Powered by glolg
Display Preferences Most Recent Entries Chatterbox Blog Links Site Statistics Category Tags About Me, Myself and Gilbert XML RSS Feed
Sunday, July 12, 2015 - 21:18 SGT
Posted By: Gilbert

HODL-ing Pairs

Mr. Ham: Good evening, human!

Me: Mr. Robo has been discharged, it seems. Eh, is that... duct tape supporting his... family jewels?

Mr. Ham: Well, his company insurance plan had been plunder... had hit its annual payout limits. The doctor did say it probably would be okay as long as they remained immobilized while the healing process continues, and anyway, a strapping young hamster like Mr. Robo shouldn't be cooped up in a hospital ward. What's a bit of discomfort, yeah? Are you ham or mouse?

Mr. Robo: I fail to see the significance of that query.

Mr. Ham: And also, the firm of H.L. Ham is badly missing its sole technical expert, especially after Bitcoin's crossed the 300 Rubicon again. Smack-dab in the middle of our called range, high volume action. It's 2013 all over again! Interest's mounting from my Hamerican friends!

Me: Sure it's not another false alarm?

Mr. Ham: *puffs on cigar* I'll let you know as soon as I get Mr. Robo to consult our "spreadsheet" thing. All those tiny numbers in cells always gave me a headache.

Mr. Robo: I'm not too sure on that, the crypto market's always been sorta iffy to me...

Mr. Ham: Yeah, 400% Litecoin pump-and-dump from under two bucks to over eight, like the good old days. And then, I looked over at the Chinese stock markets:


Does this look like the face of someone who's joking, comrade?
(Source: imgur.com)


I thought, obviously this is more of the usual satire - like, who could have actually thought that there wasn't an equity bubble? And it was doing just what bubbles do, pop, when lo and behold, interest rates got cut. Fine, standard playbook.

That didn't do enough, so a couple of days later, it was announced that pensions funds would be allowed to, i.e. had better, buy in. Oh, and why not mortgage your apartment to plug the bottomless pit, ahem, invest? No effect. Eh, what the heck, let's have more leverage, here's more money to lend out, you brokers had better chip in, and you get-rich-quick IPO-ers please step aside for awhile. But, fair enough, organizing emergency rescue funding has been S.O.P, even if it generally turns out to be merely a delaying tactic.

Still no dice, the markets were still plunging, and one can imagine how that must have gone over at H.Q.: "Comrade, it's no use! People are still pulling their money out now, instead of volunteering to stay in and lose more money!" "Where has the spirit of socialist sacrifice gone to? What can we do?" And then a young assistant says, "Since the problem is that people are selling stocks, why don't we just... ban selling? For, like, half a year?" Then a short silence. "Blimey, Comrade Wang! You're a genius! Why didn't we think of that earlier?"

As of now, it's come to having new graduates chant "Revive the A shares, benefit the people." I really, really, really hope they're being sarcastic, but I'm not overly optimistic.

Me: That's a slightly dramatic overview, if not entirely inaccurate. Still, they likely have some tools in reserve. Trouble is, in an authoritarian society, when an official mouthpiece declares that an inflated-looking market is just beginning to rise, who are loyal citizens expected to believe - the fundamentals, or the policymakers?

Oh yes, and Mr. Ham, on your short story.

Mr. Ham: You've edited it?

Me: Nah, still busy. It might be a sensitive time to release it, however, seeing as how our two major MRT lines went down the day after you handed it off to me, and guess who's coming under fire? All the more as they don't even know what caused it, though I imagine that they have managed a preliminary conjecture, with all the helicopter vision buzzing about.

Mr. Ham: Whoops.

Me: On the bright side, it's gotten some creative juices flowing, with two locked-on hits spawned within hours. Ah, and Singapore Pools and the Singapore Turf Club have applied to be exempted from the online gambling ban several days ago, which led to a poor concerned The State's Times reader to write in and bemoan this development... when it was bloody obvious that the whole song-and-dance was to capture the market for themselves! Though, as previously raised, I expect quite a bit of leakage through alternative channels.

Mr. Ham: Wow, no shit, much shock, très un-un-unbelievable!

Me: And yes, guess who's released?

Mr. Ham: For all the lameness of some of his content, one can read into a fundamental shift in governance going on in the background - these days, there's no easy way to shut people up, without paying a hefty price for it. You can say that your stock market's all hunky-dory, or that your investment fund's hit record total portfolio value again - hope they can cash out of China, mind - but you can't stop others from saying that it ain't all it's cracked up to be. Which reminds me, the local mainstream media has an irritating habit of removing articles after awhile. Would it kill them to leave pages up?

Me: 'Kay, back to work, hubba-hubba. Almost forgot, anything fresh, Mr. Robo?

Mr. Robo: Eh, real-time video stitching from your uni made the news. And, automatated reinstallations.

Me: Good, good. *put on music* Work, work.



[The urban-legendy backwards version]
[N.B. Perhaps if you knew exactly what you're looking out for...]




comments (0) - email - share - print - direct link
trackbacks (0) - trackback url


Next: Confirmations


Related Posts:
Mr. Robo's New Profession
Think Thunk
The Week After
Groundwork
Riding The Current
Back to top

Copyright © 2006-2025 GLYS. All Rights Reserved.