All Blog Entries

Once upon a time I used to travel quite a lot to Turkey, and especially than to Istanbul. I have not been there for many years now, so I am not sure if it is as fascinating as it used to be. At the time you could really feel and see how east meet west at the Bosphorus strait.

I am very much interested in history, buy I am not really a museum guy. IMHO most museums make history quite boring. Of course there are very good exceptions around the world but generally speaking I stick to my opinion. In Istanbul though there are many exceptions from this general rule. Topkapi with the harem and the treasury chamber is one of the most fascinating places I have seen and so is Agia Sophia, the Blue Mosque and the subterranean water reservoir.

Although the coved bazar, close to Topkapi and Agia Sophia, is not a museum I have to say it's like being moved back in history when entering this maze of shops inside a building that was erected sometime during the 15th century. If you want to buy gold, rugs or antiques from the orient this is THE place to go.

And it was here, in a gold shop, I met the best sales man in the world, maybe of all times.

My wife was about to have an even birthday and I thought I should have a look at and maybe buy her some jewelry when in Istanbul. So I went to the covered bazar and entered in to a shop that had pictures of Bjorn Borg and some Swedish politicians on the wall showing how they, with a big smile, bought jewelry in this particular shop. Quite trust worthy indeed.

Got contact with one of the sales guys and told him I was interested in buying a ring - tiffany style. No problem at all. He draw a picture based upon my description and since the design looked really good I approved it. Three days later I could pick up the ring and it looked just as nice as on the picture. The ring made quite a success at my wife's birthday, so you could say I was quite a happy customer.

Four years later we had our first child and a couple of weeks after the birth of my daughter I found myself in Istanbul once again. I had some spare time so I thought I would go to the covered bazar and see if I could find a birth gift (don't know if you say like that in English but I guess you get the meaning) to my wife. Thought it would be a good idea to buy a pair of earrings in the same style as the ring I had bought four years earlier.

Of course I went to the same shop - nice service and good craftsmanship is always a good basis for recurring business. When arriving to the shop it was full of American tourists busy checking in the merchandise and discussing with the sales persons behind the counters.

At the back of the shop I spotted the same guy I bought the ring from four years earlier. He was quite busy servicing an American lady, but since he did such a good job with the ring I decided to wait till he had finished the business with the American lady. So I kept a low profile at the entrance of the the shop, waiting for my turn.

After abut five minutes my guy suddenly looked up and in to the shop, scanned the customers waiting and then his eyes stopped on me and ....

"Mr. Hakan! You are back!" he shouted out in the shop. I was looking around to see if there were anyone else he could have addressed, but it was quite obvious he meant me.

"It's impossible", I said.

"You can not remember me! It's four years since I was here".

"Of course I remember you Mr. Hakan. One month after you were hear I had my first child, a son, and I baptized him to Hakan. Of course I remember you!"

"Wow, that was very nice of you, but still ....".

"Baptizing his son after me", well, that sounded a bit to much of a sales trick to me.

"Wait, wait", he said, "I make a drawing of all the items we produce and sell. I'll show you."

He ran off to one of the counters and picked up a little black book and then came back to me.

"Look, look" he said. And there it was, a sketch of the ring I bought four years ago and along side the sketch a neat little note that said "Sold to a Swedish gentleman named Hakan".

Did I buy a pair of earrings to my wife from this sales man? Of course I did! Did I pay to much? Of course I did not! I paid exactly what I thought it to be worth, no more or no less. And to me it was worth quite a lot to be recognized as Mr. Hakan in this gold shop in the covered bazar in Istanbul!

During breakfast today I read in the morning paper that work career will peak when you get 44 years old. This really worries me! Not because I am concerned about what will happen myself because I passed 44 almost 10 years ago. I do not believe my career was at the top 10 years ago but possible some of you might have a different opinion.

What worries me more is the general views that are put forward and the lack of respect for people with experience and knowledge. At 44 you would have been in worklife for roughly 20 years and you have at least 20 years to go before retirement. During the first 20 years you gain a lot of experience and routine. During the next 20 years you can really put all your experience to work and be very valuable to your company. It is my great hope that younger associates in a company view older colleagues as an asset and not the other way around.

Of course it is of extreme importance that you even after 44 continue to grow with the time and actively follow the development. It really worries me if a general attitude of age discrimination spreads and that we will have situation where those that are below 40 will have the view that everyone above 50 is past his or hers best date and even more worrying if all above 44 will see themselves as on their way to retirement. We need a combination of young and older competences in a company and it is really important that those over 44 really see the how important they are.

By the end of March this year, China's FX reserves amounts to the dizzying figure of three trillion dollars. Imagine the shopping spree China's central bank could go on instead of buying boring American government securities.

How about buying Apple, Microsoft, Google and IBM and still have more than two trillion left? Throw in all real estate in Manhattan and Washington DC, the 50 most valuable sports teams and they still have a huge pile of money left. Amazing!

What would you invest in?


(Image from the Economist Article)

Read the full Economist article Who wants to be a triple trillionaire?

Attached Thumbnails

 

Tomorrow is Holy Thursday in large parts of the world including Sweden and it will be celebrated in various degrees depending on where you are. One odd thing in Sweden is that Holy Thursday means half day for most companies and that is of course creating a very special situation for most businesses including the banks. A full day of work has to be completed and all tasks that is normally done in around 8 hours have to be fulfilled in half the time. I must seriously challenge this tradition and ask why we really put ourselves in a situation like this?

It is difficult for the employer who will have problems with making sure that every task is completed, it is strenuous for the staff who will have to work twice as hard during the day. It is a surprise for clients from other parts of the world that naturally have never heard of the strange phenomenon of half days and of course would like to contact the bank in the afternoon as well.

For the staff you can also add the situation how to do if he or she would like to take the day off, is it good to use one whole day of holiday when it is only half a day of working?

To make this Swedish habit even more odd you should know that is viewed as half day but in reality it is only a day shortened with 2,5 hours. This fact is something that is pretty much waived and we all look at it from being half day work instead of a full day. Other strange effects of this half day mess are that we will go for lunch earlier and by that of course disturbing normal habits.

Then add to this that we will repeat this awkward habit several more days during the year!

Can’t we just be like normal countries and get rid of all this half days and maybe introduce another full day holiday or maybe two?

When is was young in the sixties and were at school we actually had school on Saturdays and my father was at work. These Saturdays where not full days and luckily enough it went away and we now take Saturdays for granted as a day off, it is now time to get rid of the half days as well and by that act wisely as country

I have just returned from a full week at SIBOS in Amsterdam. SIBOS is a big conference hosted by Swift that target bankers from all over the world. To gather almost 10 000 bankers in the same place might be a bit scary for some but for me it is wonderful.
I just love SIBOS and I have been attending since the beginning of the nineties. This year was the largest ever and compared to the last 2 years the general mood at the conference was also very good. I found that instead of focusing on the Financial crises, that was the topic both in HongKong last year and in Vienna the year before, the focus this year was very much on business opportunities.
One other area that was very much in focus this year was the regulatory Tsunami that we are facing right now!
Is this really going to be beneficial to the community?
Will the regulatory initiatives actually give the protection to investors and stabilize the financial system that should be the driver of all this?
I sometimes have a feeling that just the number of regulatory inititives will be difficult to handle and implement in the best way.
Do we get regulations that actually adress the correct issues?
I can also see a risk that regulation will drive cost and by that be negative to the investors in the long run. At worst case it might be so restricitve to the financial industry that growth is affected negatively.
In general Sibos provided a very good basis for interesting discussion and I would of course like to hear your view both on how you experienced SIbos, if you were there, but even more your thoughts on the developments of what I would like to call the "Regulation industry"