The other day I upgraded Xorg on my Gentoo Box (Kernel 2.6.30) and then my Firefox became incredibly slow when I tried to look at some flash pages or open Gmail. I heckled around and found the solution: The Graphic Media Accelerator from Intel should be labeled “Intel” in our xorg.conf file and not “i810”. Since I changed that, everything runs smooth except that driconf still gives me an error [but I do not mind that because my Firefox is a lot faster now]. For Gentoo-Users also do not forget to set ‘VIDEO_CARDS=”intel”‘ in your /etc/make.conf. Also make sure you got all the Xorg modules compiled correctly [and the latest version thereof].
Risikoanalyse für Schweizer KMUs seit 2008
Für unsere GmbH war ich auf der Suche nach einer zuverlässigen Auskunft zur Risikoanalyse, welche für KMUs (auch GmbHs) ab 2008 notwendig ist. Von der Eidg. Revisionsaufsichtsbehörde RAB habe ich folgende Antwort erhalten (interessant finde ich vor allem das Zitat von Blocher):
Die Frage:
Betreff: Unterschied eingeschränkte und normale Revision, Risikoanalyse
Sehr geehrte Damen und Herren
Bezüglich den neuen Bestimmungen im OR habe ich zwei Fragen:
1. Wie umfänglich muss die Dokumentation sein für die “Angaben über die Durchführung einer Risikobeurteilung”? Als Unternehmer führt man ja jeden Tag eine Risiko-Analyse durch.
http://www.admin.ch/ch/d/sr/220/a663b.html
2. Worin unterscheidet sich die “eingeschränkte” von der “normalen” Revision?
http://www.admin.ch/ch/d/sr/220/a727a.html
Die Antwort:
Besten Dank für Ihre Anfrage, zu der wir gerne Stellung nehmen. Wir möchten Sie jedoch vorab darauf hinweisen, dass die Eidg. Revisionsaufsichtsbehörde (RAB) primär eine rechtsanwendende Behörde ist und daher nicht für die verbindliche Auslegung des Gesetzes, insbesondere nicht des OR, zuständig ist. Letztlich kommt diese Befugnis nur den zuständigen Gerichten zu.
1. Sofern eine Gesellschaft verpflichtet ist, gemäss Art. 663b Ziff. 12 Obligationenrecht (OR; SR 220) im Anhang zur Jahresrechnung „Angaben über die Durchführung einer Risikobeurteilung“ zu machen, müssen grundsätzlich die wesentlichen Geschäftsrisiken dargelegt werden. Welche Angaben im Anhang zur Jahresrechnung konkret gemacht werden müssen, ist in der Praxis jedoch umstritten. Der Bundesrat hat in seiner Botschaft vom 23. Juni 2004 zum neuen Revisionsrecht festgehalten, dass die Risikobeurteilung nicht sämtliche Geschäftsrisiken erfasst, sondern nur die Erläuterung derjenigen Risiken, die einen wesentlichen Einfluss auf die Beurteilung der Jahresrechnung haben könnten. Grundsätzlich sind drei Varianten denkbar:
a. Im Anhang wird lediglich der Prozess der Risikobeurteilung offengelegt;
b. Im Anhang werden der Prozess und alle wesentlichen Risiken, die einen direkten Einfluss auf die aktuelle Jahresrechnung haben, offengelegt;
c. Im Anhang werden der Prozess und alle wesentlichen Risiken (inkl. operativer und strategischer Risiken) offengelegt.
Verschiedentlich wird die Ansicht geäussert, alle vorgenannten Varianten seien zulässig, solange aus den Angaben hervorgehe, welche Variante gewählt wurde (vgl. Q&A-Papier der Treuhand-Kammer oder die Ausführungen von Lipp in: Der Schweizer Treuhänder 11/2008, S. 933 ff.). Alt-Bundesrat Christoph Blocher hat sich demgegenüber am 1. Dezember 2005 bei der Diskussion der fraglichen Bestimmung im Ständerat wie folgt geäussert: „(…) Als Angaben zur Durchführung einer Risikobeurteilung genügen ein Sitzungsdatum und die Aussage, man habe über die Risiken gesprochen, natürlich nicht; das ist zu wenig. Der Gesetzgeber erwartet eine inhaltliche Auseinandersetzung mit den Unternehmensrisiken; man kann prüfen, ob das vorhanden ist. Ob sie richtig oder falsch ist, ist von der Revisionsstelle nicht zu prüfen. (…)“
Auf Grund der vorstehenden Ausführungen ist daher festzuhalten, dass der Gesetzgeber eine inhaltliche Auseinandersetzung mit den bestehenden wesentlichen Risiken und deren Offenlegung erwartet. Blosse Angaben über den Prozess der Risikobeurteilung im Sinne einer Vollzugsmeldung genügen daher u.E. nicht.
2. Im revidierten Revisionsrecht wird neu zwischen ordentlicher (Revisionsstelle muss mindestens eine Zulassung als Revisionsexperte haben) und eingeschränkter Revision (Revisionsstelle muss mindestens eine Zulassung als Revisor haben) unterschieden. Unterschiedlich sind aber nicht nur die Zulassungsanforderungen an die Revisionsstelle, sondern auch der Prüfumfang und die Prüfdichte; diese sind bei der ordentlichen Revision wesentlich weiter gefasst als bei der eingeschränkten Revision. Im Gegensatz zur ordentlichen Revision (vgl. Art. 728b Abs. 2 Ziff. 4 OR enthält der Revisionsbericht bei der eingeschränkten Revision auf Grund des eingeschränkten Prüfumfangs und der eingeschränkten Prüfdichte daher auch keine Genehmigungs- oder Rückweisungsempfehlung mehr (vgl. Art. 729b OR).
Die hauptsächlichen Unterschiede zwischen ordentlicher und eingeschränkter Revision verdeutlicht nachstehende Tabelle in zusammengefasster Form:
Wir hoffen, Ihnen mit diesen Angaben gedient zu haben. Ausführlichere Informationen können wir Ihnen auf diesem Weg leider nicht zukommen lassen. Bei Bedarf empfehlen wir Ihnen, gegebenenfalls eine Fachperson beizuziehen oder die entsprechende Fachliteratur zu konsultieren.
Another highly informative piece of Ben Bernanke
Yesterday the “Chef” of the Fed, Ben Bernanke, published another highly informative piece about the state of money flow, liquidity, fear of inflation and general insights how he handled and is still handling the current economic crisis. It will be interesting to see if Obama will try to use the Fed to pay for his HealthCare idea and other US government expenditures. Ben Bernanke is still resisting this push as he is also resiting the push of some Senators to audit the Fed.
The Congress, however, purposefully–and for good reason–excluded from the scope of potential GAO reviews some highly sensitive areas, notably monetary policy deliberations and operations, including open market and discount window operations. In doing so, the Congress carefully balanced the need for public accountability with the strong public policy benefits that flow from maintaining an appropriate degree of independence for the central bank in the making and execution of monetary policy. Financial markets, in particular, likely would see a grant of review authority in these areas to the GAO as a serious weakening of monetary policy independence. Because GAO reviews may be initiated at the request of members of Congress, reviews or the threat of reviews in these areas could be seen as efforts to try to influence monetary policy decisions. A perceived loss of monetary policy independence could raise fears about future inflation, leading to higher long-term interest rates and reduced economic and financial stability. We will continue to work with the Congress to provide the information it needs to oversee our activities effectively, yet in a way that does not compromise monetary policy independence.
From my point of view, Ben Bernanke is a very fine man doing a very fine job.
he told the Senate Banking Committee. “The American consumer is not going to be the source of a global boom by any means.”
Oswald Grübel is kicking some *ss!
Well I never particularly liked Oswald Grübel when he was head of Credit-Suisse (and I actually do not know why). But since he has taken over at UBS, I am slowly becoming a fan of him. Yesterday he released an internal UBS Memo, to my great satisfaction it contained some clear leadership.
Im Schatten des Erfolgs sei es zu schlimmen Übertreibungen und allzu kurzfristigem Denken gekommen, und es habe Kompromisse in Bezug auf die Qualität und die Reputation gegeben.
and
Die Strategiearbeit richtet sich auf Schlagworte aus: Reputation, Integration und Abwicklung. Der Schutz der Reputation stehe über allem, und diesem Ziel würden alle Aktivitäten untergeordnet.
Subprime, how much is it worth today?
So how much are the houses worth that sold like crazy just one year ago, today? WSJ has an interesting article about the new prices of the houses: Subprime Resurfaces as Housing-Market Woe
This is going to pressure the banks further:
The U.S. housing market is facing new downward pressure as holders of subprime-mortgage bonds flood the market with foreclosed homes at prices that are much lower than where many banks are willing to sell.
and
According to Karen Weaver, global head of securitization research at Deutsche Bank AG, the steepest losses are on subprime loans, where lenders generally are recovering just 26% of the original loan amount.
Obviously there is not a lot of refinancing going on – or that is not interesting for the buyers:
There still is much more inventory that mortgage-servicing firms are racing to sell for securitization trusts. Such entities tend to sell in bulk so that they can cut losses, finding it more cost-efficient to move homes through foreclosure and subsequent sale than to try to restructure the mortgage with the borrower. Securitization trusts also realize that potential buyers won’t step in unless the price is attractive.
VirtualBox 3.0.0-BETA_1 is really fast, no comparison to qemu
Because I had such great experience in the past with VirtualBox I downloaded and installed VirtualBox 3.0 Beta 1 recently. And I must say that it just works flawlessly! 1. The Installation after downloading the Files was really fast, then 2. My Windows XP is as fast as anything I could imagine. I can actually have my Linux and my Windows XP running at the same time with no performance problems whatsoever with 2 GB of RAM. Ok I got one of those Intel SSDs (160GB) that might make a difference but I really give VirtualBox my thumbs-up and Qemu my Thumbs-Down, including my toes! I tried to use Qemu for a long time but (between the VirtualBox versions 1.5 and 3.0) and for the mean time I am back to VirtualBox because it is such a real pleasure to use it! Thank you VirtualBox! Thank you to DownloadSquad for pointing this out to me.
Bond Vigilantes
From the Wikipedia:
Bond vigilantes is a term first coined by Edward Yardeni in 1984 to describe bond market investors who protest monetary or fiscal policies they consider inflationary by selling bonds, thus increasing yields [1].
In the bond market, prices move inversely to yields. When investors perceive that inflation risk is rising they demand higher yields to compensate for the added risk [2]. As a result, bond prices fall and yields rise, which increases the net cost of borrowing. The term references the ability of the bond market to serve as a restraint on the government’s ability to over-spend and over-borrow.
and
Clinton Administration
From October of 1993 to November of 1994 10-year yields climbed from 5.2% to just over 8.0% over worries concerning the fiscal profligacy of the Clinton Administration. Upon this and the influence of Robert Rubin, Bill Clinton adopted a concerted effort to reduce the deficit. 10-year yields dropped to approximately 4% by November 1998[3].
Clinton political adviser James Carville said at the time that “I used to think that if there was reincarnation, I wanted to come back as the president or the pope or as a .400 baseball hitter. But now I would like to come back as the bond market. You can intimidate everybody[4].”
As I read this in WSJ today:
Late Monday in New York, the 10-year note rose 18/32 point, or $5.625 for every $1,000 invested, at 95 5/32, to yield 3.713%, down from 3.783% late Friday, as yields move inversely to prices.
It’s all a cycle
Ok, how interesting is this. Obama brings back the laws that Clinton tore down:
Other efforts have had unintended consequences. The Clinton administration won legislation that broke down Depression-era barriers between commercial banking, investment banking and insurance, among other things. Mr. Obama has criticized that law for helping create some of the financial behemoths that threatened the economy last year.
Get the full article here. This sure does make sense. But keep in mind that Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac where and still are both Goverment Agencies that where used by the Clinton Administration to dole out cheap housing. Of course during the whole Clinton years the economy was booming, credit was cheap (because of Greenspan) and so that was then affordable. It is all a cycle. And people really either do not know or like to ignore this fact as well:
President Bush recommended a significant regulatory overhaul of the housing finance industry in 2003, but many Democrats opposed his plan, fearing that tighter regulation could greatly reduce financing for low-income housing, both low- and high-risk.[citation needed] Bush opposed two other acts of legislation: [22][23] Senate Bill S. 190, the Federal Housing Enterprise Regulatory Reform Act of 2005, which was introduced in the Senate on January 26, 2005, sponsored by Senator Chuck Hagel and co-sponsored by Senators Elizabeth Dole and John Sununu. S. 190 was discussed in the Senate Banking Committee on July 28, 2005, with the result: “Ordered to be reported with an amendment in the nature of a substitute favorably”, meaning the bill was reported out of committee, yet not voted on.
Credit and Liquidity Programs and the Balance Sheet
Some news from the Fed:
The Federal Reserve on Wednesday issued the first of an ongoing series of monthly reports providing considerable new information on its credit and liquidity programs.
The report, entitled Federal Reserve Credit and Liquidity Programs and the Balance Sheet, makes public a wide range of data concerning borrowing patterns and collateral.
Download the report here.
Nice tidbits from the Statistical Review of World Energy 2009
Renewable energy continued to grow strongly. Global wind and solar generation capacity increased by 29.9% and 69%, respectively – both figures above the 10-year average. Driven by a favourable policy environment, US wind capacity rose by 49.5%, surpassing Germany as the world’s capacity leader. Ethanol production rose by one-third driven by continued strong growth in the US and Brazil. Download the PDF here:
or
Global gas production grew by 3.8%, above the 10-year average of 3%. Strong growth was driven by the US, which for the second consecutive year accounted for the largest increment to global production. In the US output rose by 7.5%, 10 times the 10-year average and the strongest volumetric growth on record. The development of unconventional resources and strong drilling activity (which began to decline later in the year as prices weakened) drove the US increase. Qatar accounted for the second-largest increment to supply as pipeline shipments to the UAE continued to ramp up. EU production rose for the fi rst time since 2004, as increases in the Netherlands and Denmark offset UK declines.
Open Source Teddy Bears 
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