The Invisible Man

Liu Bolin is an interesting painter.


Look at these few photos.

He paints himself.He is a camouflage painter.


In China, he is dubbed the "Invisible Man".




See how he blends himself, chameleon-like into the background?

The Passenger War Begins!

The war for the year-end-Chinese New Year season traveler's buck has begun. The Straits Times has this to report today (13 October 2009).

Hit hard by budget carriers flying their route, express coach companies are starting to fight back.

Case in point:

One company, Transtar Travel, is planning a promotion with half-price tickets to Kuala Lumpur. It will offer $9 (RM21.60) one-way tickets to the first 9,900 customers traveling between Singapore and Kuala Lumpur on its new express coach service.

The offer can be booked at the three-day Travel Malaysia fair starting on Friday at Suntec Convention Centre, where seven bus companies will have booths. These promotional seats are normally priced at $17 and offer the usual perks of reclining seats, shared entertainment screens and a food and beverage bar. One-way express bus tickets range from about $20 to more than $60, depending on how luxurious the coach is.

A Transtar spokesman reiterated that business has been down by about 30 per cent since caps were lifted last December on how many flights budget carriers could make on the route.

Every year, more than 1.5 million people hop on express coaches and head for Kuala Lumpur. Since the opening up of skies between Singapore and Malaysia, however, bus companies are reporting a drop of about 30 per cent to 40 per cent of passenger traffic.

The Singapore-Kuala Lumpur sector is now served by 11 airlines and is the busiest out of Changi Airport, with 498 flights both ways a week.

Flights take about 45 minutes, but passengers need to check in and make a trip to and from the airport, bringing the total time to five hours, similar to traveling by bus.

“We cannot just sit around and hope that we won’t get hurt. We have to come up with ways to bring people back to the buses,” he said.

"Transtar, with a fleet of 50 coaches running the Singapore-Kuala Lumpur sector 12 times a day, is one of the bigger players in the market, so the likelihood is that other companies will follow suit with lower fares soon," he added.

The company's low-fare deal is a promotional offer for a new class of coach service called Transtar Classic. This line will be scaled down from his high-end coach services, which come with 18 reclining seats that double as massage chairs, individual entertainment screens and food from Delifrance. Transtar Classic will have 61 seats and run non-stop to Kuala Lumpur three times a day.

Other bus firms are not sure that competing on price alone is the best strategy.

Hasry Singapore, a competitor, said lower fares would attract more people, but sustainability would be an issue. He is considering raising the level of service and convenience instead, like having Internet connection on the bus.

For construction firm owner Brandon Lim, who takes the bus regularly to Malaysia, the perks mean little. “Planes don’t get me door-to-door, and I have to spend extra time and money on getting to and from the airport. Bus is always better,” he said.

I think he's got a point there!

Clipping Casino Wings!

Reuters has this to report on the casino scene in Macao yesterday.

"The Chinese city of Macau is considering ways to curtail expansion of the world’s fastest-growing major gambling market, sending shares of US casino operators from Las Vegas Sands Corp to Wynn Resorts Ltd sliding yesterday.

The former Portuguese enclave is considering rules, to be drafted in two to three months, that might impose limits on table numbers and raise age limits for casinos, according to a statement posted on the city’s official website.

Wynn, Sands and MGM Mirage have invested billions in the only Chinese city where gambling is legal, hoping to ride double-digit percentage growth in visitors — particularly from mainland China — and gaming revenue.

But state-run Chinese media and grass-roots organizations say breakneck expansion has fostered social ills from corruption to prostitution. Beijing, worried about addiction, periodically tries to limit the flow of its tourists.

In a statement yesterday, Macau Secretary for the Economy and Finance Tam Pak Yuen said six major casino operators — which he did not name — agreed broadly during a meeting that casino expansion should not be limitless.

“The casino operators have agreed that the scale of the industry should be examined,” it read. “The government pledges that we will listen to public and industry feedback before objectively examining the issues,” including table numbers.

That comes as more than a dozen hotel, casino and retail operators build on the Cotai Strip — a 4 sq km swathe of reclaimed land — with most due to open in 2010.

Macau’s six casino operators include Sands and Wynn Resorts, along with home-grown players Galaxy Entertainment Group Ltd and SJM Holdings Ltd The other two are Melco Crown Entertainment Ltd — a joint venture between Melco International Development Ltd and Australia’s Crown Ltd — and a casino jointly operated by MGM Mirage and local businesswoman/tycoon Pansy Ho.

Spokesmen for Las Vegas Sands had no comment on the government’s statement. Wynn declined comment. A spokesman for the Macau government and MGM could not be reached.

Macau’s government has signalled its desire to curb the industry’s explosive growth. In April 2008, it slapped a moratorium on new casino licenses and a building freeze, a move seen as motivated by an increasingly concerned Beijing.

Las Vegas Sands shares slid as much as 8 per cent before ending down 1.8 percent at US$17.72. (RM60.25) Wynn stock lost as much as 5.6 per cent before finishing off 2.9 per cent at US$65.88. MGM closed 1.6 per cent lower at US$12.08.

“The government’s primary concern appears to be distortions in the labour market caused by gaming’s rapid expansion,” said Susquehanna analyst Robert LaFleur. “This report does not appear to present any threat to the current operators.”

US operators have benefited from a surge in visitors to the island, an hour’s ferry ride from China and Hong Kong. Sands’ Macau arm generated US$491 million of revenue in the second quarter — nearly half its total and twice the Vegas figure.

Underscoring investor interest, Wynn Macau enjoyed a strong debut last week on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange via a US$1.63 billion share sale, ending 6 per cent higher. The gain boded well for the Las Vegas Sands’ own proposed listing later this year.

Macau rocketed onto the global gambling stage following reforms that put an end to a monopoly and awarded licenses to many players that boosted competition. The Chinese territory generated HK$105.6 billion (RM45.9 billion) of gross gaming revenue in 2008, more than double the HK$46.7 billion generated by the Las Vegas Strip during the same period.

Among regulations now under discussion, the government is considering raising the entry age for casinos to 21 years old from 18 and dictating that slot machine halls move away from residential areas and into commercial zones.

In the statement, the government also reaffirmed it was requesting that operators hire locals to staff their establishments, which it said the companies agreed to do.

China quietly began easing restrictions on citizens travelling from Guangdong province to Macau earlier this year, top executives told Reuters in September. It had imposed rules last year limiting them to two trips a year, prompted partly by reports of officials frittering away millions of dollars of government funds."

My Take:

I think they would not choke out the golden geese. China policymakers are now pragmatic. If control they must, they will do so. Everything they do will not impact too much on the golden eggs Macao casinos are laying. Period.

The AGMs-Interesting Occurrences

I have been attending AGMs since May this year. Some were good AGMs;some were not that good. It reflects the company and the caliber of its Board.

The last few AGMs really had its great moments.

Let me relate one laughable one. The company, to save cost, decide to hold the AGM at their office instead. So, they put the registration of shareholders in front of their front office. That was not too bad. However, they put the registration of the proxies right in front of the lifts. Imagine, the number of people who wants to use the lifts. They could not come out or go in because of the crowd near the lift apron. Couldn't they find a more appropriate place?

After the registration, a shareholder or proxy then collects his morning breakfast pack. It was an assortment of Malaysian cakes plus a bottle of mineral water. They refused to give out the food voucher;saying that it will be distributed only at the end of the meeting.The reason was they wanted the AGM to be fully attended. As the meeting room was so small, it filled to the brim in no time. But no, they were stubborn. No food coupon until the end of the AGM.

Meanwhile, there was this issue of car parking. The company decided to foot only RM3 for each shareholder. This is definitely not enough because it would have cost a shareholder to spend something beyond RM9 for the entire AGM duration. They stick to their guns!

So to circumvent the loss of car parking expenses,shareholders lined up three times each to get the equivalent of RM9. The company should have just endorsed all the tickets and pay the car park management the real amount. The whole exercise of being restrictive at RM3 came to naught! Silly corporate ineptitude!

Finally, the meeting was over. No one knew where to get the food voucher. There was pandemonium! So,finally the great brainy management decided to dispense them at the table where the directors sat at the AGM. They asked for lines to be formed. No one bothered. Every one crowded around the table and tried to get the vouchers. There was pushing, screaming,elbowing and what not. Those dispensing the food vouchers lost their patience many a time but they have to swallow their ego and pride because of their unthinking selves. If only they had given the vouchers at the time of registration.

I had a great day at this AGM. It tells me of things that those managing AGM ought not to do.

I heard they had a similar problem of this nature last year.

I think the next AGM will be about similar. When will they ever learn?

MACC-Show Your Teeth some more!

MACC should be making this type of arrest.

This is a classic case of collusion that can pervert the dispensation of justice.

If MACC avoid the limelight of being seen to be an instrument of politicians, particularly of the govenrnment of the day, their image will will change and they will join the ranks of Hongkong, Singapore and the Scandinavian countries.

I like the following report.

On Oct 11, a magistrate and a police prosecutor were arrested by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) in Kelantan.

MACC deputy chief Commissioner Abu Kassim Mohamed told the press the two were involved in a drug case.

A press release by the MACC this evening stated the 27-year-old magistrate was picked up at 10.30pm at a petrol kiosk at Machang while receiving some money, which is believed to be part of a bribe.

The cash sum of RM3,000 is believed to be part payment on a bribe of RM5,000, demanded in exchange for reducing the sentence of an accused who had committed an offence under the Drug Addiction (Recovery and Rehabilitation) Act 1983.

The money was received from a policeman who acted as the prosecuting officer in the case.

However, to date, only the magistrate has been remanded for two days.

I believe MACC, being in the harsh spotlight because of the ongoing Teoh Beng Hock inquest can be the better of all the investigation agencies in this country.

A Potential threat Against RCE

There seems to be something in the air these days.

First it was CUEPACS wanting to do its own deductions for civil servant retail loans. If they could do so, it would save some money for civil servants and literary break the monopoly of the National Cooperative Organisation of Malaysia, or Angkasa, as a middle man conduit for such payments.

Now, rumour has it that a number of commercial banks are planning to break into the lucrative market of lending to government employees after being allowed to make automatic salary deductions.

Presently, only credit cooperatives and a number of government-owned financial institutions are provided with the special codes that allow these salary deductions.

It is understood that the move is aimed at liberalising the landscape in order to benefit the borrowers, namely the over one million government employees.

The entry of commercial banks should spell lower interest rates and better service levels but may also jeopardise the profitability of existing players.

The market for these loans is huge.

According to a document obtained by StarBiz, civil servants forked out a whopping RM590mil in loan repayments for the month of August alone under this scheme.

It does seem to be a great business to be in.

The government-initiated monthly salary deduction means that the loans are virtually risk free, keeping non-performing loan levels extremely low.

Angkasa, the national union integrating the various cooperatives in Malaysia is weary of such developments.

Over the years, Angkasa has built a robust interface system with the Accountant-General’s office that enables the salary deductions.

The approved lenders – the 450-odd credit cooperatives and government-owned financial institutions such as Bank Rakyat, Malaysia Building Society,Bank Simpanan Nasional and Agrobank – have to use Angkasa’s services for the deductions.

Angkasa netted RM6.3mil in transaction fees in August alone.

To be sure, commercial banks are already in the business.

But their role has been limited to funding those holding the Angkasa codes.

Public-listed RCE Capital has made a profitable business out of funding three cooperatives to reach government servants.

Due to the many layers involved, the interest rates on the loans to government employees have historically been high.

But competition among the existing players has driven down rates to an average of 5% to 6% presently.

Still, if commercial banks are allowed in the market, interest rates can be driven down more, considering their lower cost of funds and the lower risk involved due to the banks’ ability to “garnish” the salaries of borrowers.

That, in turn, can lead to existing borrowers migrating to the commercial banks.

And that can spell trouble for existing players.

The status quo, however, is unlikely to be rocked overnight.

The interested commercial banks are believed to be working on building an electronic interface similar to what Angkasa has.

Due to the complexity of such a system, it may take months before it is up and running.

Furthermore, Angkasa is unlikely to open its system up to the newcomers.

Angkasa’s members are the cooperatives involved and they have their rationale for keeping things as they are.

Angkasa vice-president Mustapa Kamal Maulut said: “The profits that Angkasa make are channelled back into society in the form of free training programmes on skill development for cooperative members.

"Opening up the market to other players could hurt Angkasa’s bottom line and hence these activities.”

Another concern is that with cheaper loans available to them, civil servants may be tempted to borrow more.

Former chief executive of Malaysia Building Society, Ahmad Farid Omar, said more checks needed to be in the system to ensure there was no over-borrowing.

“There should be some way of determining that loans should only be given for productive purposes such as buying of land. An unnecessary high debt level among civil servants can lead to all sorts of problems,” he said.

Still, the argument for liberalisation does make sense.

There must be other ways to fund the cooperatives’ social objectives without denying the benefits that a freer market place will bring to the country’s civil servants.

So,companies like RCE will have to view all this new development seriously;so as not to lose too much to these johnny-come-lately banks.

Singapore is Unconvinced!

Singapore is yet to be convinced that an early economic rebound can be sustainable. As such on Oct 12, its central bank kept its loose monetary policy unchanged. Economists now expect tightening only to begin next year.

New data has shown the economy expanded a forecast-beating 0.8 per cent in the third quarter from a year ago, returning to growth after three quarters of contraction. however, the central bank was quick to point out that there continue to be no decisive recovery in export demand.

This cautious outlook for export-dependent Singapore mirrors its policymakers’ concerns from the United States to South Korea that an economic revival could taper off, underscoring the urgent need for growth-supporting policies.

“Going forward, do we see this kind of growth in Q4? It is quite unlikely,” said Wai Ho Leong, economist at Barclays in Singapore. “On the policy front ... the chances are the central bank is building towards an April normalisation.”

The Monetary Authority of Singapore, which next reviews policy in April, manages the Singapore dollar in a secret trade-weighted band against a basket of currencies, instead of setting interest rates.

The currency fell as far as 1.4010 per US dollar, down nearly 0.4 per cent from Friday’s close and compared to levels of 1.3950 just before the policy announcement. The Singapore dollar had risen last week as some investors had placed bets on a possible tightening of policy.

The central bank said there could be some upward consumer price pressure from higher oil and food prices, though underlying domestic cost pressures will be contained. It forecast inflation of 1 per cent to 2 per cent next year.

“MAS will continue to be vigilant over developments in the external environment including the medium-term risk of stronger global inflationary pressures,” the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) said in a statement.

Singapore’s economy continued to grow robustly in the third quarter as the base of the recovery extended beyond pharmaceuticals into the wider manufacturing and services industries.

GDP grew 14.9 per cent from the previous quarter on a seasonally adjusted basis.

The government lifted its forecast for 2009 GDP to a contraction of between 2.5 to 2 per cent, from a forecast of a contraction of 6 to 4 per cent.

“Inflationary pressure is still benign, growth is showing steady improvement. But overall economic fundamentals and external conditions are still below the historical trend, or where MAS would extend a tightening policy,” said Irvin Seah, economist at DBS Group in Singapore.

So, do not bring out the beer cans out yet, hear?