Depending on your style of trading and stocks investing as well as your risks management, rumors could be your best friends. You can’t ignore rumors totally because it moves the stocks. Of course you need the flexibility (your local stock exchange) to make money out of such volatility. The best is if you can long and short stocks with ease without which you might be putting your foot onto a landmine and need to wait for the next bull-cycle (average 10-year-cycle) to break-even – simply because you were at the wrong place at the wrong time and .you’re stubborn enough not to cut-loss.

Whether you like it or not, the local stock market has entered a new dimension thanks to the unbelievable result from the recent 12th general election which saw the government lost its precious two-third majority and five states. The symbiosis relationship between politics and stocks has gotten even closer than before, so much so that the overnight Dow Jones performance is taking back seat. For example, when the Works Ministry announced it would study the country’s highway concession agreements last week almost immediately investors dumped their stocks related to toll concessions.

PLUS Expressway Berhad (KLSE: PLUS, stock-code 5052) was one of the obvious victims. Heck I shouldn’t call this stock a victim of investors’ nervousness since you (the concessionaire) can milk this cash-cow for another 30 years till 2038. But do you really think for a second that these rich highway tycoons would be punished? Come on! If the previous Works Minister was willing to let his own peoples’ temple burnt to ground than to even initiate a meeting to revise the already bias agreements towards the toll concessionaires, do you think these companies will lose a single cent now? The most likely scenario will be the government quietly paid the compensations for not allowing these toll collectors to raise the rates. And whose money would be use to pay if not the tax-payers? Who’re the suckers taken for granted here?

 

It’s puzzling why the government, maybe through EPF, could not just acquire all these toll assets. Wouldn’t it be a good political strategy to be extra nice to the voters while at the same time make money from the “new toll rates” acceptable to all? The privatization concept has breached its boundaries to the extent that only certain cronies benefited from the suffering of the people. And these cronies or concessionaires are very powerful indeed if you take the recent Grand Saga-Bandar Mahkota Cheras (BMC) issue into perspective. They’re so powerful that the police force is easily mistaken as part of the toll concessionaires’ employees under their payroll. Since when does the Royal Police Force venture into construction and toll-collection business, you might wonder?

Yes, police brutality has also entered a new phase inline with the recent general election outcome which saw the Federal government is all out for vengeance particularly with the five opposition states governments. And what better way than to sabotage, frustrate and punish the voters who voted against the Federal government? Already people are seeing and hearing more stories of hard-working DBKL doubling trips shutting down hawker stalls and business premises especially restaurants. But the brutality in beating up and hurting innocent civilians are really mind-boggling, never mind the beaten one is the Member of Parliament. It appeared the job scope of police force has change dramatically from protecting civilians to intimidating and if given chance, beating and harassing civilians. Has the country slowly entering the police state, just inches from Myanmar’s military junta model? One thing is for sure though – the crime rate skyrockets as we speak. Don’t believe me? Go and ask your aunts or uncles staying in the rural areas.

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May 10th, 2008 by financetwitter

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