Monday, February 19, 2007

Follow up

Over a month passed since the time I have created this blog and life has written new lines to some of the stories present in my previous posts.

Business ethics

Last week's Wall Street Journal presented a couple of interesting stories, which add to the post about unethical behavior of business professionals (http://janbartczak.blogspot.com/2007/01/when-will-they-learn.html).

Siemens seems to be in a lot of trouble as bribery allegations might overlap with a German-Russian big-time telecommunications scandal, deepening the company's problems. The case is even more severe, as the issue is clearly not only unethical, but also unlawful behavior.

An example of handling a similar issue completely differently was given with KPMG and its CEO, who decided to admit to the organizations unlawful practices and tried to eliminate such behavior. These actions apparently saved the company, which faced a threat similar to the one that destroyed Arthur Andersen a couple of years ago.

Securities market

In the post “What does the market hold for the future?” (http://janbartczak.blogspot.com/2007/01/what-does-market-hold-for-future.html), I have discussed the possible effect of various factors on the stock market.

Some time followed since then and a couple of things are clearer now. The stock market is obviously affected by the fluctuations of oil prices, and moves in such industries as the Technology Sector (which particularly holds for NASDAQ).

Through this month the Dow Jones Industrial Average showed strength, as it climbed over 12,700 points, and set yet another record in the high 700’s. It is interesting to see now, how the major indices will react to such factors as lower automobile demand, changes in real estate prices and oil price fluctuations.