“beyond payments”

economy technology

is Wirecards motto. Those jokers ran a company, and a scheme where they pretended that billions of Euros would be generated by some daughter company in Dubai. That money then was supposedly in the Philippines. Funny that that that division in the middle east was the only part of Wirecard that made all that money. And it was growing. So the Wirecard stock price when up and up. The FT had some articles about stuff being sketchy. I think, no interest to peek behind their paywall. They seem to play the role of Harry Markopolos in this re enactment of the Madoff story: A crisis puts pressure on a Ponzi Scheme until it collapses. Crazy that it is only always one of these that gets exposed.

Not so great is the role of EY KPMG PWC and and Deloitte. Wirecard was running this scheme since 2015. And only in 2020 did KPMG notice. Beyond Responsibility would be a better subtitle for this.

Principles by Ray Dalio

economy

I am usually suspect of people like Ray Dalio. Not because he is very rich. But he seems to have the material that cult leaders are made from. If you look for somebody to follow then he could be a candidate. I still enjoyed “Principles: Life and Work”. It is long, and the later part is more a manual for people working for him than a book for public. But he builds a mostly coherent case for a specific view on humans and – which is not that common – derives from his insights clear guidelines on how to structure interactions. The book is interesting in this respect. I don’t agree on all points, others are really valuable. I am already sad that I forgot so many of them. I am not aspiring to make as much money as he did. But I imagine that if I would have remembered one or another of his Principles and put them to work I might end up this decade being richer than I would have otherwise.

It is a wonderful gesture that Mr Dalio takes the time to write all this down. He does not have to. He does not have to do anything. That he put all the work in to document his process is really amazing.

I would recommend giving what he has to say some attention.

2005

unkategorisch

was the year that the last TV was made in the USA. Seems to have been AKAI branded. Akai, the japanese company, had been defunct in 2002, while inMusic would only pick up the brand 7 years later. The picture here is from the history of Magnavox page. Which I found since I wondered about their defense division “Magnavox Electronic Systems”. Min Kao had worked there, when Gary Burrell recruited him to work for King radio. In 1989 then both started Garmin which made them very rich. Garmin employs 13,000 people and seems to have malware problems right now.

There is a story here: People from defense tech, starting a big successful thing based on GPS that decades later gets kneecapped by some Russian hackers with generic ransomware. A bit like stopping a tank with sticky tape. In tech that is possible it seems.

Dolls for Singapore

unkategorisch

64 years ago dolls were made in Canada to be shipped all over the world. Funny how the skin and hair color of these figurines is not worth any reflection in the idea that dolls go all over the world from that factory in Canada.

what happened?

unkategorisch

It is so strange to look at all these countries that have an increase in Covid cases after having had such a good curve bending moment end of May:

Back then it look realgod for all of them, and then – suddenly – it didn’t:

What is strange is there does not seem to be a pattern in their policies, not even in their climate. They all had things seemingly under control and then cases started rising again. I have no explanation either. Not even a far fetched theory. Which is strange in itself …

all things end

daily life misc

some end well

Frankfurt Hahn – fake geographic name

unkategorisch

The Airport Frankfurt Hahn is not close to Frankfurt, it takes a minimum of 90 minutes by car, much of it on surface roads, to reach its namesake city. Ryan Air had insisted that it would be called this. Now they reduce operations. What is left is a very confusing name. An ex US airfield that is loosing money and is owned by a Chinese company.

The audacity of the name change is striking.

An der Goldgrube 12

unkategorisch

ist die Addresse von BioNTech in Mainz. Kommt hin …

Kanye Ouest

media politics

2021 a victories Trump will make his buddy Kanye ambassador to France. He likes to stick it to Macron and Kanye likes to make Kim happy. She would in turn have to be invited to all the fashion shows. Funny how the Dems declared a gay candidate un electable ‘because of the black vote’ (which in itself would warrant closer inspection) only then to loose to a pop star with psychological issues the size of Wyoming.

Mosel: ausgebucht

deutschland economy

Vor ein paar Tagen hiess es gefühlt noch das Hotels ausserhalb der Küsten und Alpen in Deutschland kurz vor dem Ruin stehen.

Als ich gerade eine kurze Exkursion zur Mosel planen wollte war es dann schon ganz anders: Das Ausbleiben der Japaner, Chinesen und Amerikaner wird scheinbar durch deutsche Urlauber mehr als Wett gemacht. Nächste Woche (Ende Juli 2020) ist schon das meiste ausgebucht …