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Archive for Our Philosophy

Paying to Play in High School

Andy Spero | July 22, 2010 | 0 Comment(s) |

That’s the title of the front-page article in the sports section of today’s paper edition of the Pittsburgh Tribune Review.1

As it turns, the article is about budget shortfalls and participation fees, but when we saw the title, we thought it was about something much more disturbing and quite unethical.

While we like to quip that there is no better place to see the Fallen Nature of Man than Catholic school sports, that’s not quite true. We realize it is a bit of an overstatement when referencing the boorish, immature… Read the rest

Leave Shirley Sherrod Alone.

Andy Spero | July 21, 2010 | 0 Comment(s) |

We have deep sympathy for Shirley Sherrod, and the Kafkaesque predicament in which she finds herself.

The former regional USDA official was forced to resign from the Department of Agriculture for seemingly racist comments that were clearly taken out-of-context and very much contradict the point of her anecdote.

The story she related was a confessional of her journey–of how she grew to treat fairly someone of a different race–of how she overcame her prejudices. In addition, she was describing events that happened in 1986, which is nearly one… Read the rest

Information? Knowledge? and Wisdom?

Andy Spero | July 18, 2010 | 0 Comment(s) |

Which One (or more) Is (are) Missing?

Peggy Noonan has an excellent column in this weekend’s edition of The Wall Street Journal: Youth Has Outlived Its Usefulness.

In it, she laments the lack of wise old men (and women) in positions of power or near those in powerful positions.

That’s something that we have written about by asking “where have the grownups gone?” (See the first second and third fourth results; we forgot to consider this post now appears at the top of the search results.) In those posts we lamented the

… Read the rest

Can Anyone in Congress Value a Derivative?

Andy Spero | July 14, 2010 | 0 Comment(s) |

Any Derivative?

When we have the time, we’ll write more about the Dodd-Frank bill. As many of our readers know, the bill is meant to further regulate financial and derivative transactions and institutions in the USA, but as we sit here trying to do our work, one over-riding thought keeps nagging at us (enough to stop what we’re doing and write this short post).

While we agree with certain provisions in the bill, e.g., the proposed ban on proprietary trading at guaranteed and subsidized institutions, it is important to… Read the rest

Interest Rate Swaps and Stupidity, II

Andy Spero | July 12, 2010 | 0 Comment(s) |

What Could Go Wrong? Visit the Emergency Room.

Last Thursday, The Wall Street Journal had another article about how some organizations “lost” money on interest-rate swap contracts.

The fact that someone–one of the two parties involved–lost money should come as no surprise. Unless rates evolve along very specific paths, someone–either the customer or the bank–is going to lose money on an interest rate swap.

Last week’s article, entitled Wrong-Way Financial Bets Have Hit Hard in the paper or Hospitals’ Wall Street Wounds on-line, tells how hospitals lost money on… Read the rest

Bureaucracy and Its Handmaiden: Voicemail

Andy Spero | July 11, 2010 | 0 Comment(s) |

State Government, Inertia, and Your Tax Dollars

A friend of ours has spent much of his adult life interacting with state government appointees, bureaucrats, and a few good men and women in their employ and association. He tries to help those in need with state resources, when possible.

On Friday, he mentioned that due to a fiscal-year-end financial crisis/dispute, he made twenty calls to various state employees during the holiday-shortened four-day work week.

None of his calls were answered, nor did he get a response from any of the messages… Read the rest

Get Your Bitsmith Here!

Andy Spero | July 8, 2010 | 0 Comment(s) |

Expert Subject & Information System Knowledge

We occasionally get comments (from folks that don’t know us very well) that our consulting practices seem broad and unrelated. Their (unsolicited) advice is usually that we should “focus.”

In those situations, our verbal response is simply, “thanks.” However, it is quite possible to be an expert in more than one field, especially if those fields are (1) related at a more basic level and (2) support each other.

More importantly, for knowledge workers, cross-field expertise applied to substantial and/or… Read the rest

High Unemployment: It’s Bush’s Fault!

Andy Spero | July 7, 2010 | 0 Comment(s) |

Illegal Immigration and High Unemployment Rates

As is our style, the post title is tongue-in-cheek but true, too.

Like almost every other reasonable person, we’re sick of hearing how every problem that the Obama administration can’t manage is former President Bush’s fault.

Some problems certainly were of President Bush’s making. For example, his administration’s panicked response to the rapid deterioration in the creditworthiness of certain financial firms in the fall of 2008 exacerbated the crisis-in-confidence and deepened the recession. However, other tragedies, like the Gulf Oil leak and the Obama administration’s… Read the rest

Managerial Control & Risk Management

Andy Spero | July 6, 2010 | 0 Comment(s) |

We have a new page that describes our risk management services for industrial organizations. The practice is actually broader than industrial firms and encompasses all non-financial firms.

Histogram generated from Monte Carlo Analysis

Managers at many such firms realize that they do not (currently) have the expertise to employ hedging tactics, including the purchase of futures or forwards contracts or derivatives contracts, and they may not know where to start.

Others may realize that they do not have the expertise to negotiate with sophisticated trading firms or banks that who serve as counter-parties to… Read the rest

Happy Independence Day, 2010!

Andy Spero | July 5, 2010 | 0 Comment(s) |

stars-and-stripes-150pxTechnically, and chronologically, the Fourth of July, is already over.

Officially, and bureaucratically, there are still another 23 hours to go before the official holiday ends; so, there is still much to do.

however, as we reflect on our past eighteen-plus hours, it seems that we have had as All-American holiday as anyone could have. We exercised just about all our rights, and responsibly enjoyed the freedoms and liberties that were bestowed upon us (by our blessed good luck to have been born in the U.S.A.).

Admittedly, we didn’t attend… Read the rest

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