Thursday, January 08, 2009

Eyewashes

We had to wait till the guy from Financial Times got up and asked a great question at the satyam press conference. A clear-cut question and not a lecture like the guy from Aaj Tak decided to give or some of the more classy uninformed ones by other business telly reporters. I was also puzzled at why print kept so quiet on the whole - the telly channels sent their bruisers in, the newspapers should have done the same, the biggest business story in a few months - you should send your big guns.
Anyway, the conference was an eyewash - Ram Mynampati could not clearly answer any question let alone explain why they hadn't filed a police complaint against Ramalinga Raju. They claim they are responsible to their employees but Ramalinga raju wrote a metaphorical suicide note and while it could well be dishonest, one thing has to be taken at face value - the man committed a massive fraud. Mynampati is trying to be Gerald Ford to Richard Nixon but while like Ford he has inherited the hot seat he isn't the highest power in the land.
My underlying question remains, who on earth is buying Satyam shares? Over 70 per cent of the company traded hands yesterday - is the Raju family trying to buy back the company after scaring investors off and will they then claim that Ramalinga Raju was 'mentally disturbed'? Some online forums are even reccommending Satyam shares. I do not really believe this scam is over - something is still horribly fishy.
Moving beyond Satyam - Read Eric Schmidt's assertation on Fortune about how Google really, really wants newspapers to survive. After stealing all their advertising! Heh!

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Right boss. Till that FE guy, it was all boring and crap. He almost got Mynampati pants down ;)

U r saying things are fishy, This pond is full of rotten smell... Eukkkk

Shashikant Kore said...

K,

This is classic Greater Fool Theory at play. But unfortunately, this decision may wipe out the capital of the buyers proving there is no "bigger fool" out there.

I am sure many of the institutions are out of the stock, there will only be speculators trading this stock.

Anonymous said...

this clip of Erin Burnett's http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=988312116&play=1
was the most interesting Satyam item on i saw on tv yesterday...

you should check the bid to offer quantity of Satyam on moneycontrol, 5.some lakhs to 0....

what surprising is no political party has made a statement...i mean YSR Reddy and PC Gupta have but no party's spokesmen.....
at least i have not seen any

The thing is this guy might be seen like some Robin Hood....with his charity and that as he claims he only lied dint benefit monetarily benefit.Sympathy you know

and who actually believes that PWC is actually so dimwitted to miss 5000 crores due to negligence. If this is anything, even R.Raju did not clear them in his letter

Srini said...

So what was the question? And what was Ram Mynampati's response?

Anonymous said...

what worries me even more is that here is the dead silence from the liks of Shiv Madar and more importantly Azim Premji, both of whom run their companies like family owned enterprises. Are they next?

Anonymous said...

Away from all this...I hear the 'bastard child' is busy issuing relieving lettters to staff? Staff has even been told to look out for other jobs...