Worldsec – Forefront IPO document

Forefront International Holdings Ltd.(FIL) is mainly engaged in the distribution and sale of heavy commercial vehicles in the Greater China region. the Group has the exclusive distribution rights.

Bala article on using Mauritius for Chinese funding to India

Mauritius is in the fortunate position of having good relations with China and India. It is true that Singapore also has the same advantages while at the same time being one of the major financial centres of the world and with a very big Yuan deposit base.

Worldsec – Natural Beauty IPO document

Natural Beauty Bio-Technology Limited (NB) is capitalising on two new and lucrative trends in the beauty care business, a shift towards natural ingredients and growing use of expensive body treatments rendered in spas to augment the beauty regimen.

From Lenin to Lee Kuan Yew, legacies are determined by the living

I have seen the mausoleums of Vladimir Lenin, Mao Zedong (毛澤東) and Ho Chi Minh. Thousands still line up in hushed silence, to see them, demonstrating to non-believers that the embalmed bodies still serve a powerful emotional and political purpose.

Worldsec – Writing on Jockey Club of Hong Kong

Hong Kong’s Jockey Club, one of the last bastions of the old older in the one-time colony, is doing its best to commit suicide in true dinosaur fashion, and the Government,which ought to know better, is helping it.

How British colonial rule left Hong Kong politically stunted

There are some who think Hong Kong might have been better off, economically and politically, had it remained a British colony. Economically and socially, British rule was good, but it was a total failure politically – and the consequences are still with us.

Why rich societies like HK are committing demographic suicide

As a newly married man in Singapore many years ago, my hairdresser once asked me when my wife and I were going to have our first child. I replied, like many people do even today, that it was too expensive to have a child and to bring one up.

Rule of law depends on Hongkongers’ values, not foreign judges

It is no longer acceptable to have 19th-century prejudices such as the belief that the absence of melanin in the skin makes a person superior. However, the equally 19th-century belief that people from Europe or the US cannot be judged by “oriental” laws…

HK must avoid an underground hell on Earth

Whenever I hear about expanding urban space below ground, as a study regarding better utilisation of some of our most popular recreational grounds intends to do, I think about a 600-year-old Turkish spa or hamam…

How one Malaysian school became a bright spot in colonialism’s dark legacy

Neither of my parents knew any English. The reason I can write passable English is down to the schools I attended in Penang, Malaysia. Penang Free School, my secondary school, celebrates its 200th anniversary on October 21.

A rising China is good news for ethnic Chinese in Southeast Asia – up to a point

On the last day of the Rio Olympics, when the celebrated Malaysian badminton player Lee Chong Wei was playing in the final against a Chinese, I was attending Malaysia’s Merdeka Day (Independence Day) Ball.

Why the days of Western banks in Asia are clearly numbered

Many people already know that Chinese banks are some of the largest in the world. But I was astonished to learn recently that some banks in India have a market capitalisation greater than the mighty Deutsche Bank.

‘Little England’ made a wise choice to leave the pompous, crumbling EU

After the Brexit vote, “Little England” is being used as a term of derision. But, to me, it is not size that matters but whether a country is able to provide security and jobs for its citizens.

Whoever wins the US presidency, expect the dawn of a wrenching new global order

Around this time next year, people in Asia and elsewhere will be wondering how they could have missed the signals about the political and economic tsunami that the US has unleashed on the world.

Hong Kong banks need to put the customer first, not profits

A long time ago, I was persuaded by a credit card company that somehow the colour of the plastic you carried in your wallet determined your status and so I applied for a “gold” card.

First, a cabbie. Next, a legislator of South Asian descent in Hong Kong?

Two men surnamed Khan have made the news recently – one in Hong Kong, one in London. Both have a success story to tell, but the difference in what they aspired to speaks volumes about social progress and prejudice in the two cities.

Suzie Wong

On a recent trip to Kyoto, Japan, during the cherry blossom season, I was surprised at the hundreds of “geishas” wandering around town, though I had seen only one or two during our last trip there a couple of decades ago.

Instead of Queen’s Road Central, let’s have Sun Yat Sen Avenue in Hong Kong

There is not a street or road named after Dr Sun Yat-sen in Hong Kong. However, there are streets named after him in Calcutta, India, and in many other places, including even Mauritius.

Britain, like Singapore in 1965, has outgrown the need to be part of a federation

An island nation that was dependent on free trade, international finance and other services for its wealth was part of a larger federation across the channel. The federation, unlike the island, had its own rigid political and economic imperatives…

Poor excuse

Anyone with even a passing knowledge of India can immediately see that Indians arriving in Hong Kong to seek “political asylum” are engaged in a scam.

A vein of anger

It should be easy to understand the ideology of Donald Trump in Hong Kong – he is just like a Hong Kong “localist” but on an American scale.

A balanced world for young and old

The two biggest expenditure items of the Hong Kong government are education and health. Education expenditure is spent mostly on the young and the health expenditure is spent mostly on the old.

Bala Comments on stock exchange Board Diversity

Diversity of opinion is a cure to a dogmatic mindset and rigidity; it is not an aesthetic question and has positive implications on corporate goverance by encouraging a balance of perspectives.

Bala East Timor article

East Timor also has an unemployment rate of about 20 per cent and a literacy rate of about just 40 per cent.East Timor’s history accounts for its backwardness, as it was brutally colonised by the Portuguese for about 400 years

Bala article in China Daily on Taiwan and Hong Kong.

People in Taiwan are even more worried about economic stagnation and income inequality than Hong Kong people.The ratio of a ordability for a residence in Taipei is even worse than in Hong Kong

Bala article in Washington Post and New York Times 1980

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