Capital Markets, Market News, Risk Management

Société Générale hit by $7 billion loss by Rougue Trader- video report

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As you may be aware, amidst this past week’s financial market turmoil world wide, we had another very significant development happening. French banking giant Societe Generale revealed a trading fraud which cost the bank $7.2 billion.

Trader Jérôme Kerviel had built combined trading positions over recent months, totalling about €50 billion or $73 billion. SO in this past week, SocGen unwinded about $70 billion dollars of positions (after considering that about $3 billion were direct position losses acknowledged by the bank). One can only imagine the kind of challenge given to SocGen’s best traders to unwind such large positions without causing panic in the markets and protecting their stock price.

This report by Wall Street Journal is the best so far.

We can probably use the simple thumb rule that for every one fraud revealed, at least one more will not be revealed, and one can only imagine what all is hidden in those back office billion dollar trades.

Here are two video reports:

Imagine… SocGen is known internationally for its expertise in equity derivatives. And Risk Magazine had awarded the bank its “Equity Derivatives House of the Year” this month. So a lot of work is needed on the reputation front, to ensure that it does not lose profits from its equity derivatives business. Building reputation is hard; rebuilding is harder.

Innovation, Internet, New Media, Online Marketing

Podcasting For Business Communications

Podcasting is one of the newer methods for Business Communications. You may have already seen podcasts from a variety of special interests groups sending out their messages online to interested individuals. in the same promotional theories.

If you use podcasting properly, you can send a recorded audio message/discussion to all employees or to specific customers who has agreed to receive the information. Podcasting for business can also be information made available to recipients without it being automatically delivered to their device – like sending a URL where the actual podcast is available. This practice is more friendly to the target audience as they can view the message at their convenience.

Podcasting for business can be used to send information to employees by way of their cell phones or handheld devices. For example, a recording by the CEO on the new market challenges.

The podcast is uploaded to a server or distribution service where it can automatically to broadcast to all intended recipients at the same time. This ensures that all employees get the same message at the same time. The receiving devices can be used to view the message at the recipients’ convenience and with the right software and structure a confirmation message can be transmitted back to allow the sender to know the information has been received.

Other uses of podcasting for business include sending information to customers through wireless devices or by sending an email to them giving them the address at which information about products and services are available through podcasting.

This is ideal for sharing information that customers may find useful. For example, some best practices, or an interview with a product/solution expert that answers FAQ on a given topic.

Distribution: Sending an email or text message direct ing them to a podcasting site is recommended when podcasting for business. For example, here’s a podcast from Harvard Law School

Respect Privacy: When using podcasts for sharing information with customers, please make sure the customer has agreed to receive the information, to protect your business from any charges of spamming.

Sales Coaching

Using the Theory of Supply & Demand in Service Sales to Your Advantage

Is there too much of you available to be desirable? If you’re ready to jump for every lead that comes your way, the answer is “yes”. Professional sales coaching will help you to understand you can increase demand for you by controlling supply without being discourteous to your prospects.

Have you ever noticed the more plentiful something is the less you want it? Well, the same is true when you make yourself available to everyone for any and all reasons. Professional sales coaching will enable you to see there are several things wrong with being overly accessible: it creates time inefficiencies and low productivity, it reduces your perceived valued in the eyes of the prospect, and it lowers your self-confidence because you’re setting yourself up to hear “no”.

So how do you increase demand and reduce your supply, and do it effectively without acting like a snob? This professional sales coaching secret is based on disqualification. Currently when you meet with a prospect or contact a lead you think of yourself as being accepted or rejected.

Your objective should be to reject any and all leads that aren’t qualified leads. You view this as being far more difficult than it is. Spend some time identifying the 1-5 key questions that you need answers to.

When you know the answers to these questions you will know if there is a reason for you to set aside time to spend with a potential prospect. That means whatever approach you’re using to attract prospects now needs to include a qualification step(s). When the prospect has successfully met the qualification criteria then and only then is there a reason for you to have a face-to-face appointment to discuss how your services might help them to get what they want.

Do you realize just how much time you’ll free up for actual selling if you stop meeting with the wrong people? You won’t be wasting ridiculous amounts of time running to meet people you shouldn’t be meeting with in the first place. And when you’re only meeting with real prospects, do you realize how much more productive you’ll be in terms of closed transactions?

When your focus is on disqualifying the prospect the power is in your court. In contrast, when you live in fear of being rejected by the prospect professional sales coaching demonstrates that you have forfeited your power. The funny thing is we all have an internal weakness meter, and when we sense it we move the other direction.

Review your appointment calendar over the past month. If you find that a paltry 20%-30% of the prospects you met with converted into clients that’s a clear indicator that you need to take the professional sales coaching philosophy of disqualification leading to a supply and demand advantage for you to heart. You have the power to put the ball in your court by knowing the critical qualifying questions and incorporating them into your marketing funnel.

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Article Source: https://EzineArticles.com/expert/Cheryl_Clausen/56791

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/942378

Artificial Intelligence, Innovation, People

Artificial Intelligence Evolution & Trends

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If you are interested in the concept of Artificial Intelligence, this post if for you. Here’s an interesting video on the topic of technological singularity.

The technological singularity takes place when the human race succeeds in creating an A.I being more intelligent than any human could ever be. Let us call it Alpha. Since the act of creating Artificial Intelligence is a task that benefits directly from the intelligence level of the creator, this more-intelligent-than-men being would surely be faster and more efficient at creating his own A.I being, let us call him Beta. This second generation being would too be better than its predecessor, and could in turn create a third one, Gamma, who is even more powerful, and so on. As capacity increases, the median generation time decreases, resulting in an exponential rate of evolution that quickly becomes asymptotic, at which point it becomes difficult to speculate further. No one knows what Omega will bring…

Many people think of Artificial Intelligence (or AI) as the stuff of movies, but it is not. AI is slowly but surely moving forward in multiple fronts. Every time, we develop a software (or a combination of software and hardware) that can make a decision on its based on dynamic events, it is AI.

We can be sure about the potential and very realistic possibility of AI playing greater role in more common works, like helping companies in analyzing data and trends to make business decisions. It may not be something that will be launched like a shining brand new car, but fair amount of groundwork continues to happen – for example, how Google analyzes the activities of millions of web surfers – developing a system that can do more than what any group of peoples can achieve. Some other companies are actively using Neural Networks in a variety of market data analysis and prediction. There are endless possibilities.

Do let us know if you are involved or interested in such projects. Some of our team members keenly follow such projects.