The News Review:
- How Harvard’s Investing Superstars Crashed
- Investment Professor Jailed for Gambling Away Students’ Cash
- Texas billionaire accused of $8-billion investment scam
- Investing in the next ‘big thing’
- China Infrastructure Investment Reports Second Quarter and Six …
- Fairfax Fourth-Quarter Profit Falls on Fewer Investment Gains
How Harvard’s Investing Superstars Crashed
Forbes NY -
The one category that has done well since last June is conventional Treasury bonds and Harvard appears to have owned little of these. As of its last public disclosure on this score it had a modest 16% allocation to fixed income consisting of 7% in inflation-indexed bonds 4% in corporates and the rest in high-yield and foreign debt. For a long while Harvard’s daring investment style was the envy of the endowment world. It made light bets in plain old stocks and bonds and went hell-for-leather into exotic and illiquid holdings: commodities timberland hedge funds emerging-market equities and private equity partnerships. The risky strategy paid off with market-beating results as long as the market was going up. But risk brings pain in a market crash. Although the full extent of the damage won’t be known until Harvard releases the endowment numbers for June 30 2009 the university is already working on the assumption that the portfolio will be down 30% or $11 billion.
Investment Professor Jailed for Gambling Away Students’ Cash
FXNews -
The Corruption and Crime Commission of Western Australia said that Graham Michael Brecker 51 of Perth will be eligible for parole after serving three years for 35 stealing offenses and four fraud charges. During his trial prosecutors said Brecker had convinced a Perth college to introduce a course for beginner investors which he was to design and present. In the course Brecker floated the idea to students of investing funds for them to watch and gain an insight into the share market. He told the students the funds would be invested in blue chip shares in listed companies. Brecker’s lawyer said his client was not a fraud but had made very poor investment decisions and big errors of judgment. He had every intention of repaying his students’ money the court was told.
Texas billionaire accused of $8-billion investment scam
Los Angeles Times CA -
Allen Stanford and two other principals of his investment and banking empire in a complaint alleging massive fraud. Williams10:45 PM PST February 17 2009R. Allen Stanford the Texas billionaire charged Tuesday with perpetrating an $8-billion investment fraud cast himself as offshore investment guru to the transatlantic jet set and benefactor to the Caribbean islands’ poor through multimillion-dollar promotions of their beloved sport of cricket.
Investing in the next ‘big thing’
BBC News UK -
YouNoodle uses a scoring system that plans to turn the business of investment into more of a science. The software measures the “buzz” surrounding a company via blogs and media reports along with a variety of factors including website traffic. The scoring tool covers nearly 30000 start-ups ranging from biotechnology to gaming software. “By watching the way the world responds to a start-up we can give advance notice of what’s hot and what’s not” said co-founder Bob Goodson. Researchers adjust the algorithm (the mathematical rating) based on more than 150000 start-up related stories every day.
China Infrastructure Investment Reports Second Quarter and Six …
CNNMoney.com -
Revenues in the quarter — which were derived principally from theoperation of the Pingling Expressway — were $12101788 compared with$13954729 in the same period last year. Second quarter net income declined to $282583 from $2183653 or $0. 04 pershare in the second quarter last year. In the six months ended on December 31 2008 revenue decreasedapproximately $1.
Fairfax Fourth-Quarter Profit Falls on Fewer Investment Gains
Bloomberg -
Chief Executive fficer. The swaps are financial instruments basedon bonds and loans that are used to speculate on a company?sability to repay debt or to hedge against losses. The value ofthe contracts increases when investor sentiment deteriorates andthe cost of protection rises. Fairfax said it sold almost all of its U.
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