to the defendant.' - LAWYER EDMOND PEREIRA

Read "Judge slams CNB for complete neglect of duties" here.

Fannie, Freddie crisis not the last: Soros

Billionaire investor George Soros said that the crisis over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will not be the last, and noted that the broader credit meltdown will impact an already slowing United States economy.

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The mortgage lender illusion

It’s dispiriting indeed to watch the U.S. financial system, supposedly the envy of the world, being taken to its knees. But that’s the show we’re watching, brought to you by somnambulant regulators, greedy bank executives and incompetent corporate directors.

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Guilt & Innocence in the Criminal Legal System

Link

Battle for China

British experts and scholars held a heated public debate in London Saturday on some key issues of China’s recent development and called for a balanced portrayal of China.

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ILM study confirms growing power of Chinese managers

China has the fastest growing global economy and – according to research by the Institute of Leadership & Management (ILM) – also boasts a highly ambitious, sophisticated and commercially astute management population that poses a rising challenge to managers and businesses in the West.

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Unlimited rise in oil price in case of Iran war: Opec

Cartel won’t be able to make up lost output, says its head

VIENNA) The head of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) warned on Thursday that oil prices would experience an ‘unlimited’ increase in the event of a military conflict involving Iran because the group’s members would be unable to make up the lost production.

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A Nightmare for the U.S.

The Voice (issue 264 - 11th May) ran an article beginning, ‘Iran has really gone and done it now. No, they haven’t sent their first nuclear sub in to the Persian Gulf. They are about to launch something much more deadly – next week the Iran Bourse will open to trade oil, not in dollars but in Euros’. This apparently insignificant event has consequences far greater for the US people, indeed all for us all, than is imaginable.

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Most Obnoxious Tourists? The French

Remember the tightwad tourist whose baggy shorts, frequent complaining and shouted questions about why none of the locals spoke any English made the ugly American the world’s Visitor From Hell? Well, it’s time for Archie Bunker to move over and make way for Petulant Pierre. According to a recent international survey, the French are now considered the most obnoxious tourists from European nations, and behind only Indians and the last-place Chinese as the worst among all countries worldwide.

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Singapore’s Minister Mentor Slips Up Under Oath

Lee Kuan Yew testifies to a laudatory letter that was never sent by an international legal organization

It was the kind of error that would earn a Singapore opposition politician a trial for perjury, probably with a heavy fine and perhaps a jail term. But when Lee Kuan Yew testified in the recent trial of opposition leader Chee Soon Juan probably “misspoke” – told a crucial untruth, deliberate or not.

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Singapore falls short on rights: lawyers' group

It said the Singapore judiciary had a good international reputation when adjudicating commercial cases that did not involve the interests of PAP members or their associates.

"However, in cases involving PAP litigants or PAP interests, there are concerns about an actual or apparent lack of impartiality and/or independence," it said.

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Caves of Dunhuang

Planning a trip there...

View the beautiful photos here