Grim News

For those looking for the hottest new investment deal there are now Sharia compliant ETFs on the market to meet your investing needs.  Javelin Exchange Traded Shares launched its first fund at the beginning of July catering to the Islamic market.

The Dow Jones Islamic Market International Index Fund (JVS) seeks performance that corresponds to a benchmark index that measures investment return on “Shari’ah compliant securities. JETS notes that certain businesses are incompatible with Islamic law and therefore excluded from the fund. These sectors include alcohol, conventional financial services (banking, insurance, etc.), casinos, firearms, and pork-related products.

That last part doesn’t sound very fun.  To many people investing is not fun, so let’s get down to basics.  The JVS fund opened up on July 1, 2009.  The opening price per share was $399.99.  In less than a week the fund as fallen down to $38.85 per share.  Sharia doesn’t appear to be a good investment.

The stock market works through good old supply and demand.  Let’s take a look at the JVS fund in depth and see what it looks like.

This looks very pitiful.  There were only 100 shares of the Sharia fund traded today.  It’s not that popular compared to other picks.  Let’s take a look at the Level II screen to see how many shares are for sale.  A Level II Quote lets you see all the buyers and sellers along with their prices.

The Ask price is what a seller wants to get rid of his shares.  If you’re a buyer you typically buy from a seller at the Ask price.  Here we have someone with 800 shares of the Sharia fund and they are Asking $399.99 for each share.  If you want to buy 1000 shares, you’re out of luck because there are only 800 shares for sale right now.

The Bid or Offer price is what a Buyer is offering to take the stock off someone’s hands.  There is a buyer out there and he’s wanting to buy 800 share of the Sharia fund, but he’s only willing to pay $0.15 for each share.  He obviously doesn’t think these things are worth that much.

What this means is, if you want to buy some Sharia fund shares you can put an order in to buy at the Ask price of $399.99 per share.  You could set your Bid price lower than the Ask price to see if the seller will lower his price.  If you Bid price is higher than the currently listed $0.15 your order will appear above the one pictured.  This goes on and on until both parties enter the same price for the stock if you don’t offer the Ask price up front.  But it gets even better folks.  Let’s say that you bought 800 shares of the Sharia fund for $399.99 and now you decide you don’t want them.  There’s a buyer out there offering $0.15 per share.  You can either lose $399.84 per share and take him up on his offer price, or you can name your price and it will appear in the Ask column.  Then you hope and pray to Allah that someone will buy those shares at your Ask price.

Now let’s look at a more exciting example, the Direxion 3x Daily Financial Bear (FAZ)

This fund also has a good example in it to illustrate price moves with a volume of over 185 Million shares traded today.  There are a total of 22400 shares for sale between the NASDAQ and PACX at 5.07.  What happens if someone buys all those shares from these two sellers?  The price next price listed is 5.08 with 3500 shares.  That is what happens behind the scenes when a stock price goes up.  Unfortunately the Sharia fund is unlikely to go up since it only has one seller who will probably never close a deal at $399.99.

This fund (FAZ) is not Sharia compliant.  This is a fund that performs opposite to the traditional financial sector we all know and love to hate (Citigroup, AIG, Bank of America, etc).  This is a 3x short fund so it basically means when the stock market goes down, this thing goes up at 3x the rate.  If the banking sector is down 5%, this fund goes up 15%.  And that’s how you make money when the market is going down.  Unlike the Sharia fund.  This puppy has had over 185 million shares traded today.  The Sharia fund on the other hand only traded 100 shares today.  Finance is hot, Sharia is not.

If you aren’t feeling very Sharia, then the Vice Fund (VICEX) might be worth taking a look at.  It is a traditional mutual fund and not an ETF.  The fund managers invest in tobacco, alcohol, and casino companies.  In a recession vice companies tend to do better than regular companies . I don’t own any VICEX shares, but it may be something worth researching if you don’t find the Sharia funds to be that profitable or fun.

An excellent example of journalism chronicling the abuses by the Iranians.

Lasala, 33, is one of 10 young employees and interns at the Iran Human Rights Documentation Center who are collecting videos, photos and news reports as they wait to arrange interviews with eyewitnesses to the violence.

With all of the chaos over in Iran, government stupidity always manages to shine through.  The government has “asked” members of the soccer team to resign for wearing green wristbands, showing support for the protesters.  Since they effectively fired a good portion of their soccer team without consideration for how it would affect the team’s performance and as a byproduct, national glory, we can conclude that Iran is run by losers.  That’s right.  They decide to put symbolism ahead of building a winning team.  It’s a Dilbert cartoon with turbans which means Elbonia is a good analogy here.  If they can’t build a winning soccer team, then how can they expect to build a winning economy or military?

They also said that they plan to clear the country of hooligans.  Which is pretty easy to do when you don’t have a serviceable soccer team anymore.  I had no idea there were that many British soccer fans in Iran, but if the Supreme Leader doesn’t like them trashing his stadium then he’s well within his right to make a losing soccer team so the Brits don’t destroy the place after they lose the match.

Poor planning is one many reasons Iran will fail and Asians will end up ruling that part of the world.  We understand the value of building a winning team at all levels.  We also understand that winning at all levels is important.  But Iran has yet to produce a Supreme Leader that rivals the skills of Mao Zedong or Ho Chi Minh.  Not that the current Supreme Leader has any math skills to speak of since he only realized this week that more than 100% voter turn out is not normal.

Sometimes my coworkers make fun of me for how little time I spend playing games, specifically MMOs. Or, they’ll jest when they notice that I show up early in the morning (around 8:00 AM, which is like dawn to a game developer), then head out after I’ve been at work for a mere 9 hours (including an hour of lunch). “This guy isn’t very dedicated to his craft!” Nobody has ever said that to me, but I’m sure someone’s thought it.

What those people don’t realize is that it’s intentional, and I think it’s healthy. It’s a balance I’ve created between my family life with my wife, my work life at 38 Studios, and my play (video games being one of several activities). In my world, my family comes first, work comes next, and my entertainment comes last.

A lot of people assume that someone dedicated to their work will spend double-digit hours there every day, working through lunch and taking no breaks. That’s certainly a sign that such a person is dedicated to work, but it doesn’t mean they lead a balanced life or that someone who doesn’t do that isn’t dedicated to their job.

The truth is, I love my job. I get to wake up every weekday and take on new, intellectually stimulating challenges as a game designer at 38 Studios. I get to work closely with people of every discipline, socializing with them while we work, playing ping pong, or getting in a game of ultimate frisbee at lunch (hooray I can play again after many months of wrist problems!). I get to be creative and solve problems. I get to be on time, bust my ass, and make it not suck (that’s for you, Curt).

But work comes second for me. I love my wife, Deanna, even more than I love my work. So, I’ve made a very intentional, conscious effort to ensure that she stays first. No, I don’t wake up early by nature; I’d rather sleep until noon. But, my wife gets home early (she’s a special education teacher), and I want to spend as much time with her as possible. So, I come in as early as I can, and I leave work as early as I can as well.

That said, I’m not imbalanced toward my wife. I take providing for my family very seriously, and think of working hard as part of the family equation. I bust my ass and work very efficiently while at the office in part because I really care about Copernicus and in part because I want to ensure that I can provide for my family in the future.

Finally, we come to play. It’s the last thing on my list, but it’s a necessary one. My play consists of hockey (when my wrist is fully healed), reading, watching TV/movies, listening to music, video games (duh!), and a random assortment of other activities. I get a little bit of playtime every day by myself. It’s usually video games or reading a book on the average day, but all play helps me to achieve balance in my daily life.

All work and no play makes Ryan a dull boy. All play and no work makes Ryan a dull boy. Without a balance of all three things in my life–Family, Work, and Play–I eventually start to notice that imbalance and its side effects.

Note that I also worked pretty hard on this even when I wasn’t married, and even when my wife was still in school in Colorado and I was in San Diego. Back then, “Family” was good friends. My family in San Diego consisted of people like Marlon, aka BBQ, and other good friends I hung out with. I did work a little too hard sometimes (or play a little hard, as the case may have been), but it lead me down the right path to find the proper balance of Life, Work, and Play.

Lai Jiansheng is a hero.  Chen Fuchao decided he was going to ruin everyone’s day by threatening to jump off a bridge.  Well Lai was not going to have any of that.  He walked past the police barricade, shook hands with Chen, and then pushed him off the bridge.

“I pushed him off because jumpers like Chen are very selfish. Their action violates a lot of public interest,” Lai was quoted as saying by Xinhua. “They do not really dare to kill themselves. Instead, they just want to raise the relevant government authorities’ attention to their appeals.”

Unfortunately Chen survived the fall, so this means he is going to have to try again later.  Lai should be getting a medal from the police for quickly resolving a situation that could have impeded commerce for a long time.  We should take Lai’s example in the US and legalize pushing jumpers off their objects.  After all it is being a good samaritan when you help others attain their goals.