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We may be a tiny country when viewed from space. But when it comes to corruption and other such activities, we certainly stand out on the world map. According to the World Bank, corruption adds up to 10% to the cost of doing business globally, and up to 25% to the cost of government contacts in developing countries. In the case of Top Glove, the world's biggest rubber glove producer, it has a policy of zero tolerance for corruption. The Top Glove boss certainly walks his talk. His company sells rubber gloves to 180 countries or almost the entire world. It employs some 11,000 workers at its plants in Malaysia, Thailand and China and grossed a turnover of RM2 billion in its last financial year. Corruption undermines good governance, grossly distorts public policy and leads to misallocation of resources. The beast of corruption can only be tamed with the cooperation of a wide range of stakeholders, including most importantly the state, civil society and the private sector. Ther...

The closing gap By about September last year, buyers no longer became very interested to buy; they got tired. They were buying at prices that they think should be lower than what they would have paid a year ago. Owners began decreasing their prices until an equilibrium point, where asking prices and transacted prices began matching around December last year. "Because of the wait-and-see attitude of buyers, a lot more sellers began thinking, 'Oh oh, is this the end of the cycle? Am I hitting about 90% peak? Let me release the properties.'" Residential properties packaged within mixed use developments will fare particularly well, believes Kho. “The products that are doing well are the self sustaining products where you got retail, residential, hotel and shophouse components all together. Investors, especially the foreigners, will ask, ‘How is it going to sustain itself? Why would someone want to live in this location?” Take a look at another real estates related ...

Edited from the comment by G.Sivalingam in "Is Capitalism at Fault?": To allow capitalism to work, the insolvent banks or banks riddled with high non-performing loans and lack of capital should be allowed to fail and go bankrupt and exit out of the system. This is what should happen under perfect competition. However, it seems that most governments are not in favour of a capitalist system where the driving force is "survival of the fittest". What has in fact failed is government and the state which allowed or even facilitated greed and weak corporate governance to triumph over the economic system in allocating scarce economic resources. What the government did was to encourage the banks to take excessive risks at the expense of the depositors and taxpayers, which the government preferred to call it a "workout" instead of a bail out. The vast misallocation of funds hurt the pockets of the taxpayers. In other words, when banks made profits, they kept ...

True education was to be restricted to the son and daughters of the elite. For the rest, it would be better to produce skilled workers with no particular aspirations other than to enjoy life. ~ G.Edward Griffin, The Creature from Jekyll Island Above statement was mentioned when studying education and freedom . Below are some related points happening in the real world, excerpt from an article from The Sun Daily newspaper. As far as young people are concerned, they could play an important role. Young people in campus, they have no responsibilities. And they are full of hope and aspiration. But what the government did – which was very bad – was burden young people with debts. The moment you enter campus, you are in ... I was so shocked! RM40,000, RM60,000 debt. Come on! You are only 22 and you have a RM40,000 debt? Gila! So they tie you up, you know? After paying off PTPTN (National Higher Education Fund Corporation) loan, pay for a car loan … then a house. So all your life is about...

An interesting ads found at The Edge Financial Daily newspaper: Old Newsstand New Newsstand Must Go Early Real People Limited Copies, may be sold out No Back Issues Buy other Sundry Goods Early Delivery Multimedia Links Open 24 Hours Archive Library No Sundry Goods. ;P Worth noting is that for digital version, user experience may vary with different tablets. Though there may be some issue here, the march of technology is definitely unstoppable. Another eye catching line about the business model would be statement at the ads bottom: Read it for FREE thanks to BMW and SP Setia Group (Property Developer) What say you? :)

Financial freedom is not about amassing millions of dollars to live off of. It is simply having more money coming in every month in cash flow from your investments, or your business, than is going out in living expenses. For example, Robert (Kim’s husband) and I retired in 1994, but we didn’t have a lot of money. What we had was $10,000 per month coming in from our investments, primarily real estate at that time. We had $10,000 coming in every month, but our living expenses were only $3,000, so at that point, we were financially-free. And then from there, we grew it and grew it and grew it. Financial Freedom = Income > Expenses, FOREVER Awareness = Success  Be aware of self-defeating messages inside your head and replace them with positive, self-affirming messages. ~ Secret The reason a lot of people don’t believe in their self worth is because they’ve been programmed to believe that. They’ve been programmed to believe that they’re not worth much. They’ve...

James Cameron Bought Farmland In New Zealand James Cameron, the director behind blockbuster hits Titanic and Avatar has bought around 1000 hectares of farmland (reportedly valued at $20 million) in south Wairarapa, New Zealand. One of the farms Cameron bought includes Lake Pounui, which the Bayleys real estate website describes as "possibly the finest privately owned natural lake in the country". The records show that Cameron and his family, who currently live in Malibu, California, plan to "reside indefinitely" in New Zealand, and operate both properties as working farms. According to Green Party co-leader Russell Norman, foreigners buying up New Zealand land will see land prices skyrocket, driving it out of the hands of kiwis. " There's a bigger issue if you look at globally productive land, particularly land that can produce food and has access to water, which New Zealand obviously is well placed, that land is becoming increasingly valuable, as th...

An old bank savings passbook from Kwong Yik Bank. Stated in the cover: If you try hard enough, you can be whatever you want to be.

As we embark on lifelong learning process, continuous improvement to our multiple streams of passive income is important. A Look Into The (iPhone) Apps World shows that there is a promising future for apps market. Let's take a look on the comparison of both world. 4 Types of Internet Income 3 Types of Apps Income 1. Content Publishing 2. Affiliate Program 3. Resale Rights 4. Own Products 1. Apps Download (apps sales) 2. iAd / AdMob (similar to Adsense) 3. In App Purchase Internet User Behavior Apps Use Behavior Check Mail Surf Net Watch Movie Social Networking Search Info Forum, Blog, Chat Buy apps Buy apps Buy apps Content Publishing Apps ~ 0 cost with domain mapping , or simply pay annual hosting fees (for more server related freedom) $99 annual listing fees for selling unlimited apps on iTunes Content cost (your time for writing or article purchase cost) Apps development cost High competition (looking at number of website...

Missed Christmas, New Year, Chinese New Year traffic? There is this Valentine's Day coming on 14th February, every year! Check out the simple idea below, where it has 2500+ LIKES, and 4600+ SHARES in Facebook: Imagine if you have something viral similar to this, say "10 Steps To Prepare A Romantic Dinner" for your food related content business, will it help to bring traffic for your site? The Flower Knot http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.169713853136971.34182.153636578078032&type=3

The Sun Daily Newspaper, February 2, 2012

the internet contributed 4.1% of Malaysia’s GDP or US$9.75 billion of the US$238 billion GDP (RM30 billion of RM738 billion) in 2010. This places Malaysia among the highest of 30 fast growing countries in terms of internet GDP, surpassing the US and China. Malaysian businesses today only spend 1% of their advertising budget on online mediums. The amount of time Malaysians spend on TV, print and radio is equivalent to the amount of time they spend on the internet. in the UK, companies spend between 25% and 30% of their advertising budgets online. while Malaysian businesses sell more things online than many other countries with similar wealth, they have yet to invest in internet advertising to the same extent other countries do. while internet penetration has increased to 62.3% as of early January, with a target of 75% by end-2015, only 100,000 out of 700,000 small medium enterprises (SME) have online presence. There are 600,000 SMEs without websites. If policies are put in place...

Sentoria - the developer and operator of the Bukit Gambang Resort City (BGRC) in Kuantan, Pahang - is slated to be listed on the Main Market of Bursa Malaysia on Feb 23. The indicative price is believed to be 85 sen a share with the IPO expected to involve a public issue and an offer for sale of a total of 100 million shares, or 25% of its enlarged paid-up share capital. Its IPO will raise RM51.6 million for the group, of which: - RM27.7 million would be for working capital; - RM11.2 million for repayment of bank borrowings; - RM9 million for purchase of property, plant and equipment; and - RM3.7 million to defray listing expenses. The exercise entails a public issue of 60 million new shares and an offer-for-sale of 40 million promoters’ shares. Of the 60 million new shares: - 20 million are for public balloting; - 10 million for directors, employees and business associates at 85 sen per share; - 30 million shares are for private placement at placement price of 87 sen p...