Saturday, January 23, 2010

Hedge Fund Regulation: How to Avoid a Boondoggle

The central role of wildcat outfits in causing or aggravating blowups in the financial arena has led to widespread calls for hedge fund regulation. Amid the furor, policymakers have responded in their usual fashion by cooking up legislation intended to curb the excesses that led to the wipeouts.

However, past experience suggests that the heap of regulations will merely serve to throw a monkey wrench into the machinery of finance. In that case, the main impact of the legislation will be a mound of paperwork and bureaucracy which does little or nothing to prevent similar fiascos in the future.

If the stumpers are to be tackled head-on, a sweeping change is required in order to blunt the threat of hedge funds armed with weapons of mass carnage. The purpose of this article is to lay bare the real problems along with a cogent approach to eradicating the bogeys.

More on Hedge Fund Regulation: How to Avoid a Boondoggle.

*       *       *

Tuesday, January 12, 2010

Guide to Creating an Investment Strategy

A Sound Program of Investment Strategy Matches Personal Circumstances against External Opportunities


A cogent approach to investment strategy is to align the personal traits of the investor with the external conditions in the marketplace. In the financial arena, as in most areas of life, one size does not fit all. Moreover, the best approach varies over time even in the case of a given individual. The proper choice at each stage will depend on a fluid array of characteristics such as financial resources, risk aversion, and retirement plans.

This article talks about the critical issues involved in thrashing out a tailored program of investment. A trenchant set of guidelines is presented, along with a selection of pointers to additional resources.

More on Guide to Creating an Investment Strategy.

*       *       *

Wednesday, January 6, 2010

Leadership in Business Intelligence Software

In the age of information, business intelligence software is a mainstay of the modern enterprise. The infrastructure is an enabler of productivity for every type of organization in both the private and public sectors.

In spite of its importance, though, the software in the marketplace tends to lag far behind the state of technology. In fact, existing platforms for business intelligence rely for the most part on digital techniques which were first developed during the 1970s or even earlier.

Another shortfall lies in the fact that the virtual tools are far from easy to use. For this reason, the majority of employees are unable to exploit any features beyond the simplest functions.

On the upside, though, both of these limitations – namely, crudeness and gawkiness – may be tackled in parallel. The trenchant approach is to embed a greater level of intelligence into the software. In this way, the tools will be able provide more useful information to a larger throng of users.

If the platforms were to be upgraded and the functions expanded, then the tools could be deployed in far greater numbers. In that case, a conservative estimate of the potential would be an upsurge of an order of magnitude in the number of users as well as the revenues for the marketplace.

This article presents a cogent approach for building the next generation of digital tools. Once the basic functionality is revamped, the adept software will go a long way toward realizing the full potential of business intelligence software.

More on Leadership in Business Intelligence Software.

*       *       *