Bill Gates chi triệu đô nghiên cứu... phân người

Quỹ Bill Gates đã đầu tư 1,5 triệu đôla để thực hiện dự án chế biến phân người thanh nhiên liệu diesel sinh học chứa metan (Vietnamnet, 28-7). Phân người hóa ra có rất nhiều công dụng. Sau khi người Nhật tìm ra cách làm thịt từ phân, giờ tới ông Gates loay hoay với món này.

Сác chuyên gia cho rằng phân người là vật liệu hữu cơ đậm đặc có giá trị năng lượng cao so với nhiều loại năng lượng sinh học khác. Quỹ Bill Gates không loại trừ triển vọng đến một ngày nào đó, ác nhà khoa học sẽ thành công trong việc từ phân người tạo ra một nguồn năng lượng thay thế mới.

MPI công bố số liệu thu, chi ngân sách nhà nước tháng 7 và 7 tháng 2011: Nhiều điểm đáng bàn

26-7-2011 (VNEconomy) - Theo tài liệu của Bộ Kế hoạch và Đầu tư công bố chính thức tại buổi họp báo Chính phủ tháng 7, vừa diễn ra chiều 24/7, lũy kế 7 tháng năm 2011, tổng thu ngân sách nhà nước ước đạt 386,76 nghìn tỷ đồng, bằng 65% dự toán năm.

Như vậy, nếu áp vào so sánh với số liệu được Tổng cục Thống kê công bố vào tháng trước, thu ngân sách riêng trong tháng này đã tăng rất mạnh, tới gần 85,5 nghìn tỷ đồng, và làm tăng tỷ lệ thực hiện so với dự toán thêm khoảng 14,4 điểm phần trăm.

Mới qua 7 tháng, tỷ lệ thực hiện như trên là khá cao, đặc biệt là khi so với các con số tương ứng do Tổng cục Thống kê công bố, cùng kỳ năm ngoái là 57,5%; hay năm kia là 50,9%...

Vietnam PM set for second term

July 25, 2011 (AFP) -- Vietnam's one-party parliament is to elect Nguyen Tan Dung for another term as prime minister on Tuesday, confirming him as the country's most powerful politician at a time of economic crisis.

A symbolic vote by the communist-controlled National Assembly will choose Dung for a second five-year stint after his nomination on Monday as the sole candidate.

[...]

Soros, Epstein, and Caldwell Debate the Meaning of Hayek

Cato Policy Report, July/August 2011 -

In 1960, F. A. Hayek published an important book that acted as the positive counterpart to his more famous The Road to Serfdom. Whereas the latter fiercely critiqued the very idea of a centrally planned economy, the former provided his view of what should take its place. This spring, a distinguished panel convened in the Cato Institute's F. A. Hayek Auditorium to discuss the new, definitive edition of that work, The Constitution of Liberty, edited by Ronald Hamowy.

The panel included Bruce Caldwell, Hayek's intellectual biographer; Richard Epstein, the brilliant legal scholar; and George Soros, the hedge-fund billionaire and founder of the Open Society Foundations. Soros opened his talk with his own interpretation of the great economist.

"Hayek is generally regarded as the apostle of a brand of economics which holds that the market will assure the optimal allocation of resources as long as the government doesn't interfere," Soros said. He went on to describe what he considers the two main pillars of this brand — the efficient market hypothesis and the theory of rational expectations — which, he insisted, place Hayek firmly in the dominant strain of American economics. Most label this breed the Chicago School. "I refer to it as market fundamentalism," Soros said.

Richard Epstein did not concur. "In some sense, I'm taking exactly the opposite side of George Soros," he said. While Soros praised Hayek's warning "against the slavish imitation of natural science" in the social sciences, Epstein thought his ideas weren't systematic enough. In acknowledging that they were "enormously instructive," he ultimately concluded that those ideas were "incomplete." Epstein argued furthermore that Hayek's work points not to unfettered markets but to a "presumption against regulation."

Giving voice to some of the raised eyebrows in the audience, Bruce Caldwell responded to Soros. "I think that George has a handle on some parts of Hayek, but misunderstands other parts," he said. With a better grasp of the missing pieces, Caldwell was convinced that Soros "would identify himself, I'll say it provocatively, as a Hayekian." He then countered some of the billionaire's specific claims. Hayek actually rejected the usefulness of the socalled twin pillars in "capturing the workings of the market process," Caldwell told Soros, demonstrating that "he's not the sort of market fundamentalist that you're describing. I think a pithy way of putting this is that there's definitely a difference ... between Chicago and Vienna."

Continuing his earlier call for all sides to acknowledge that they only have half of the truth, Soros made some concessions. "Maybe we can find common ground," he said. "I think that we would all agree that government regulation is a necessary evil ... so if you can avoid regulations, you should." Many observers picked up on Soros's criticisms of the less-than-savory political and legislative processes that produced the recent health care and financial-reform bills. In the end, the discussion was both provocative and civil. The event mirrored a long-standing debate over the great economist's influence. Last year, Kate Zernike wrote in the New York Times that Tea Party activists were resurrecting "long-dormant ideas [found in] once-obscure texts by dead writers." She was referring, of course, to writers like Hayek. But she may have sold him short.

This is the same man, after all, who won the Nobel Prize in Economics in 1974. Years later, he met with President Reagan at the White House. He also met with Margaret Thatcher, who, in reference to The Constitution of Liberty, declared: "This is what we believe." Hayek was described by Milton Friedman as "the most important social thinker of the 20th century" and by White House economic adviser Lawrence H. Summers as the author of "the single most important thing to learn from an economics course today." He was the mind behind The Road to Serfdom, a book that has never gone out of print and, in fact, sold over 100,000 copies last year alone. Cato is proud to note that, in the last years of his life, Hayek became a distinguished senior fellow at the Institute.

But even that doesn't do him justice. "On the biggest issue of all, the vitality of capitalism, he was vindicated to such an extent that it is hardly an exaggeration to refer to the 20th century as the Hayek century," John Cassidy once wrote in the New Yorker. Hayek, however, was much more than an economist. He also published impressive works on political theory and psychology. He embodied the type of intellect that influenced disciplines across the spectrum, remaining relevant long after his own lifetime.

As executive vice president David Boaz wrote on Cato@Liberty, "He's like Marx, only right."

Tư vấn chuyên nghiệp là đây

25-7-2011 (Vietnamnet) -

Tại các thành phố Mỹ, việc mua dâm diễn ra khá công khai song có một góc của ngành công nghiệp tình dục lại được bảo vệ và giấu kín. Đó là thế giới của gái điếm cấp cao, nơi khách hàng bỏ vào đó hàng trăm nghìn đô la mỗi năm. Một thế giới bí mật với những quy định và cách hành động có thể thay đổi mọi thứ mà bạn nghĩ là mình đã biết về nghề mua bán dâm.

Tuy nhiên, thế giới bí mật này đã được hé lộ phần nào qua lời của người trong cuộc. Đây là một phụ nữ ở San Francisco lấy tên là Elise Vanderhoff. Cô vào nghề năm 28 tuổi, sau khi đã học hành xong xuôi và đang làm cố vấn cho những thiếu niên gặp rắc rối.

Bắt đầu nghề gái gọi...

"Tôi làm gái gọi khi đã tốt nghiệp và có bằng Thạc sĩ về tâm lý, đang làm bác sĩ thực tập. Tôi vào nghề một phần là để thanh toán các hóa đơn còn nợ, vốn không ngừng tăng lên sau khi tôi tốt nghiệp. Công việc bắt đầu khi tôi kết thúc giờ thực tập. Ngoài ra, tôi làm việc đó còn vì những lý do cá nhân khác, ví dụ tính chất phiêu lưu của công việc.

Không cần nói cũng biết, làm gái gọi, tôi kiếm được nhiều tiền hơn làm bác sĩ thực tập và cũng như giàu hơn nhiều nhà trị liệu khác mà tôi biết. Tuy nhiên, lại một lần nữa, tiền chỉ là vấn đề thứ yếu. Tôi hiện làm gia sư và hành nghề tổ chức hội thảo trong khi vẫn làm gái gọi cấp cao.

Bận bịu chăm sóc khách hàng...

Công việc này hay thay đổi và mang tính mùa vụ, vì vậy, khó nói con số chính xác ở đây vì nó thay đổi thường xuyên. Trung bình, tôi gặp 2-4 khách một tháng, ở bất cứ đâu từ khoảng 4h tới vài ngày một lần. Xin hãy nhớ rằng việc làm này không phải là lúc nào cũng gặp khách hàng.

Tôi dành khá nhiều thời gian để duy trì quan hệ với các khách hàng hiện thời, tìm các vị khách mới, chăm chút cho vẻ bề ngoài (gồm hẹn làm tóc, móng, chăm sóc da, tập luyện 3-5 lần một tuần với người huấn luyện, chăm sóc xương, mát xa..), chụp ảnh mới, quảng cáo, bảo trì website, theo dõi các sự kiện đang diễn ra, học về rượu, thức ăn và văn hóa.

Đây là việc bảo dưỡng cần phải làm bất kể tôi phải làm những việc gì trong tuần. Tôi chỉ được trả tiền cho thời gian ở cạnh khách hàng trong khi thời gian còn lại là tương đối lớn.

Quan hệ với khách hàng...

90% công việc kinh doanh của tôi được hình thành từ các sự kiện thường xuyên. Tôi xin lặp lại rõ ràng một lần nữa là lý do tôi làm việc này không phải chỉ vì tiền. IQ của tôi là 150+, tôi nói được 4 ngoại ngữ và tôi có bằng thạc sĩ. Tôi có thể kiếm nhiều tiền ở các lĩnh vực khác.

Tôi coi trọng mối quan hệ đã có với khách hàng và tôi coi việc dành thời gian với họ là đem lại lợi ích cho họ trong cuộc sống. Ngoài ra, làm gái cấp cao tôi cũng thấy thích thú. Do đó, tôi tập trung vào việc thiết lập những mối quan hệ lâu dài với khách hàng mà tôi thích. Mỗi năm, tôi chỉ tiếp xúc với một vài khách hàng mới.

Tiền công…

Giá tối thiểu trong vòng 4h mà khách hàng phải trả tôi là 2.500 USD, nếu chỉ trong thành phố, nhưng sẽ là 3.500 USD cộng phí di chuyển cho các cuộc hẹn ở ngoài San Francisco. Khi đi lại, tôi tính thêm phụ phí vì tôi tốn thời gian cho di chuyển. Khách hàng cũng sẽ phải trả tiền đi lại cho tôi.

• Hoài Linh (Theo CNBC)

Why banks do not lend at near-zero interest rates

By Philip G - The Fed is surprised. For more than two years it has held the Fed Funds Rate at near zero levels. Yet bank lending has remained anaemic during the whole of that period.

That meagre bank lending is due to, not in spite of, low interest rates is an idea that has never occurred to the Fed.

The logic behind keeping interest rates low seems to be as follows, to use an analogy. If the price of wheat is kept low, even the poor can afford it and demand will be high. Then, if the government supplies wheat at low prices to grocers, they will add a small mark-up and supply it to consumers.

The analogy seems apt, if you replace grocers by banks and the low price of wheat by the low supply cost of money. But in practice the analogy does not seem to have worked. Why?

To begin with, money is not wheat. When a grocer sells a kilogram of wheat to a customer he collects the price for it and that is the end of the transaction. When a banker lends money that is just the first leg of the transaction. He needs to get the money back and make sure that the value of the money he gets back is not only more than the value of the money he lent out but also meets all his costs and yields a profit besides.

During a period of near-zero interest rates the chances of this are bleak. The reason is inflation. If inflation is 0% when the bank lends at, say, an interest rate of 5% and is 5% at the end of a year when the load is repaid, the bank will have clearly sustained a large loss, if lending costs and provisions for bad loans are taken into account. And high inflation is not just a remote possibility. It is a certainty considering that it is the Fed's avowed aim to raise inflation. And given the Fed's record before and after the Great Recession, what guarantee is there that inflation will be just 5%? In such an uncertain situation why blame banks for not lending? Their chances of losing money are smaller if they don't lend than if they lend.

The other reason that banks don't lend when the cost of money is low is just plain common sense. But in an era of complex mathematical economics, common sense has been a prime casualty, so that I need to invoke an economist who has for long been held in considerable contempt: Alfred Marshall.

This is what he said in Principles of Economics (edition of 1920):

"If a person has a thing which he can put to several uses, he will distribute it among these uses in such a way that it has the same marginal utility in all. For if it had a greater marginal utility in one use than another, he would gain by taking away some of it from the second use and applying it to the first."

Now, loans are not the only use that money can be put to. Banks can also use money in trading, which has the singular advantage of not tying up money for long periods and so does away with the uncertainty connected with those long periods. If banks can earn profits through trading, they would naturally not risk making loans. The return of huge bank bonuses just a year after the financial crash is proof that this was what happened.

Why has such a commonsensical idea not occurred to the Fed or to most economists? I think the reason is that Keynesianism has held economics in thrall for more than half a century so that economists are unable to see past the demand side of an equation.

To illustrate the point he makes in the above quotation Marshall considers a housewife with a limited number of hanks of yarn who must make a decision about how to divide the yarn between making socks and making vests.

In the footnote he says:

"Our illustration belongs indeed properly to domestic production rather than to domestic consumption. But that was almost inevitable; for there are very few things ready for immediate consumption which are available for many different uses. And the doctrine of the distribution of means between different uses has less important and less interesting applications in the science of demand than in that of supply."

It almost sounds like an admonition to Keynesians from beyond the grave.

I hope readers will be interested in the following graph which plots a) Commercial and Industrial Loans at All Commercial Banks against b) the Effective Federal Funds Rate from January 2001 to June 2011 [The data are from (where else?) the web site of the Federal Bank of St Louis.]

Especially interesting is the period from around the beginning of 2001 when the Fed began to reduce interest rates to get out of a recession and kept reducing rates until the middle of 2004. All through that period, commercial and industrial loans shrank. From the middle of 2004 the Fed started raising rates to curb the housing bubble and immediately commercial and industrial loans began to rise.

Only an amazing coincidence, I'm sure.

Greed drives bourse to the brink

Vietnam Investment Review; March 5, 2007 -- Article Excerpt. Dr Vuong Quan Hoang, a research scientist at CEB-University of Brussels and managing director of InvestVietnam,. Inc. shares his ideas on the ongoing explosion of Vietnam's stock market. The thirst for a fast profit and groundless greed of many investors have blown up the stock market bubble and together with the absence of market makers, these factors are creating implicit market risks.

In 2006, the VN-Index rose nearly 150 per cent and during January, it increased by 36 per cent. What do you think of these gigantic rises?

From a psychological aspect, there are three reasons behind the market's recent explosion. First, Vietnamese in general really want to make money fast, easily feel satisfied with what they have earned and always seek easier profits. Second, business opportunities in the economy are not so easy to find, especially when one pursues it by themselves. Third, the transaction capacity of the market has yet to be brought into full play and the main reason for this is the periodical order matching system and the bottle-neck issue on the Ho Chi Minh City's Exchange. These factors result in a deviatory supply-demand relationship, strongly affecting stock price fluctuations.

What is the stock market's real risk rate now?

The risk is large. The most important function of the market is to create high liquidity for stocks. However, in Vietnam, that liquidity remains very low. The market can reach a total value, per trading session of VNDI trillion but in comparison with the market's entire scale (nearly VND30 trillion) or with the real demand for transactions of investors, the liquidity of Vietnam's stock market is quite worrisome. In addition, given the absence of market makers, the market has a special feature. When stock prices are high, almost none sell and when they are low, there are few buyers. This places the market in a situation when most transactions are unilateral and in terms of mathematical statistics, any big jump contains risk.

Unexpected market developments have led bourse management to continuously post warnings. But, many view such warnings as unnecessary, explaining that the market has its own rules?

Though the Vietnamese economy's annual growth rate from 7.5-8.0 per cent is high compared to the world average, there is no point if stocks keep rising 30 per cent monthly. When the market was small with total capitalisation of just 1-2 per cent of GDP, it was not worrisome. Now, the market exceeds 20 per cent of GDP, the market's growth has created illusory prosperity, which goes with panic. Panic is the single feature that distinguishes the stock market from normal commodities markets. If the commodities fall in price, they can be bought though they are not really necessary. They can be given away or replace old ones. By contrast, when financial products fall in price, many are ready to dump them though they used to believe these products were good. The panic psychology is very dangerous to Vietnam's stock market because of its low liquidity and absence of market makers.

The State Bank has warned commercial banks not to pour money into the stock market, but this phenomenon has yet to be curbed. This phenomenon creates a communicating 'vessels effect' between bank deposits, the money that depositors expect to be safe with fixed income generation, and the investment channel with unpredicted risks. As an economist, I feel very concerned when the market has grown excessively regardless of the authorities' warnings.

One reason often quoted to assure investors of the recent sharp rises in stocks price is that Vietnamese businesses have been sold at a low price (almost all of the listing businesses are equitised state-owned enterprises) and at present they are being reevaluated. What do you think of the quality of Vietnamese businesses in general?

If quality is measured in scale terms, this type of quality went up strongly last year. However, if the business quality is defined by such standards as business strategy, sectoral planning, core values and strategic vision, it is very doubtful. I have met with leaders of many big businesses in Vietnam and they are all worried about businesses' future in the context of the global game (the WTO)....

(*Read full article at: http://goliath.ecnext.com/coms2/gi_0199-6405279/Greed-drives-bourse-to-the.html)

Taking stock

Vietnam Investment Review; June 18, 2001 -- Article Excerpt. The past 11 months have been more a roller coaster ride than gentle learning curve for the nation's stock market pioneers. Vuong Quan Hoang analyses the quirks and deviations of the nascent bourse

FOUNDED on July 20, 2000, the Ho Chi Minh City Securities Trading Centre (HSTC) has not been in existence long enough to allow scientific models to function, either empirically or theoretically.

However, 11 months has been sufficient time for thousands of people to invest their money.

The establishment of the HSTC itself was considered the first success and the beginning of operations with two firms listed on the bourse's boards the second. Although there are currently only five listed companies, trading does happen.

The HSTC is governed by a set of regulations designed to avoid collapse and to ensure the smooth functioning of the market. Generally, these regulations work, with occasional exceptions.

One example is the temporary trading interruption of Transimex (TMS). Trading only resumed following re-assessment of the reference price. Also, some manipulation was believed to have taken place, with orders having been written then cancelled deliberately.

Following that incident, the State Securities Commission (SSC) decided to ban the discarding of orders written by market participants, a move that still makes investors uncomfortable. Another problem is the lack, or misrepresentation, of information.

Most recently, a "warning" message issued by the SSC in an attempt to ease the `irrational exuberance' that had built towards Hapaco's shares failed to produce the desired effect.

The qualitative statement is that the fledgling market is worth exploring, not because it has produced returns for some investors, but because it contains some interesting properties.

Based on observations of the HSTC over its first 113 trading session, the main trend has been for stock price to move by the maximum allowed fluctuation of 2 per cent.

In most trading sessions, share prices have hit the ceiling, but they have also sometimes dropped to the floor.

Graphical analysis of these movements shows that the market is caught in a "liquidity trap".

When traders expect the price to go up, they tend to place orders at the upper limit. But of course, knowing that the value of the shares they are holding are set to rise, shareholders are unlikely to want to sell them, leading to very low transaction volume, both in terms of the number of shares traded and their monetary value. In a non-parametric manner, the stock runs in this case are positive for many consecutive sessions.

When the direction turns, the "trap" again springs, only this time in reverse, with shareholders finding it extremely difficult to sell.

Again, few shares are traded. The only exception to this situation is right at the point where the direction starts to turn, and when this happens, large transaction volumes are recorded for the session.

The graphs below show a remarkable similarity between the five listed companies' share price movements. But this close correlation should not be so. For the time being, there is nothing normal in the distribution of stock returns on the HSTC.

When assuming normality,...

(* Read full article at: http://goliath.ecnext.com/coms2/gi_0199-3806704/Taking-stock.html)

Nurturing indirect foreign investment

Vietnam Investment Review; April 16, 2001 (more than 10 years ago) -- Vietnam could boost its coffers with much indirect foreign investment via the emerging stock market and growing domestic private sector. Reality? It rather depends on whether some recent thinktank suggestions become policy.

SOME possibilities for attracting strong inflows of indirect foreign investment can be seen in two drafts produced by the Ministry of Planning and Investment.

The first suggests some foreign-invested enterprises (FIEs) be allowed to list on the stock exchange, with the first firms going public on a trial basis. This would hopefully lead to plenty of extra capital being injected into these firms.

The second draft identifies 40 types of domestic private firms, including services companies, which should be permitted to sell up to 30 per cent of themselves to foreign investors.

For FIEs wanting to list, the MPI recommends that their capital base must remain at least 30-per cent foreign. Otherwise, says the ministry, the firms would have to operate under the Enterprise Law, which was activated last year to cover purely Vietnamese firms.

Jolly good idea too

Reacting to the MPI's draft identification of 40 domestic private-firm types which could go partly foreign, an attorney, Pham Nghiem Xuan Bac, was very upbeat,

Bac, managing Partner of Vision & Associates, said: "It is a positive move to boost foreign investment in Vietnam, as well as development of the private sector here.

"A strong private sector will absorb labour redundancies which may be the result of the acceleration of the equitisation and restructuring process and which may create difficult social issues ... [though it would promote the economy's efficient cy and competitiveness]."

Officials of the MPI were quick to outline how the firms would have to "keylock" stake sales to foreign entities at a maximum 30 per cent, because foreign investors must not be allowed to dominate the country's financial and economic structure.

On this point, Minister of Planning and Investment Tran Xuan Gia said: "When we talk about the ratio between foreign capital and domestic investment in Vietnam's financial structure, it is naturally a little complicated."

Presently, domestic investment sources, both state and non-state, account for 60 per cent of investment in the country.

Official development assistance (ODA) and FDI account for the rest (around $16 billion has been accumulated from these sources in the past five years).

For the coming five-year period, said Gia, it would be tough to make ODA and FDI cover one third of the $60 billion of investment being targetted.

A misleading notion?

Asked whether focusing much more on indirect foreign investment was appropriate, Vuong Quan Hoang, a financial expert for the World Bank's International Financial Corporation, said: "Clearly this notion of categorising between direct and indirect foreign investment is vague and misleading.

"Investment is investment, with the money being spent and associated with some risks. One should not care whether it is `direct' or `indirect.'"

Added Hoang: "The boosting of investment via the stock market depends on whether such a market can really generate substantial investment prospects for investors at reasonable risk.

"In addition, all investments will not come across easily. Investment approaches will require more open...

(Full article content at: http://goliath.ecnext.com/coms2/gi_0199-3792940/Nurturing-indirect-foreign-investment.html)

Vietnam Sees Second-Quarter Growth

June 29, 2011 (Wall Street Journal; June 29, 2011) -- HANOI—Vietnam's economic growth sped up slightly in the second quarter, but remained restrained amid government efforts to rebalance the economy and rein in inflation.

Gross domestic product expanded 5.7% year-to-year in the second quarter of 2011, the General Statistics Office said in a statement. The economy grew 5.6% in the first half of the year.

The second-quarter growth was slightly faster than the 5.4% increase in the January-March period, thanks to higher industrial and construction output, but significantly slower than the 7.3% expansion posted in the final quarter of 2010. Vietnam's economy expanded 6.8% last year.

"I think after the government admitted itself that [full-year] growth can be around 6%, it's probably signaling that it's putting stability in front of growth," said Santitarn Sathirathai, an economist with Credit Suisse, who had expected the second-quarter growth figure to be 5.8%.

In February, Vietnam's government announced a major policy switch as what was once one of the most promising developing economies spun out of control, resulting in rising inflation, an entrenched trade deficit and a battered local currency—which has been devalued several times in the past year and a half.

Authorities have pledged to keep credit growth below 20% this year, cap the budget deficit at 5% of GDP, boost domestic production and curb the trade deficit. The central bank has raised benchmark interest rates several times this year.

The government this month cut its 2011 GDP target to 6% growth from 6.5%, and lifted its inflation forecast to 15% from 11.75%. It was the second time this year the government lowered its growth forecast and raised its inflation outlook.

The consumer price index rose 20.8% year-to-year in June, up from May's 19.8%, with some economists predicting that inflation won't peak until August or September.

Though the government has taken steps to tighten lending in the first half, Vietnam will continue to face high inflation in the third quarter, and more anti-inflationary efforts should be taken in coming months, says economist Vuong Quan Hoang of Hanoi-based DHVP Research & Consultancy.

"As June CPI rose 20.82% on year and it's thought that it will rise further in July; it's very difficult for the government to pull it back to 15% or even below 10% any time soon," Mr. Hoang said.

--Leigh Murray in Bangkok contributed to this article.

Write to Nguyen Pham Muoi at phammuoi.nguyen@dowjones.com