The Anniversary

What a difference a year made! About a year ago, who would have known how the entire financial world would change so dramatically. I remember vividly that I was sitting in NTU's Free Access Lab watching the financial world disintegrating before my eyes. It was between classes and I was checking the headlines on CNBC and Bloomberg, Merrill Lynch merged with Bank of America and Lehman Brothers was allowed to go into bankruptcy.

I still remembered Lehman's exquisite recruitment session where students were required to wear suit and tie, hop on a bus to a luxurious hotel for their recruitment talk. The hall was filled with hundreds of people and when they were only hiring less than 4 people for their Singapore office. Lehman's asian employees were definitely high-fliers, their equity department head was from GIC, others came from very established names as well.

Nonetheless all this came to naught with a tumbling crash that virtually sent the global economy into cardiac arrest. Money market funds broke the buck and froze the entire repo market. Countries after countries were forced to guarantee all deposits of banks. All trade and economic indicators went into a virtual freefall. Undoubtedly, we were facing a meltdown. Many of my classmates were still in a world of their own, oblivious about the rampage that was going on.

Then later AIG got into trouble and people were queueing up outside AIA building wanting to pull out of their investment policies. AIG's CEO for Asia jumped ship the just barely a week after he was being interviewed on Businesstimes for "view from the top". The claim was that he was disillusioned by management in the US.

To be honest, I knew of the magnitude and severity of the problems beforehand but I did not expect it to unfold the way it did. Not a chance at all. I did went into the markets, to buy, but I went in too early. The pain was massive, as the asset values were cut by more than half in less than a week. I was spooked and did not have the emotional capacity, there I stood rooted in fear of what more unimaginable was to come.

Fast forward a year later, having being a participant to witness one of the worst financial bloodbath in history, I have definitely grown. My investment philosophies were being redefined and is now taking clear definite shape. It has now encompassed way more dimensions and understanding that I would ever dreamed of previously. In a way, it felt like growing up. Previously, I was a new kid to the block. Now, I am ready to move on to the next stage.