How do people with schizophrenia develop professionally and socially Research Paper

How individuals with schizophrenia grow expertly and socially - Research Paper Example cap various patients with schizophrenia range issue suffer issues in adapting to regular and unpredicted pressure (Lysaker, Tsai, and Hammoud, 2009). They may experience issues in recognizing objects/individuals, verbal familiarity (Landrã ¸ and Ueland, 2008), and in arranging and starting exercises, which inside and out influence fundamental social aptitudes and practices at the working environment (Liddle, 2000, p.12). In view of these psychological and social shortages, schizophrenics will in general negligence stressors through restraint (Scholes and Martin, 2010), or not, at this point attempt elective and gainful proportions of giving their issues (Lee and Schepp, 2011). This paper analyzes the impacts of schizophrenia on the personalities of individuals with this issue. A few sources indicated that however individuals with schizophrenia battle with their state of mind during their lifetime, with appropriate treatment and backing, they can live profitable and autonomous lives (Liberman, and Silbert, 2005; Lysaker, Tsai, and Hammoud, 2009). Social impedances are considered as significant pieces of schizophrenia and poor social working is one of the side effects expected to analyze this psychological sickness (Birchwood, Birchwood, and Jackson, 2001, p.108). Individuals with schizophrenia frequently experience the ill effects of semantic memory issues, which can influence their comprehension of the real world, just as their social connections and connections (Doughty and Done, 2009). Doughty and Done (2009) directed precise survey and meta-examinations to comprehend if individuals with schizophrenia for the most part experience the ill effects of issues with semantic memory, to decide the particular profile of the disability over the wide range of trial of semantic memory, and to know how the semantic memory impedance interfaces with different side effects, particularly the Formal Thought Disorder. They distinguished 91 pertinent papers and discoveries demonstrated that members had hindered capacities in naming, word-pic ture coordinating, verbal familiarity, affiliations, preparing, and order; semantic

The Chrysanthemums and A Jury of Her Peers Essay

The Chrysanthemums and A Jury of Her Peers - Essay Example This exploration will start with the explanation that in the realm of writing, each writer starts the innovative procedure in an unexpected way. Some beginning by making an ideal discernment in their work by utilizing one of a kind and dazzling settings to catch the consideration of the crowd. Through this decision of style, they can investigate and show their crowd the world wherein they are going to put their characters. These ways to deal with composing are right and acknowledged recorded as a hard copy, in any case; there are issues that must be seen to make any bit of writing to be viewed as a magnum opus in the field of composing. The setting of a story passes on characters and subjects in a novel distinctively relying upon the nature and sort of the setting. These can be delineated utilizing these two books chrysanthemums and A Jury of Her Peers. Close examination of the chrysanthemums uncovers that the story happens in the Salinas Valley during the long stretch of December at Henry Allen’s property situated on the lower region. Promptly we meet characters who delineate a provincial setting just in the primers of the novel. The ladies are detached in their own reality and the men depict quality and are manlier than standard men are. Elisa’s spouse rides on a range while Elisa herself is restricted to her home and just works in her bloom garden. The setting of the novel conditions her character and causes her to carry on country like. Taking a gander at the topics the country setting of the story draws out the issue of abuse of ladies and opportunity.

Child of Rage Essay Sample

Child of Rage Essay Sample Child of Rage: Real Story That Makes You Cry Child of Rage is an outstanding movie that affected me greatly. It is the hard-hitting documentary film to watch, which is strongly recommended for psychology students, adoption families, foster care, and anyone who is interested in human nature. This heartbreaking movie is based on a real story of a six-year-old girl who suffered violently from attachment disorder. The real name of the main character of the Child of Rage is Beth Thomas. What occurred to the innocent child who became unattached to people around her? The movie deploys the closest relation between the conscious and subconscious of the individuals, reflects the bound with person’s earliest memories, confirming in this way Freud’s theory. Act of Aggression A brother and sister, little Eric and Catherine, have been adopted by a minister and his wife, Rob and Jill Tyler. They both seem sweet and timid children. Suddenly, it becomes apparent that Cat (real name Beth Thomas from “Child of Rage”) has some mental health problems as the little girl displays huge unreasonable outbursts of violent rage. For example, she starts with killing all of the baby birds that her brother loves so much. The little angel sticking the dog with a needle and cutting her classmate with a piece of glass! She beats her brother, Eric! What is more, the girl threats to kill her new parents; once she hides a kitchen knife inside her stuffed toy to stab Jill and Rob in their sleep… Issues Raised in the Movie: Back to Freud‘s Ideas Cat’s new parents try to get to the bottom of this and find out what is hidden behind the girl’s rage explosion. Rob and Jill turned for the help to Doris, a social worker, who, after some hesitation and delay, uncover the truth about Cat’s family. As it turns out, the girl was severely traumatized at the age of one year. Her father, who was an alcoholic and pedophile, sexually abused the infant. He also raped Cat’s older sister, Stephanie, who became a prostitute working at the topless bar as a dancer. Thus, the mental health problem has been revealed. The little girl suffers from attachment disorder caused by sexual molestation. Broadly speaking, this is severe damage that breaks the heart and mind of a child. The uncontrollable rage, which the girl displayed all the time, was the results of sexual abuse. She unconsciously became unattached from people around her and took her anger out even on poor animals. The child mentally was ruined. Her inability to trust, love or care is the result of attachment disorder. This case proves that unattached children trust no one and don’t care who they hurt. They feel like a horrible person or even devil. Children suffering from RAD are capable of anything, including cold-blooded murder. Another feature of the disorder is non-acceptance of any authority. However, in Cats case, the girl can listen to commands of her foster mother. It is one of the bridges which give parents the hope to build communication with the girl. They can try to change the way Cat feels about herself and make her feel valued and loved. Parent’s Choice Problematic Definitely, Child of Rage brings the matter of the concern before those who are about to adopt a child. Just imagine what a hard challenge met Rob and Jill who were expected to raise happily two sweet, healthy children! On the one hand, they can send the girl away to the foster care and bring up only the boy. On the contrary, they have a chance to help this poor child to overcome her past. But to do this, the couple must gather up all the love, courage, and patience they keep in their hearts and face the challenge. The minister proposed to his wife to keep only Eric, but Jill answered that they must help the girl. This Christian family showed lots of love and mercy for the suffering child. They didn’t give up and turned for a psychologist’s help. Apparently, Rob and Jill teach us the lesson of the power of love, hope, and faith. Not many families will keep at home a child who is eager to slaughter members of the family at night. Treatment as a Hope for Abused Child Holding therapy, a controversial treatment method of Dr. Myers, was Cat’s chance for healing. Having examined the girl, the psychologist told Rob and Jill that Cat is a very sick and there is a small chance to create an emotional connection. Nevertheless, Dr. Myers started holding therapy session. Cat admitted to the psychologist that she is eager to kill her foster parents and her brother. Also, the girl told that she would like to kill pets by sticking them with pins to death. Cat explained that she didnt like people around her as well as animals. She preferred to be alone, without outside interference. It is the reason for the girls inappropriate behavior. However, after several therapy sessions, a breakthrough occurs. Cat’s heart melted; and she started to cry. The movie ends with Cat telling her new parents that she loves them. Conclusion It is unbelievable but events from our childhood that took place at the age which most of us unable to recall may lead to mental health disorders. The movie demonstrates clearly how person’s infancy impacts on adult life. It is important to mention that the real girl, Beth Thomas from Child of Rage, grown up and successfully recovered. She lives a normal life working as a nurse. Beth from Child of Rage gives the hope for numerous families who raise children with different kind of mental disorders and fight for their health. We should remember that love and faith really work miracles.

Financial Crisis To A Global One Finance Essay - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 11 Words: 3430 Downloads: 5 Date added: 2017/06/26 Category Finance Essay Type Argumentative essay Did you like this example? Factors that led the US Economy to the Financial Crisis of 2007 and the Mechanisms of Transmission to a Worldwide Crisis During these last few years the most important economic event has affected the worldwide economy has been the financial crisis. There is no precise definition of financial crisis, but a common view is that disruptions in financial markets rise to the level of a crisis when the flow of credit to households and businesses is constrained and the real economy of goods and services is adversely affected.[1]Being students of economics branch, we are continuously studying about the economic models, theories and development of a variety of economic structures. Such event as the financial crisis has really fascinated us and motivated to deepen our knowledge regarding its importance and characteristics. Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "Financial Crisis To A Global One Finance Essay" essay for you Create order It is stated that this financial crisis is the most important and in the meantime the most dramatic one since the Great Depression of 1930s. Considering the importance of such an economic event, we wanted to understand the structure of a financial crisis, the causes that led to it describing specifically the relations between them and the mechanisms of transmission from one step to another; from the starting point to the spread of the crisis within the country of origin and afterwards all over the world. This will provide us with information about the real economy and how it constantly adapts to these happenings. The structure of our paper consists in first explaining the factors that led to the beginning of the financial crisis, which are part of the first chapter and which include War in Iraq, the securitization process, the subprime mortgages and the housing bubble effect. The development of the crisis within the country of origin will be explained in the second chapter; here we have to mention the mechanism of transmission from the financial crisis to the economic one. And in the third and last chapter we will explain channels in which the crisis became global the so called Contagion Process. The factors that led the American Economy to the Financial Crisis War in Iraq After the suicide attacks by   Al-Qaeda terrorists  upon the United States on September 11, 2001, in the World Trade Center  in New York City, the situation of the economy became even worse. This contributed to the loss of business on Wall Street, the Dow Jones[2]industrial average closed down more than 684 points, or more than 7% (dropping below the 9000 mark at 8921, according to preliminary figures), on extraordinarily heavy New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) volume. The Nasdaq[3]composite index dropped by 109 points, or 6.5%, to 1586, leaving the already battered index at its lowest point since October 1998. Besides these devastating losses, the war in Iraq, which began on March 20, 2003, as a counteraction to the terrorists attack, has come at a great cost to the American economy. According to Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz the Iraq war has cost the US 50-60 times more than the Bush administration predicted and was a central cause of the sub-prime banking crisis threatening the world economy[4]He calls it a hidden cause of the current credit crunch. To fight against it, the US central bank responded to the massive financial drain of the war by flooding the American economy with cheap credit. What happened than will be explained later. But before we go there, we also have to mention that in the short run, wartime spending actually stimulates the economy. As another Nobel Prize-winning economist, Paul Krugman argues, the war is indeed a grotesque waste of resources, but we cant blame it for the current economic mess. Remember, the lowest unemployment rate America has experi enced over the last half-century came at the height of the Vietnam War.[5] Securitization Process Securitization is a financial instrument that appeared at the American economy at the beginning of 1980s. It is referred as distribution of default risk by grouping debt obligations(such as mortgages) into a pool, and then selling securities backed by this pool. In other words this means that in order for the banks to ensure funds for their normal and ongoing activity they gave loans to people who became debtors. This money was tied up in banks and they couldnt make any profit of it(except for the part when the loan would be returned which would actually be in a long-term period). In order to profit from the loaning process banks turned these loans into securities; they divided the credits into parts and sold them to other people (security buyers) as obligations with considerably high interest rates. It is estimated about 10% interest rates for these obligations in 2006. In this way the person who had taken the loan from the bank was not a debtor of that bank where he had taken his loan from, but to the buyer of the obligation with his mortgage credit. This process was of priority from both sides- banks could take off the risk by selling these loans(and transferring that risk to the people who bought the loans) and the security buyers got regular payments from the debtors. Banks started borrowing money from other banks in order to lend more money to the people so they could increase the level of the loans and sell these loans as securities. Furthermore, one high street bank such as the Lehman Brothers also bought mortgages so it could securitize them and sell them to the others. At first the people who were profiting the loans were people with sufficient incomes or as it may also be called safe borrowers. After that the situation changed; banks started giving loans also to poor people, people who had credit level below the usual. These loans are known as the subprime mortgages[6]or self-certified loans or also liars loans. Banks started buying, selling and trading securitization or as we may say, they started buying, selling and trading risk. Whats interesting is that the banks tended to spread the risk to the security buyers. Furthermore, involved in this mechanism, banks started to invest. These investments were considered high-profit investments because the obligations were with a considerable percentage of profit (about 10 % interest in annual scale as it is mentioned in the first paragraph). But these kinds of obligations were massively supported by subprime credits. Consequently, this meant that these investments were very risky; not-safe borrowers would have subsequently problems with paying off the credit. Banks were exposed toward the problems by being engaged in these activities. Securitization was implied to be a productive financial instrument that could help the banks lend more and lower the risk; instead, it led towards a risky and unsecure situation. When people started seeing the real situation, the crisis of confidence spread. Investment banks were sitting on high risk loans. There was an increase in the prices and in the value of the immobile property known as the housing bubble(which will be explained in details later) which led to the process that the security buyers wanted their money back. People didnt have money to pay the loans so the banks found themselves in quite a difficult situation. Lacking in deposits, some of them collapsed. At this point, banks turned to the government for help. More money was injected but still it wasnt enough; the banks went bankrupted and the confidence wasnt restored. Subprime Mortgages and the subprime boom There are generally two types of mortgages in the US: fixed-rate mortgages (FRMs), which have an interest rate fixed for the life of the loan; and adjustable-rate mortgages (ARMs), which have variable periodic interest rates. Subprime mortgages are defined as mortgages to borrowers with limited credit histories. Between 2003 and 2006, a high number of mortgages were issued to subprime residential borrowers. Many subprime mortgages are a combination of ARMs and FRMs. Such mortgages provide for a fixed rate for the first two to three years, which is known as the teaser rate, and after that period the interest rate becomes adjustable semiannually. As real estate prices rose in the early years of this decade, and securitization provided more capital for mortgages, lenders changed their underwriting criteria in order to issue more mortgages and turned to subprime lenders. Between 1995 and 2005, subprime mortgages increased from 5% to 20% of the mortgage market. In 1994, $35 billion in subprime mortgages were produced, and by 2006, that number had increased to more than $600 billion, about 17 times more than in 1994. And the most significant cause for this boom appears to be the increase in the securitization of mortgages as it is explained in the first paragraph. Housing Bubble A bubble occurs when exaggerated expectations of future prices increase unusual demand either by people who fear being priced out of a market or by investors hoping to make a lot of money fast. A bubble is a self-fulfilling prophecy for a while, as successive rounds of buyers push prices higher and higher. But the willingness to pay higher and higher prices in fragile: It will end whenever buyers perceive that prices are no longer going up. Hence bubbles carry the seeds of their own destruction. Only time is needed for bubbles to end.[7] The current financial crisis started in the United States housing market in 2007. The US housing market is seen by many as the main cause of the financial crisis. The financial turmoil that engulfed the US during 2007-2009 began in the mortgage lending markets. There are two potentially reasons and competing explanations of the origins of this crisis. The first is that the easy money policies of the Federal Reserve produced the US housing bubble that is at the core of todays financial crisis. The second and more credible explanation is that it was indeed lower interest rates that spawned the speculative euphoria. As found by Robert Schiller, the inflation-adjusted house prices had been remained constant in the period 1895-1995. But he also found that the real house prices in 2002 had rosen almost 30% after adjusting from inflation. This led him think that there would be such a phenomenon called housing bubble The rise in house prices caused large increases in demand for houses, but the supply remained the same. The increase in the demand is attributed to a number of factors such as: Low mortgage rates. Even though the US savings rate was low during the housing bubble, a flow of savings entering the US economy from countries such as Japan and China helped to keep mortgage rates low.   Relaxed standards for mortgage loans.  Standards for mortgage loans were changed as a result of a number of factors: new governmental policies aimed to adopt an increase in home-ownership rates among lower-income households and also greater competition in the mortgage loan market. Low short-term interest rates. The Fed funds rate began in 2001 at 6.25% and ended at 1.75% level at the same year. If the course of housing bubble in the US would have follow the same way as in Japan, the housing bubble would have collapse along with the collapse of the stock bubble in the years 2000-2002. Instead, the collapse of the stock bubble helped to feed the housing bubble, because the loss of faith in the stock market caused that a large number of people turned to investments in immobile property as a better alternative than the stock market. In addition, the economy was very slow recovering from the 2001 recession. The weakness of the recovery of economy, led the Federal Reserve Board to continue cutting interest rates, pushing the Fed funds rate in mid-2003 to a record of 50-years to the level of 1%, where it stayed for a year. In purchasing-power terms, a borrower during that period who merely invested in goods, whose prices merely rose at the rate of inflation, was prof iting in proportion to what he borrowed. In this way, unconsciously, Fed created a credit bubble. But Fed says that the reason of a very low interest rate choice in 2003 and 2004 was that they ignored the dollar weakness, higher interest rate choices abroad, the Taylor Rule[8]and the booming performance of the US and global economics. Affected by some factors, housing bubble burst in 2006. First, average hourly wages in U.S had remained stagnant or declined 2002 until 2009; in real term this represented a decline. Second, growth in the supply for houses tracked price rises. Third, as interest rate rose to a peak of 5.25%, adjustable-rate mortgages (ARMs) become less attractive and so removed many non-prime prospective buyers from the market. Fourth, as house prices fell, home-owners unable to take monthly payments, lost their houses in foreclosures, while banks and other mortgage-lenders lost hundreds of billions (unable to recover amounts loaned). By the beginning of 2007 these changes happened: ÃÆ' ¢Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ¢ Home prices were at unprecedented levels. ÃÆ' ¢Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ¢ Mortgage quality had declined substantially. ÃÆ' ¢Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ¢ Asset-backed securitizations had spread well. This is determined as the beginning of the subprime mortgage crisis. But how did we get to the Financial Crisis? We will try to explain all the mechanism in the upcoming chapter. From the Financial Crisis to the Economic one Because of the rising of the interest rates due to the inflation, the debtors were unable to return the money to the banks. Based on the lending contract, if they couldnt pay the borrowed money back by the end of the maturity of the mortgage, they were obligated to consign their houses to the banks. Millions of home-owners lost their houses. Even though banks had the right of the ownership over the houses, the level of the bank reserves was minimal, because of the non-pay backed loans. In order to profit from the ownership of the houses banks tried to sell them, but the great supply of the houses derived an unpredicted result; people didnt need the houses and moreover, they couldnt pay for them. This led to the devaluation of the house prices. By the first  quarter of 2009, home prices had decreased by over 32% from their 2006 peak.  Ãƒâ€šÃ‚  However, home prices were still 50% higher than they had been in the first  quarter of 1998. Contrary to the housing bubbl e process, the house prices declined dramatically. Banks couldnt get enough money to cover the original inflated loans by selling the foreclosed properties. The bust quickly spread and the crisis had affected the general economy. At this moment distress among subprime mortgage lenders was visible. Some of the top investment banks either failed or were taken over. The deepening crisis in the subprime mortgage market had affected the investors confidence. Confidence was also shaken in many financial institutions so banks began to avoid engaging in any interbank lending activity. But those transactions are the engine of the entire economy. The credit crunch became a visible crisis when there was zero liquidity in the market. That is the point where subprime crisis crossed the border and turned into the credit crisis (crunch). On December 1, 2008, the National Bureau of Economic Research announced that the economy had entered into a recession in December of 2007. Real GDP increased by only 1.1% for the year 2008. Real GDP  decreased  at annual rates of 6.3% in the 4th quarter of 2008 and of 5.7% in the 1st  quarter of 2009. The unemployment rate increased from 4.9% in December of 2007 to 9.5% in June of 2009. From the Economic Crisis to the Global one In this chapter we will see how the economic crisis in the US became a global crisis and which are the channels in which it passed, by differing them in two parts: the transmission mechanism the developed countries and in the developing ones. This process is also called Contagion[9]and has a big importance to us, because it lets us understand how the global economy interacts. Developed Countries To explain how the economic crisis spread throughout the world lets take the example of two international trade giants such as Toyota (the worlds largest automobile producer, headquartered in Tokyo, Japan) and Caterpillar of Peoria, Illinois (the worlds largest producer of heavy construction equipment and vehicles). Toyotas US sales consists of one-third of the companys total sales. The current recession caused Toyotas sales in the United States to fall by 37 percent in December 2008 and by 32 percent in January 2009. This, not surprisingly, led to cutbacks in production, and so announced a reduction in employment. In the example of Caterpillar of Peoria, in the other hand, we conclude that its sales, of which 60 percent are typically outside North America, fall dramatically in late 2008. In anticipation of the global economy continuing to weaken in 2009, Caterpillar announced in January that it was reducing employment by 20,000 workers. By reducing the workforce these companies have indirectly decreased the demand on goods and services in both countries (US and Japan), leading to the global crisis. International trade (Import-Exports) between and among countries means that what happens in one nations economy can have a dramatic effect on that of others. Developing Countries The economic downturn in developed countries have significant impact on other worlds devel ­oping countries. But how can this happen? The channels of impact on develop ­ing countries include: ÃÆ' ¢Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ¢ Trade and trade prices. Growth in China and India, as developed countries, has increased imports and pushed up the demand for goods and services, which has led to greater exports and higher prices, for example from African countries. Eventually, a slow down on the growth rate of the economy of China and India has led to a decrease of exports of the developing countries. ÃÆ' ¢Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ¢ Remittances. There will be fewer economic migrants coming to developed countries when they are in a recession, so fewer remittances and also probably lower volumes of remittances per migrant. ÃÆ' ¢Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ¢ Foreign direct investment (FDI). The process of securitization, as shown before, insured the investors with obligations and increased the level of investments within the US and abroad. But these obligations were based in risky borrowers, and so they never got their money back. The result is that they cant invest in the developing countries, causing an economic crisis there. ÃÆ' ¢Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ¢ Commercial lending. Banks under pressure in developed countries may not be able to lend as much as they have done in the past. ÃÆ' ¢Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ¢ Aid. Aid budgets are under pressure because of debt problems and weak fiscal positions, and this will be reflected in the developing countries economies. Each of these channels needs have direct consequences for growth and development. The impact on developing countries will vary. It will depend on the response in developed countries to the financial crisis and the slowdown, and the economic characteristics and policy responses, in developing countries. Conclusions In the end of this paper we would like to summarize some of the most important conclusions we found about the Financial Crisis. First, we have to mention that the crisis has its roots in some key factors; they all together led the American Economy and the World into the crisis. These factors include the War in Iraq, which contributed in the decline of the American economy as a whole. The reaction of the Fed by cheapening the credit led the banks to a risky initiative: the Subprime Mortgages. Followed by the securitization process, which on one hand creates diversification and liquidity, but on the other hand resulted to be risky, if not well understood by the investors, it created such a situation in which the debtors could not pay their money back. This caused the so called Housing Bubble. From the housing bubble the American economy passed to the devaluation of the house prices and the so called Crisis of Confidence. This is the point in which the financial crisis began leading the banks to a very low liquidity level and made it impossible for them to go on with their transactions. All this affected the American economy as a whole and transformed the crisis into an Economic Crisis. As the American economy dropped, the effects would be present in the other countries too. And this because channels in which the crisis was transmitted all over the world. These channels may be seen in two different point of views: in developed countries (which are strongly related with the American economy) and in developing countries(which are indirectly related with it). The most important channel through which the crisis spread is the foreign trade which includes import and export of the US to other countries and vice versa. But there are also other channels as remittances, foreign direct investments, commercial lending and aid, which delivered the crisis in all the countries around the world.

Definition of the Term LD50

Definition: The median lethal dose of a substance, or the amount required to kill 50% of a given test population. LD50 is a measurement used in toxicology studies to determine the potential impact of toxic substances on different types of organisms. It provides an objective measure to compare and rank the toxicity of substances. The LD50 measurement is usually expressed as the amount of toxin per kilogram or pound of body weight. When comparing LD50 values, a lower value is regarded as more toxic, as it means a smaller amount of the toxin is required to cause death. The LD50 test involves exposing a population of test animals, typically mice, rabbits, guinea pigs, or even larger animals such as dogs, to the toxin in question. The toxins might be introduced orally, through injection, or inhaled. Because this testing kills a large sample of the animals, it is now being phased out in the United States and some other countries in favor of newer, less lethal methods. Pesticide studies involve LD50 testing, usually on rats or mice and on dogs. Insect and spider venoms can also be compared using LD50 measurements, to determine which venoms are the most deadly to a given population of organisms. Â   Examples: LD50 values of insect venom for mice: Honey bee, Apis mellifera - LD50 2.8 mg per kg of body weightYellowjacket, Vespula squamosa - LD50 3.5 mg per kg of body weight Reference: W.L. Meyer. 1996. Most Toxic Insect Venom. Chapter 23 in University of Florida Book of Insect Records, 2001. http://entomology.ifas.ufl.edu/walker/ufbir/.

Tim Horton’s Website Analysis Free Essays

On October 25, 2010, I examined the website of Tim Hortons Company. I did this as part of my assignment for Business Communication course in University of Toronto Scarborough. The assignment requires students to compose a website analysis report of a business. We will write a custom essay sample on Tim Horton’s Website Analysis or any similar topic only for you Order Now And I chose Tim Hortons because it has always been one of my favorite coffee shops. This report describes the strengths and weaknesses of Tim Hortons’ website. And at the end of the report, you will find my personal recommendations on the points that could be improved. The report’s purpose is to help Tim Hortons establish a more customer-friendly website. I will explain more on the word â€Å"customer-friendly† through the following parts of the report. Strengths of the Website I am quite impressed by the design of Tim Hortons’ website. By simply looking at the theme colors when I first entered in, I am able to recognize the brand. These brown and red colors are what we commonly see in a local Tim Hortons store. The use of the colors makes the store and website an integral whole. Another thing that attracts me is the flashing banner. Those well-designed advertisement videos give customers a quick view of what is new at the store. They also lead to a better trade promotion. I compared the webpage of Tim Hortons with Starbucks and Second Cup’s. And I discovered that Tim Hortons has some competitive advantages over the other two famous coffee shops. Here are four most prominent ones: * An Offer of Healthier Products Options. Many customers today are not in favor of eating traditional donuts that contained large amount of fat and sugar. In order not to lose those customers, more healthier food options are offered on the website. In the online menu, customers can find one category named â€Å"Healthier Options†. By applying those options, customers may add milk instead of cream to their coffee. They may also choose bagels that are high in fiber instead of donuts. People who enjoy a healthy lifestyle will find Tim Hortons’ products appealing to them. Moreover, for customers’ convenience, there is a link to the â€Å"Nutrition Calculator† beside each category of food. By clicking the link, customers can quickly obtain further information on the products. * Clear Classification of the Products. The catalog appeared in the menu helps to arrange all productions into detailed classes. The arrangement makes the menu more organized and clearer to look at. Customers who want to look for a certain type of products will quickly find their targets. This is a demonstration of â€Å"customer-friendly† webpage. * The Idea of Weather Forecast. On the front page of the website, I discovered a window shown the weather forecast and the best product option to choose under this weather. I found this idea very attractive. The weather forecast transfers a message that Tim Hortons is very concerned about it’s customers. It deserves a brand loyalty. Besides, customers who are aware of this information may come to the website everyday to check the weather. This will result in a higher click rate to the website and more exposure to the advertisements. * Online Shopping Option. A link to the online shopping website is attached to the front page. Not only can customers find cans of grind coffee there, but they can also find gift baskets and other accessories available. This online shopping option will contribute to a larger sale of Tim Hortons coffee. Weaknesses of the Website On the other hand, I discovered some weaknesses of Tim Hortons’ website after compared with other coffee shops’. Speaking critically, there are certain places that could be made better. To demonstrate my findings, I listed four problems below: * Catalog is Not Clearly Indentified. Most customers come to Tim Hortons website to search for information on coffee and baked goods. However, the catalog shown on top of the front page does not include these two items. It takes some time for customers to find their desired information. Besides, all the menus and nutrition information are under the category of â€Å"In Our Store †. I personally think this title is inappropriate. Because â€Å"In Our Store† can mislead people to think about locations, staffs and other unrelated information. * Nutrition calculator is difficult to use. The idea of making a calculator to track calories is very creative. However, the calculator did not function well when I was using it, especially on a Mac computer. The button for â€Å"Detailed Information† is often hidden behind the product category list. This makes the button difficult to click on. Fonts are Too Small to Read. Except for the headlines, the font sizes for most of the written materials are too small. This will result in unwillingness for customers to go further reading. Though the storyboard tells a thrilling adventure, customers may have no interest to look at. * No Sounds for the Banner. Research shows that people’s retention becomes stronger when they can be provided with both visual images and sounds. Having a banner is absolutely a good promotion choice, but without any audio inputs, the advertisements are a bit lack of excitement and harder for customers to remember. Conclusions A website can be said to be â€Å"customer-friendly† if it is able to offer the most to its customers. For the design, the website should be attractive and fun to look at. And for the function, the company ought to focus on an idea of clarity, convenience and simplicity. Compared with the webpage of other famous coffee shops, Tim Hortons is good at making convenience accesses for its customers and delivering sales messages. This is demonstrated by its strengths of clear classification, option of online shopping and an offer of eather forecast and healthier options. Nevertheless, Tim Hortons is a bit weak at providing clear information. Because some titles of the catalog fail to transfer definite information and the fonts of the words are too small to read. Things can be improved also include the nutrition calculator and the sounds of the banner. Recommendations Competition between coffeehouses is quite fierce these days. Though Tim Hortons are most well known in Canada. It does not have such popularity in other countries, even in the United States. One of the accesses for people to gather information of Tim Hortons is through the Internet. Therefore, it is of top primarity for Tim Hortons to establish a more customer-friendly website. Here I provide four recommendations that will contribute to its success: * Change the Titles of the Catalog Categories. Make Category titles clearer to indentify. For example, name â€Å"Coffee† or â€Å"Menu† instead of â€Å"In Our Store†. Also, put the items customers most interested to prominent places. For example, modify the â€Å"Menu† button as the first icon appeared in the catalog at the front page. Improve the Nutrition calculator. If the technical problems cannot be solved, simply add a list of nutrition information containing all products to the website. It is also a good idea to provide a search engine for that information. * Make the Fonts Larger. Make the size of the fonts larger so that customers can easily read the information they are looking for. * Make Banner’s Alive. Deliver music commercials. Add more fun and excitement to the website. This will catch customers’ attention and result in a higher click rate of the website. How to cite Tim Horton’s Website Analysis, Essay examples

Illegal immigrants Essay Example For Students

Illegal immigrants Essay Illegal immigrants from the country of Honduras will find out later this year if they will be allowed to stay in the U.S. as illegal immigrants. With the Clinton Administration switching over to the Bush Administration the answer is not clear of whether or not they will be allowed to stay in the country after July 5, 2001. This is when the Temporary Protection Status (TPS) law runs out and will find if they will be accepted or denied by the new administration. The fact that the Honduran immigrants have been allowed here already is a big plus in their favor. They also have other advantages in, Elaine Chao, an immigrant herself to the U.S. when she was just eight years old. She is President Bushs selection for Secretary for Labor. This can do nothing but help the decision go in favor of the Honduran immigrants. There are also disadvantages that they have. For instance a man by the name of John Ashcroft, Bushs selection for U.S. Attorney General, supports stronger border patrol and stronger penalties for violations of immigration laws. Obviously, the main theme of the article is immigration, suggesting whether it will happen for a group of people, or not. The fact that the Clinton administration had already approved the illegal immigration of the Hondurans, will make it harder for Bush and his colleagues to not extend the law past July 5 of 2001. The article just goes to show that many people from other countries see the U.S. as an opportunity to improve or provide a better lifestyle for their families that may or may not come with them. This demonstrates how lucky we are and another perspective on how to look at the topic of immigration, worldwide. Bibliography:

In Debt We Trust free essay sample

In Debt We Trust It is common knowledge that public debt is one of the basic topics in macroeconomics. Debt is actually a certain amount of goods or money (mostly money) owed by one side to another. There are various types of debts, from personal debts to debts by the government. The US public debt is the amount of money owed by the United States federal government to creditors. National and individual debt combined total well over $10 trillion. The video notes how credit card companies quarry on college students and others too young and dumb to realize how easily a spending spree can change their future. Meanwhile, the working poor are mislead into loan schemes with huge disciplinary consequences for late payment, including ever-more-frequent home foreclosures. Middle-class families end up in deepening debt just trying to maintain the same home-and-car-owning lifestyle their parents could afford. Where there used to be a penalizing but real last-ditch escape route, Republican lawmakers recently shoved through restrictions making it almost impossible for individuals to declare bankruptcy. We will write a custom essay sample on In Debt We Trust or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page The national debt is the total amount of money the United States Treasury Department has borrowed and currently owes to the federal governments creditors. These creditors are mostly comprised of the public, including individuals, corporations, as well as state, local and foreign governments. They also consist of various government trust funds, such as Social Security and Medicare. Additionally, they include the Federal Reserve, mostly in the form of treasury bonds, bills and notes. Currently, the U. S. national debt is estimated to be $8. 5 trillion. This ever-growing figure brings with it several social and economic implications. Therefore, the national debt is a frequently debated topic that has over the years produced various schools of thought on how the U. S. government should manage it. In order to understand how the national debt could ultimately affect future generations of the United States and the different ways the government can best deal with it, it is first necessary to discuss its’ history. According to the latest statistics, as of 2006 the sum that Federal Government owed to its citizens and overseas creditors was 5. 2 trillion dollars. This sum does not include money, owed to social security fund, and by various corporations. If the sum owed to Social Security Trust Fund is included, then the debt rises to an amazing figure of the $8. 5 trillion dollars. That means that in 2006 the expected interest, paid on the debt will be 364 billion dollars. This sum of money is actually greater than the GDP of several independent states. The average interest rate for the US public debt is 4% annually. Certainly, the debt of $8. 5 trillion dollars is a heavy load for the US taxpayers, as they are forced to service it. US certainly own the greatest amount of money, and American economy certainly has difficulties struggling with such a deficit. It is clear that any other country would simply collapse under the weight of such bonds. One fact has still to be taken into consideration: US economy is the most powerful one today, consequently. If calculating the public debt in percentage of the GDP, it equals 67%. This figure is actually normal for most developed countries, and USA hold 35-th place in the world according to this scale. I find it funny that the film speaks of the impending financial doom that we’re currently experiencing. I find it sad that we’re going to bail out these financial institutions that are doing this. We just sent them 700 billion more because they have us so enslaved that we could not live without them. So when their greed finally got the best of them good old GW and the folks we elected†¦ bailed them out by sending them more of our money for free! When will it end? The answer as of right now looks like never!

Interpretation of picasso art essays

Interpretation of picasso art essays Pablo Picasso was one of the most famous Modern artists of the twentieth century. Picassos work followed the style of Cubism. Cubism was a non-objective style of painting developed in Paris in the early twentieth century. It was characterized by reducing and fragmenting natural forms into abstract, often geometric structures usually presenting itself as a set of unconnected distinct planes. Three Women is a classical example of the Analytical Cubism style. Three Women, created by Picasso in 1908 with oil on canvas, depicts three nudes posing for a picture. Each of the three figures are positioned to overlap each other so not to bring more focus to one over the other. The nudes presented are the center of attention; they are the dominant figures. The faces of each woman seem to take on characteristics of African art. The women appear as if there is movement going on, while at the same time it seems likely that the subjects are in an immovable position. Picasso draws your eye to the figures by painting them with bright complementary colors, causing the women to pop out, making them the first thing you notice. The blue background further heightens the three women as center of attention by framing them in the picture. For this piece, a complementary color scheme was used. Using blue and orange allows the colors to contrast, because they share no common colors. When used together in a design, the colors make each other seem brighter and more intense. The background consists of a cool color, which does not over power the subject, therefore, putting more emphasis on the women depicted. The use of complementary colors allows the focal point to easily jump out in the picture. The cool colors recede while warm colors advance, grabbing your attention. One primary look to Cubism is the use of lighting. Since the image on the canvas is fragmented into an abstract form, there are multiple light sources within the pai...

The State of the Iranian Oil Industry and Its Role in Irans Economy Case Study

The State of the Iranian Oil Industry and Its Role in Irans Economy - Case Study Example This research will begin with the statement that Iran's economic reliance on the oil industry has been stronger than ever as demonstrated by the steady trend in domestic demand and the government’s effort to counter the adverse impact of its economic isolation. An increase in its energy output is seen as the only way to solve the issues it currently faces. This focus has led to several sustainability challenges that require immediate attention if the country is to achieve a viable economy in the long-term. Iran belongs to the top five oil-producing countries in the world. The International Energy Agency reported that in 2013, the country produced 2.5 million barrels per day and about 1.2 million barrels were exported. For this reason, the oil industry remains a backbone of the Iranian economy. It generates revenues that represent at least 18.7 percent of the country's gross domestic product and claim 85 percent of the country's total export and foreign currency earnings. Repor ts indicate that high oil prices in the past decades enabled Iran to accumulate almost $60 billion in foreign exchange reserves. The focus in oil production, however, has led or has aggravated three important sustainability challenges: air pollution; damage to water resources; and the environmental damage stemming from potential conflict. Air pollution remains the leading environmental problem in the country. It is caused by vehicle emissions, refinery operations, and industrial effluents. Particularly, combustion of vehicular traffic dominates pollutants. In Tehran, for example, they contribute to around 80 percent of air pollution.

Entrepreneurial Orientation and Marketing Orientation Essay

Entrepreneurial Orientation and Marketing Orientation - Essay Example There were so many variations as there was the number of business enterprises. This prompted management scholars to delve deep into the matter to find out how many ways are there to make a business flourish. Their search has not been without success. In fact they have come out with some rare insights into the dynamics of profit generation and maximization. While large organizations could afford to experiment with any or all of these methods, the small and medium enterprises, the SME’s, have to be very choosy in their selection of modus operandi because of resource limitations. However, they also have a fairly wide choice to select from, like the Entrepreneurial Orientation, Marketing Orientation, Operation Reasearch, Brand Boosting and the likes. Right now we would be interested in two of these most significant methods, viz. Entrepreneurial Orientation and Marketing Orientation. What is Entrepreneurial Orientation : The term â€Å"entrepreneurial orientation† has been used to refer to the strategy-making processes and styles of firms that engage in entrepreneurial activities. A popular model of entrepreneurial orientation (EO) suggests that there are five dimensions of EO—autonomy, innovativeness, risk taking, proactiveness, and competitive aggressiveness (Lumpkin and Dess 1996). Autonomy refers to the entrepreneur’s freedom to choose his own line of business, range of products and the market segment he wants to operate in. This reflects his entrepreneurial genius and his analytical ability and his resourcefulness to meet challenges.

Globalization Barcelona Renovation

Globalization Barcelona Renovation Although many cities around the world witness the triumphs and failures of globalization in all aspects of life, Barcelona has truly been a success story. Although Barcelona is a dense city confined by the Mediterranean Sea and the mountains, it has grown to be a commercial, industrial and tourism superpower in Europe. The benefits of globalization are apparent in the dynamic metropolitan area of Barcelona, a model used for urban design and renovation of cities throughout the world. Globalization has become an inevitable progression over time, and Barcelona has embraced its ongoing growth by constructively planning for the future. The metropolitan area of Barcelona has become a center for trade, industry, commerce and tourism, with almost four million residents. To prepare for the 1992 Olympic Games held in Barcelona, the city went through drastic transformations in urban development with hopes of becoming one of Europes economic superpowers. Now, Barcelona is becoming an exemplar city for its style and synthesis of urban design and innovation. Projects such as [emailprotected] Barcelona, an efficient infrastructure organization, the refurbishment of city beaches and port areas, the construction of pleasing and practical public spaces, the melting pot of world cultures and other revitalization plans have helped globalize Barcelona and make it the â€Å"capital of the Mediterranean† (Rossi). One project helping Barcelona continue to globalize and expand its knowledge is the [emailprotected] Barcelona innovation district. In the area of Poblenou, a neighborhood that was once occupied entirely by industrial buildings and factories, a complete transformation is underway to recreate 115 blocks of â€Å"modern spaces for the strategic concentration of intensive knowledge-based activities† (â€Å"Presentation†). Two hundred hectares of land in Poblenou will be renovated in order to allow for more living, working and learning spaces. According to the [emailprotected] Barcelona website, 53% of the neighborhood has begun transformation and many new companies are relocating their businesses to the new knowledge hub of the city. â€Å"The [emailprotected] project has likewise been warmly received, according to a research carried out by the University of Barcelona in June 2007, by the business community: 925 firms have already established in the [emailprotected] district or are in the process of building their corporate HQs there. More than 50% of the companies that have moved to the [emailprotected] district since 2001 belong to one of the four strategic [emailprotected] sectors: media, ITC, MedTech or energy† (â€Å"Current State†). The area of Poblenou has a designated â‚ ¬180 million in public investment, which will give the neighborhood access to innovative technology still nonexistent in many other globalizing cities. Green spaces, digital districts and tight-knit communities of buildings are just some of the inventive concepts that are being developed in Poblenou. Once the urban, economic and social renovations have been completed, the neighborhood will be transformed into a modern, unique environment for all aspects of daily life (â€Å"Presentation†). Like the neighborhood of Poblenou, Barcelonas infrastructure is constantly being upgraded and expanded. For example, Plaà §a de les Glà ²ries Catalanes is being completely reconstructed to include an underground train station, which will rival Plaza Cataluà ±a as a popular transportation center in the city. The fundamental structure of Barcelona includes a group of efficient transportation elements, including metro systems, airport expansions, sewage improvements, bus routes, highways and railroads. Barcelona has such a well-organized, logical setup for its infrastructure throughout the city, making the city once again a prototype for urban design which other cities have proposed to duplicate. â€Å"One of Barcelonas more outstanding characteristics is that its port, airport, railroad terminal for goods, highway networks and huge logistics area are all activities set in the same geographical space. This makes Barcelona highly internationalised, occupying a strategic position in t he world-wide transport network, and a key hub for trade with Asia† (Alarcon). The infrastructure in Barcelona is an important benefit of globalization because it organizes transportation to save time and avoid congestion of persons. Unlike other cities, Barcelona has public transportation centers on almost every block, whether it includes buses, metros, ferrocarrils or tunnels. This accessibility is imperative for residents, visitors and all people traveling through Barcelona because the infrastructure is time efficient and uncomplicated. Many other cities around the world would benefit from examining Barcelonas infrastructure design, which is frequently being revamped to keep up with the changes brought about by globalization and the needs of the people. Of all the renovations completed in Barcelona, the restoration of city beaches and the enlargement of port areas have helped increase tourism and turn the eyes of the people back to the sea. Huge additions to the port have been made including: a new bridge to facilitate transportation of trucks carrying cargo, extending piers to allow for more cargo ships to dock, and the destruction of industrial buildings along the beach to once again make the sea an attraction. â€Å"The past 10 years have seen a huge transformation of both port and city, as the municipal government sought to develop Barcelonas holiday and pleasure sailing reputation in tandem with traditional commercial activities. The boom in Barcelonas commercial centres has both invigorated (and itself been further promoted) with the desire to revise the citys maritime traditions† (Alarcon). Port Olympic and the Maremagnum marina are new economic hotspots near the beach, which appeal to both residents and tourists with restaurants, bars, an aquarium and movie theaters. The port, one of Barcelonas most essential places for trade, is in the process of extending its piers to increase the frequency of trade and tourism by building more docking areas for cargo boats and cruise liners. The beaches are one of Barcelonas main attractions, which have been nearly restored to their original beauty without the deterring industrial buildings that once lined the shore. These transformations, which have been underway or completed since 1992, have increased tourism and productivity of trade in Barcelona. Both of these aspects of globalization are extremely important to the city so that it can grow and attract more investors. The innovative additions to the beach and port areas will benefit Barcelonas economy, tourism and their position in the world market. If improving the coastline will help attract more tourists to the beach, improving public spaces, park areas and dilapidated buildings will help attract more residents to the city. Globalization has led Barcelona to realize its confinement between the Mediterranean Sea and the mountains, leaving a highly dense population situated in-between that continues to grow. For that reason, the Barcelona model had planned for inevitable expansion of the city. Instead of spreading further out into the suburbs like most cities, Barcelona began the â€Å"layered multiple use† of land to build vertically opposed to horizontally (Rossi). â€Å"Across the city, parks spread out atop new highway tunnels. Parking lots hide under squares. Seventeenth-century convents are turned into libraries and cultural centers, palaces are transformed into hotels, museums sprout from former textile factories† (Rossi). Every inch of land in Barcelona has a purpose, and the city is praised for its abilit y to find the problems that exist in decaying buildings or empty spaces and repair them to make the area more eye-catching. For example, the area of El Raval was always known for its immigrant population, drug deals and prostitutes. After careful planning by the city to create a rambla in the center, add more squares throughout the neighborhood, and build the Centre de Cultura Contemporà  nia de Barcelona (CCCB), restaurants, businesses and people all want to buy space in El Raval. Besides making Barcelona more beautiful, these ongoing changes have also made the city more well-organized and useful. Cranes and angle cutters can be seen and heard throughout Barcelona, which is just a reminder that the city is working hard to keep Barcelona up-to-date with globalization needs and a constantly growing population. As the population in Barcelona increases, it is easy to see the mix of colors, races and languages that have become commonplace in this international city. For almost a century between 1850 and 1950, Spain was mainly an emigrating nation. Approximately 3.5 million people, especially temporary workers, emigrated to Argentina, Cuba, Uruguay and Brazil. However, in the late 1980s Spain became a country of immigration due to â€Å"the end of guest worker programs, the closing of the borders of traditional receiving countries, such as Germany, Switzerland, and France, the political evolution from authoritarian regimes, their proximity to the sending countries in the Maghreb, and the intense historical and economic bonds between both shores of the Mediterranean† (Ortega Pà ©rez). In 1999, the foreign-born population was 2.09% (89,744 people), but by 2005, the number of foreign inhabitants had increased to 11.13% with 531,040 people (Roca Cladera). Neighborhoods like El Raval are ho me to large numbers of immigrants, especially those from North Africa, Pakistan and Muslim communities. Projects such as the Universal Forum of Cultures, which promote human rights, cultural diversity and peace, have been established to accommodate the melting pot of cultures in the international community. â€Å"In order to promote a culturally diverse society, a series of policies have been deployed to fight the poverty and social exclusion that often go hand in hand with immigration, provide the resources required for the development of different communities in Catalonia, and, above all, encourage intercultural encounters† (Lachmann). Although Barcelona has struggled with racism and discrimination against immigrant communities, globalization has made Spain, and especially Catalonia, a desirable destination for immigrants from around the globe. The city boasts hundreds of restaurants with cuisines from every country, places for prayer for numerous religions, and cultural ce nters for the integration of immigrants. As the world becomes increasingly interconnected due to globalization and the ease of travel, immigration populations will continue to rise. Barcelona has dealt with the inevitable process of globalization by paying attention to details throughout the city, by maintaining what already exists and building what is needed for the future. From protecting the historical significance of a park bench to lining a lackluster street with palm trees, every corner in the city has been touched by globalization and yet still continues to function properly and look good. Barcelonas urban design has been used as a model for city development around the globe, due to its comprehensive planning and meticulous attention to every element of the city. According to architect Lord Richard Rogers, â€Å"Barcelona is the jewel of the crown of urban regeneration† (Rossi). Globalization has been an amazing benefit to Barcelona, because of its ability to keep up with the ever-changing, constantly growing needs of a metropolitan city. As a model for urban development and design, Barcelona has been praised for its ability to keep pace with the process of globalization, by revitalizing areas around the city and integrating them together into one functional community. The intensification of Barcelonas infrastructure development as well as the multi-layered use for expansion has helped the city to globalize, while affectively using every piece of available land for a planned residential development, park, square or office building. Without the benefit of globalization that has changed Barcelonas reputation from a run-down port town to a innovative model for designing and renovating cities, projects such as [emailprotected] Barcelona would be inconceivable and difficult to achieve. Barcelona has become a meeting place for cultures from around the world, as well as an immigration magnet for people from North Africa, South America and other emigrating nations. The new enticement created by port and beach renovations that were completed for the 1992 Olympic Games have increased tourism and turned the eyes of the city back to the Mediterranean Sea. Only time can tell how Barcelona will progress in the international spectrum of globalization, but the modern revitalization of the city has been an immense benefit for Barcelona, its visitors, and its people. Works Cited Alarcon, Jose. â€Å"Barcelonas port goes for massive growth.† International Market News. 01 Mar 2001. Trade Development Council. 6 Dec 2007 . â€Å"Current State.† [emailprotected] Barcelona. 2006. Ajuntament de Barcelona. 6 Dec 2007 . Lachmann, Joseph. â€Å"The Universal Forum of Cultures considers immigration as a source of social enrichment.† 09 Aug 2004. Herald Tribe. 7 Dec 2007 . Muenz, Rainer. â€Å"Europe: Population and Migration in 2005.† Feature Story. June 2006. Migration Policy Institute. 7 Dec 2007 . Ortega Pà ©rez, Nieves. â€Å"Spain: Forging an Immigration Policy.† Country Profiles. Feb 2003. Migration Policy Institute. 10 Dec 2007 . â€Å"Preamble.† Mobility pact. Ajuntament de Barcelona. 6 Dec 2007 . â€Å"Presentation.† [emailprotected] Barcelona. 2006. Ajuntament de Barcelona. 6 Dec 2007 . Roca Cladera, Josep. â€Å"Residential mobility and foreign immigration settlement in the Metropolitan area of Barcelona.† Sixth European Urban and Regional Studies Conference. 7 Dec 2007 . Rossi, Melissa. â€Å"The Barcelona Model.† IES Barcelona. 02 Feb 2004. IES Barcelona. 6 Dec 2007 .

Describe Some of the Ways That the Person-Centred Approach

Describe some of the ways that the Person-Centred Approach differs to Cognitive Behavioural and Psychodynamic Approaches to Counselling. The good life is a process, not a state of being. It is a direction, not a destination. (Rogers, 1961, p. 186) The Mental Health Foundation (2012, Talking Therapies) refers to certain therapeutic approaches as talking therapies. These therapies include: Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT), Psychodynamic Therapy and Person Centred Therapy (PCT).The Foundation says, ‘Talking therapies give people the chance to explore their thoughts and feelings and the effect they have on their behaviour and mood’. In attempting to describe some of the ways that the Person-Centred approach differs to Cognitive Behavioural and Psychodynamic approaches to counselling it may be helpful to acknowledge that that binds them. The British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP) identifies that, ‘there is evidence that the relationship between the counsellor and the client is more important than the approach the therapist uses.BACP (2011). This does not presuppose that counsellors working within differing paradigms practice in an entirely different way to their counterparts or that those working within each approach operate in exactly the same way either. Indeed, it is within the relationship between the counsellor and the client that many of the differences in the therapeutic approaches can be identified. Nelson – Jones (2011, p1) warns us to, ‘be careful not to exaggerate the differences between counselling and therapy schools since there are similarities and differences among them. Worsley et al. (2011, p. 25) believe that, ‘the Person Centred Approach is a basic philosophy of living, and not a technique for therapy’. Worsley’s view does highlight a potential schism between the Person Centred model and the Psychodynamic and CBT approaches; that of, ‘feeling over process’ (B owyer 2011). Mearns and Thorne (2008, p. 9) provide some welcome professional credibility to this viewpoint by identifying a link between the experience of living out the tenets of the Person Centred approach (on both a philosophical and professional level), with the counsellor’s own ability to ‘grasp a hope that seems to lie beyond despair’.This raw awareness helps translate towards a natural realisation of some of the therapeutic conditions (namely: empathy, congruence and unconditional positive) regarded by Person Centered practitioners as critical to achieving positive change. Branch and Dryden (2008, p. 33) see this as the most significant point of divergence between the Rogerian (Person Centred) and CBT therapeutic approaches, in that Rogers considered the Core Conditions (Rogers 1957, pps. 95 – 103) to be both necessary and sufficient whilst CBT purists recognise the conditions as desirable and necessary but not sufficient to bring about client chan ge.In purist terms therefore, it can be seen that CBT, ‘focuses on eliciting and restructuring maladaptive goal-impeding thinking (Branch and Dryden 2008, p. 24) whilst the Psychodynamic approaches are sometimes called the ‘uncovering’ therapies (Dryden and Mytton 1999, p. 42) which, ‘aim to take the lid off that seething cauldron and bring the contents of the unconscious into conscious awareness. CBT and psychodynamic therapies may therefore be regarded as being focused on identifying and challenging behaviours and beliefs, whereas from the counsellor’s perspective, the Person Centred model assumes no such prescriptive agenda.Dryden and Mytton (1999, p. 203) acknowledge that the Psychodynamic approach focuses on the client’s past experience ‘whereas the Person Centred approach focuses on the here and now. Care must be taken not to assume that this is a one size fits all definition. For some counsellors and therapists working within each therapeutic paradigm may well ‘borrow’ methods and strategies from other approaches in order to help effect positive change. There is one tenet however which differentiates Person Centred therapy from the two other approaches; control.Whilst there is a communality of approach insofar that relationship is critical to all approaches, it is the hierarchy within the relationship which acts as differentiator. Within the Person Centred relationship, the client retains control; determining where and at what pace the relationship develops and what is explored and what remains unsaid. The non- directive approach taken by the counsellor allows the client freedom to hold his ‘comfort blanket of self-structure’ intact (Bowyer 2010) until such time that he feels able to begin a journey towards eventual self- actualisation (Goldstein 1940, p. 258). Tolan (2010, p. ) sees self- structure as being everything a person holds about herself and about the world. Following on fr om the concept of non-directive client control, the Person Centred practitioner does not consider himself to be the expert, the client is. The division between the three approaches is further widened by the atmosphere in which the counselling session takes place. Russell and Jarvis (2003, p47) identify a difference between humanistic (e. g. Person Centred) and other therapies (including CBT and Psychodynamic), in that the former refers to ‘clients’ whereas the latter regard those in therapy as ‘patients’.This reinforces the view of humanistic based therapies (including Person Centred) that regard the therapist and client as equal partners. On the client’s journey towards personal fulfillment therefore, Dryden and Mytton (1999, p. 89) feel that the counsellor or psychologist ‘acts as a companion, not a guide’. In the absence of a professional ‘expert’ comes a dynamic shift of personal responsibility. Within the psychodynamic and CBT approaches, the therapist, albeit somewhat tacitly does seek to effect positive change and sees this as a professional responsibility and not one which the client is capable of undertaking on their own.To this end, it is the practitioner who assesses the need and determines the outcome(s). CBT is based on finding solutions to issues or problems identified by the counsellor. In turn, the Psychodynamic approach assumes long held conflict between the conscious and unconscious state and sees its role as ‘bringing the unconscious thoughts and feelings into conscious awareness to help individuals make sense of their current problems, of past memories, and of dreams (Dryden and Mytton 1999, p. 4). These somewhat presumptive approaches when coupled with a’ fix it’ mentality (particularly prevalent within the time to cost driven NHS/CBT approach) seem somewhat at odds to that of Person Centred Therapy which works in the immediate and holds true the belief that â⠂¬Ëœall clients have within themselves vast resources for development’ (Mearns and Thorne, 1988, p. 16). Mearns and Cooper (2005, p. 60) provide a meaningful insight into a comparison of therapeutic approaches, ‘While inexperienced therapists tend to differ widely and are easily identifiable by their adopted approach, experienced therapists tend to become more close in their working and are not so easily identified by approach†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦.. it probably means that therapists are learning from their clients and are gradually being shaped by their clients to offer a relationship that is meaningful. I have so much to learn.

Is the Chinese Renminbi Undervalued Essay

Since July 2005, first time being revalued after 11 years of fixing at 8.27, Chinese Yuan has been heading towards only one direction – all the way from 8.27 to 6.27. Although Yuan is a highly regulated currency by government, Chinese officials could no longer peg the Yuan as it used to be in a closed economy because WTO had opened up doors for Chinese manufacturers in 2001 to export cheap goods and services to developed countries. With trillions of foreign capital flooding into the country, Yuan has appreciated over 30% over seven years. However, this one-way money flow cannot be sustained. Though it is not sure whether Yuan is at the absolute equilibrium, it is currently neither significantly undervalued nor overvalued. This essay is going to explain why Yuan is modestly priced with analysis in both the fundamentals and money flows. Needs for appreciation in past In theory, two open economies should have equivalent purchasing power – that is, if 10 units of foreign currency can buy something that is valued at 1 unit of domestic currency, the implied equilibrium exchange rate should also be 10(domestic as based money). Otherwise, there is an arbitrage opportunity. We call this Purchase Power Parity. In reality, despite some limitations about this theory, it explains most of the valuation problem in China. Take a look at China’s Balance of Payments over 2003-2010 and it is obvious to observe huge surplus annually in both current and capital & financial account, accumulating to a foreign reserve of $3.3 trillion. Reach equilibrium? At the government level, on one hand, it had to increase money base to maintain exchange rate against USD at a gradual appreciation pace. On the other hand, it needs to hold huge foreign assets, primarily in USD, to back up its currency from deprecation in the event of capital outflows. Amid the money inflow, Chinese central bank faced mounting pressure of inflation on local assets. The private sectors are impacted in two ways. Firstly, Chinese residents and companies feel much richer now because higher RMB increases their purchase power of foreign assets. This means more imports and capital account outflows. Secondly, inflation and appreciation means that Chinese products and services are more expensive. And this would lead to less exports. Pew Survey showed that 70% of Chinese people feel financially better off than five years ago, which among the best in the world. In the last a few years, the fact of continues Yuan appreciation, associated with stories about how China is cash rich and how Chinese investors are buying everything they can in the world, raises interesting discussion if Yuan had appreciated enough. There is also a trend that more goods are manufactured in new WTO members such as Nepal and Vietnam that have price advantage over China. Moreover, in the currency forward market, investors have priced in modest depreciation for Yuan in the next 12 months and spot market is no longer moving towards one direction. Data shows†¦ All those various observations reveal the same process that drives RMB exchange rate to an equilibrium level. Recent data also suggests that at current FX level, the rise in trade surplus and capital & finance account surplus slowed (see chart below). So does foreign reserve. What does it means? If we apply a popular formula: Capital out flow = Foreign Reserve – FDI – Trade surplus Numbers imply that 62.4 – 128.5 – 145.8 = 211.9 billions has flown out of China in the first three quarters of 2012. Although this estimation still lacks of actual evidence, the scale of growth slowing down in foreign reserve in 2012 is worth attention since it is so large that it is hard to be justified by seasonal adjustment or calculation period discrepancy. This might signal the start of reverse capital flows of Yuan, which means Yuan is no longer undervalued. Ultimately†¦ The answer to Yuan’s valuation problem is complex especially given that it is still mostly controlled by government and there are so many dynamic factors to consider. So far there are some money flows and data support the conclusion that Yuan is no longer significantly undervalued. In the long run, as expectation of Chinese government to allow a fully conversion Yuan is built on, maybe the real answer can only be found out by then.

Homelessness An Crippled Problem - 1090 Words

Jasmine Berry Professor Mary Rhet 101 12 June 2014 Homelessness: an Undermined Problem in Society In America we have a deliberate problem with just neglecting to deal with serious issues. Why is it that instead of finding a solution to solving homelessness in America, we keep constantly sweeping the problem out of the public’s eye? We act as if this dilemma that affects more than 3.5 million of Americans each year does not matter. This concept boggles my mind to the point of exhaustion, thinking about the way things should be in reality to what they are. Human compassion should be something that everyone has and feels for one another, considering that we all are human beings. However, this is not†¦show more content†¦We also have this stereotype that all homeless people we see on the streets are drug addict just looking for drugs. However, even though a slight portion of these people do fall into that stereotype, not everyone does. If we would just take the time to educate ourselves on the issues and occ urrences of homelessness and why these people have gotten this way, we could all gain the compassion and knowledge that we need in order to help solve this problem. It is really sad that only a slim portion of the population within our country are trying to step up, raise awareness, and put an end to this problem. Yet, as the rate of homelessness goes up it seems as the key to find the answering of homelessness is no where near in our future. A lack of affordable housing and the limited scale of housing assistance programs have contributed to the current housing crisis and to homelessness. It has also lead to high rent burdens (rent which absorbs a high proportion of income), overcrowding, and substandard housing. These phenomenons, in turn, have not only forced many people and families on the street, but they have put a large, growing number of people at risk of becoming homeless. Did you know that since 2000, the incomes of low-income households has declined as rents continue to r ise (National Low Income Housing Coalition, 2005). Even though I understand that there is clearly a

Hearsay, Deception and General Essay Topics

Hearsay, Deception and General Essay Topics The Upside to General Essay Topics Essays are often needed for scholarship applications. Your essay might incorporate the explanations for teen pregnancy and talk about the present rates of teen pregnancy and potential solutions. Before studying the top rated informative essay topics, it's important to ask what makes a great topic. A college essay topic may or might not be freely dependent on the student based on the course and the professor. Examining each side of the issue can aid your readers form their own opinions. To begin with, a quick explanation of the game ought to be written. You could be given the topic straight away by your professor, or you might be free to pick the topic yourself. For instance, you can opt for a topic for elementary, middle, or higher school. Secondly, wealthy people have a tendency to pull in the wrong type of individuals. When you're picking your topic, bear in mind that it's much simpler to write about something which you presently have interest ineven in case you don't know a great deal about it. Some people today believe that more money needs to be spent on protecting endangered species while some think it's a waste of valuable money. Many people think that money is the secret to happiness and that the more cash you possess the happier you become. Whether you need to make an essay on the newest scientific findings in your area of study or over your interpretation of a bit of classic literature, you have to have the proper facts and data along with the ability to write content that engages and commands attention. On our site you'll find a lot more useful special information that will certainly be helpful for junior and higher school kids from, like common home task essay about Hamlet, along with, for instance, application essays for college for future students. Usually an application will provide an extremely wide topic with which you can do almost anything, or else they will permit you to write about whatever topic you'd like. Some can require research although others may require the usage of the five senses and figurative language. You're able to pick one randomly, before thinking whether it meets your essay requirements or whether you're interested in it and can come across enough info. Writing a college essay can be a challenging task initially, but understanding how different topics of college essays work may help you later on. With our custom made essay offer, you can be guaranteed to find any sort of essay help you are searching for. To begin with, your key to winning essay is a very clear comprehension of what you're likely to take care of. Nobody really wishes to compose an essay. Persuasive essays share a whole lot of resemblance with argumentative essays. It is likewise very important to review words regularly. When you're writing, attempt to prevent employing the very same words and phrases over and over again. You've got to compose an informative essay. Look through our preceding guide to be certain you understand how to compose an essay for a scholarship. Though the essay questions change, the topic of the essays often stays the same. Writing a great persuasive essay is not a simple job, however, it's achievable. You've approached the last portion of your essay. Thus, consider all the potential problems you may encounter while writing an essay on a specific topic. The very best topic for your essay is one which is aligned with your field of study. It's important to select debatable argumentative essay topics as you need opposing points that you are able to counter to your own points. Among the many types of essay, there's a definition essay that could appear to be among the most simple assignments. Possessing relevant vocabulary for each topic will offer you a huge advantage. Looking at IELTS essay topics with answers is a significant means to assist you to get ready for the test. Obviously, you may pick any other topic.

Investigation of Hamlets Tragic Flaw that Led to his...

Investigation of Hamlets Tragic Flaw that Led to his Demise William Shakespeares tragedy plays have fascinated people from the time of the renaissance to present modern times. All his tragedy plays are five acts long, and the climax of the play occurs in the third act. In each and every tragedy play there is a tragic hero who bears a tragic flaw. Every tragic hero usually possesses valor characteristics such as bravery, honesty, intelligence, and so on. In the Shakespearean tragedy Hamlet the tragic hero is Hamlet. He is an emotionally scarred young man trying to avenge the murder of his father, the king. The ghost of Hamlets father appears to Hamlet, telling him that he was murdered by his†¦show more content†¦From the first act the ghost of Hamlets father appears to Hamlet, telling him that he was murdered by his brother, Claudius. Hamlet ignores this knowledge that he knows, and still wants to prove Claudius guilt. He decides to devise a trap for Claudius, forcing the king to watch a play whose plot closely resembles the murder of Hamlets father. If the king is guilty, Hamlet thinks, Claudius will surely show some visible sign of guilt when he sees his sin re-enacted on stage. Then, Hamlet reasons, he will obtain definitive proof of Claudiuss guilt. The plays the thing, he declares, wherein Ill catch the conscience of the king (II.ii.581-582). All this thinking and obsessing over proving Claudius guilt, again stops him from focussing on his purpose. As a matter a fact, a whole act is used to plot this play out, and even then, the play is not executed until the third act. The third time he procrastinates is during the beginning of the third act. The most famous line in English literature To be, or not to be: that is the question (III.i.56) is declared by Hamlet, and this marks the start of another soliloquy. In this soliloquy again he contemplates suicide and death, to rid his pains of living on earth, similar to the first soliloquy. Basically Hamlet is asking Should I kill myself? .Again he double thinks this question and is not

Ulips V/Smutual Funds free essay sample

PAPER ON A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF MUTUAL FUNDS AND UNIT LINKED INSURANCE PLAN EXECUTIVE SUMMARY : In few years Mutual Fund has emerged as a tool for ensuring one’s financial well being. Mutual Funds have not only contributed to the India growth story but have also helped families tap into the success of Indian Industry. As information and awareness is rising more and more people are enjoying the benefits of investing in mutual funds. The main reason the number of retail mutual fund investors remains small is that nine in ten people with incomes in India do not know that mutual funds exist. But once people are aware of mutual fund investment opportunities, the number who decide to invest in mutual funds increases to as many as one in five people. The trick for converting a person with no knowledge of mutual funds to a new Mutual Fund customer is to understand which of the potential investors are more likely to buy mutual funds and to use the right arguments in the sales process that customers will accept as important and relevant to their decision. The analysis and advice presented in this Project Report is based on the study on the saving and investment practices of the investors and preferences of the investors for investment in Mutual Funds. This Report will help to know about the investors’ Preferences in Mutual Fund means Are they prefer any particular Asset Management Company (AMC), Which type of Product they prefer, Which Option (Growth or Dividend) they prefer or Which Investment Strategy they follow (Systematic Investment Plan or One time Plan). Further this project also talks about the investments made by people in unit linked insurance plan (ULIP). This project talks about the comparison between the mutual funds and the unit linked insurance plan. Here the preferences and choices of the investors has been analyzed and enhanced upon to know how investors plans to invest their money and in which financial product i. e mutual funds or ulips . | | OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY AND SCOPE . †¢ To study the various benefits and disadvantages of mutual funds and unit linked insurance plans. †¢ To study the various features of ULIPs and Mutual funds. To study the comparison between the mutual funds and ulips. LITERATURE REVIEW Literature on mutual fund performance evaluation is enormous. A few research studies that have Influenced the preparation of this paper substantially are discussed. Sharpe, William F. (1966) suggested a measure for the evaluation of portfolio performance. Drawing on results obtained in the field of portfolio analysis, Economist Jack L. Treynor has suggested a new predictor of mutual fund performance, one that differs from virtually all those used previously by incorporating the volatility of a funds return in a simple yet meaningful manner. Michael C. Jensen (1967) derived a risk-adjusted measure of portfolio performance (Jensen’s alpha) that estimates how much a manager’s forecasting ability contributes to fund’s returns. As indicated by Statman (2000), the e SDAR of a fund portfolio is the excess return of the portfolio over the return of the benchmark index, where the portfolio is leveraged to have the benchmark index’s standard deviation. S. Narayan Rao , evaluated performance of Indian mutual funds in a bear market through relative performance index, risk-return analysis, Treynor’s ratio, Sharpe’s ratio, Sharpe’s measure , Jensen’s measure, and Fama’s measure. The study used 269 open-ended schemes (out of total schemes of 433) for computing relative performance index. Then after excluding funds whose returns are less than risk-free returns, 58 schemes are finally used for further analysis. The results of performance measures suggest that most of mutual fund schemes in the sample of 58 were able to satisfy investor’s expectations by giving excess returns over expected returns based on both premium for systematic risk and total risk. Bijan Roy, et. al. , conducted an mpirical study on conditional performance of Indian mutual funds. This paper uses a technique called conditional performance evaluation on a sample of eighty-nine Indian mutual fund schemes . This paper measures the performance of various mutual funds with both unconditional and conditional form of CAPM, Treynor- Mazuy model and Henriksson-Merton model. The effect of incorporating lagged information variables into the evaluation of mutual fund managers’ performance is examined in the Indian context. The results suggest that the use of conditioning lagged information variables improves the performance of mutual fund schemes, causing alphas to shift towards right and reducing the number of negative timing coefficients. Mishra, et al. , (2002) measured mutual fund performance using lower partial moment. In this paper, measures of evaluating portfolio performance based on lower partial moment are developed. Risk from the lower partial moment is measured by taking into account only those states in which return is below a pre-specified â€Å"target rate† like risk-free rate. Kshama Fernandes(2003) evaluated index fund implementation in India. In this paper, tracking error of index funds in India is measured . The consistency and level of tracking errors obtained by some well-run index fund suggests that it is possible to attain low levels of tracking error under Indian conditions. At the same time, there do seem to be periods where certain index funds appear to depart from the discipline of indexation. K. Pendaraki et al. studied construction of mutual fund portfolios, developed a multi- criteria methodology and applied it to the Greek market of equity mutual funds. The methodology is based on the combination of discrete and continuous multi-criteria decision aid methods for mutual fund selection and composition. UTADIS multi-criteria decision aid method is employed in order to develop mutual fund’s performance models. Goal programming model is employed to determine proportion of selected mutual funds in the final portfolios. INTRODUCTION TO MUTUAL FUNDS: What is a Mutual fund? Mutual fund is an investment company that pools money from shareholders and invests in a variety of securities, such as stocks, bonds and money market instruments. Most open-end Mutual funds stand ready to buy back (redeem) its shares at their current net asset value, which depends on the total market value of the funds investment portfolio at the time of redemption. Most open-end Mutual funds continuously offer new shares to investors. Also known as an open-end investment company, to differentiate it from a closed-end investment company. Mutual funds invest pooled cashof many investors to meet the funds stated investment objective. Mutual funds stand ready to sell and redeem their shares at any time at the funds current net asset value: total fund assets divided by shares outstandinG pic] INVESTMENT FLOW. In Simple Words, Mutual fund is a mechanism for pooling the resources by issuing units to the investors and investing funds in securities in accordance with objectives as disclosed in offer document. Investments in securities are spread across a wide cross-section of industries and sectors and thus the risk is reduced. Diversification reduces the risk because all stocks may not move in the same direction in the same proportion at the same time. Mutual fund issues units to the investors in accordance with quantum of money invested by them. Investors of Mutual funds are known as unit holders. The profits or losses are shared by the investors in proportion to their investments. The Mutual funds normally come out with a number of schemes with different investment objectives which are launched from time to time. In India, A Mutual fund is required to be registered with Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) which regulates securities markets before it can collect funds from the public. In Short, a Mutual fund is a common pool of money in to which investors with common investment objective place their contributions that are to be invested in accordance with the stated investment objective of the scheme. The investment manager would invest the money collected from the investor in to assets that are defined/ permitted by the stated objective of the scheme. For example, an equity fund would invest equity and equity related instruments and a debt fund would invest in bonds, debentures, gilts etc. Mutual fund is a suitable investment for the common man as it offers an opportunity to invest in a diversified, professionally managed basket of securities at a relatively low cost. Mutual fund is a trust that pools the savings of a number of investors who share a common financial goal. This pool of money is invested in accordance with a stated objective. The joint ownership of the fund is thus â€Å"Mutual†, i. e. the fund belongs to all investors. The money thus collected is then invested in capital market instruments such as shares, debentures and other securities. The income earned through these investments and the capital appreciations realized are shared by its unit holders in proportion the number of units owned by them. Thus a Mutual Fund is the most suitable investment for the common man as it offers an opportunity to invest in a diversified, professionally managed basket of securities at a relatively low cost. A Mutual Fund is an investment tool that allows small investors access to a well- diversified portfolio of equities, bonds and other securities. Each shareholder participates in the gain or loss of the fund. Units are issued and can be redeemed as needed. The fund’s Net Asset value (NAV) is determined each day. Investments in securities are spread across a wide cross-section of industries and sectors and thus the risk is reduced. Diversification reduces the risk because all stocks may not move in the same direction in the same proportion at the same time. Mutual fund issues units to the investors in accordance with quantum of money invested by them. Investors of mutual funds are known as unit holders CONCEPT OF MUTUAL FUNDS: [pic] INTRODUCTION Over the past decade, investors increasingly have turned to mutual funds to save for retirement and other financial goals. Mutual funds can offer the advantages of diversification and professional management. But, as with other investment choices, investing in mutual funds involves risk. And fees and taxes will diminish a funds returns. It pays to understand both the upsides and the downsides of mutual fund investing and how to choose products that match your goals and tolerance for risk. A mutual fund is a form of collective investment that pools money from many investors and invests their money in stocks, bonds, short-term money market instruments, and/or other securities. In a mutual fund, the fund manager trades the funds underlying securities, realizing capital gains or losses, and collects the dividend or interest income. The investment proceeds are then passed along to the individual investors. The value of a share of the mutual fund, known as the net asset value per share (NAV), is calculated daily based on the total value of the fund divided by the number of shares currently issued and outstanding. Legally known as an open-end company under the Investment Company Act of 1940 (the primary regulatory statute governing investment companies), a mutual fund is one of three basic types of investment companies available in the United States. Outside of the United States (with the exception of Canada, which follows the U. S. model), mutual fund is a generic term for various types of collective investment vehicle. In the United Kingdom and western Europe (including offshore jurisdictions), other forms of collective investment vehicle are prevalent, including unit trusts, open-ended investment companies (OEICs), SICAVs and unitized insurance funds. In Australia the term mutual fund is generally not used; the name managed fund is used instead. However, managed fund is somewhat generic as the definition of a managed fund in Australia is any vehicle in which investors money is managed by a third party (NB: usually an investment professional or organization). Most managed funds are open-ended (i. e. , there is no established maximum number of shares that can be issued); however, this need not be the case. Additionally the Australian government introduced a compulsory superannuation/pension scheme which, although strictly speaking a managed fund, is rarely identified by this term and is instead called a superannuation fund because of its special tax concessions and restrictions on when money invested in it can be accessed HISTORY Massachusetts Investors Trust was founded on March 21, 1924, and, after one year, had 200 shareholders and $392,000 in assets. The entire industry, which included a few closed-end funds, represented less than $10 million in 1924. The stock market crash of 1929 slowed the growth of mutual funds. In response to the stock market crash, Congress passed the Securities Act of 1933 and the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. These laws require that a fund be registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and provide prospective investors with a prospectus that contains required disclosures about the fund, the securities themselves, and fund manager. The SEC helped draft the Investment Company Act of 1940, which sets forth the guidelines with which all SEC-registered funds today must comply. With renewed confidence in the stock market, mutual funds began to blossom. By the end of the 1960s, there were approximately 270 funds with $48 billion in assets. The first retail index fund, the First Index Investment Trust, was formed in 1976 and headed by John Bogle, who conceptualized many of the key tenets of the industry in his 1951 senior thesis at Princeton University. It is now called the Vanguard 500 Index Fund and is one of the largest mutual funds ever with in excess of $100 billion in assets. One of the largest contributors of mutual fund growth was individual retirement account (IRA) provisions added to the Internal Revenue Code in 1975, allowing individuals (including those already in corporate pension plans) to contribute $2,000 a year. Mutual funds are now popular in employer-sponsored defined contribution retirement plans (401(k)s), IRAs and Roth IRAs. As of April 2006, there are 8,606 mutual funds that belong to the Investment Company Institute (ICI), the national association of investment companies in the United States, with combined assets of $9. 207 trillion. 1963 – 1987 |UTI sole player in the industry, created by an Act of Parliament ,1963 | | |UTI launches first product Unit Scheme 1964 | | |UTI creates products such as MIPs, children plans ,offshore funds etc | | |UTI managed assets of 6700 Cr at the end of this phase | |1987 – 1993 |In 1987 Public Sector Banks and FIs | | |SBI mutual fund was the first non -UTI mutual fund | | |UTIs corpus gr ew to Rs. 38,247 Cr public Sector Funds got Rs 8750 Cr | |1993 – 1996 |In 1993, Mutual Fund Industry was open to private players. | |SEBIs first set of regulations for the industry formulated in 1993 | | |Significant innovations, mostly initiated by private players | |1996 – 1999 |Implementation of new SEBI regulations led to rapid growth | | |Bank mutual funds were recast as per SEBI guidelines | | |UTI came under voluntary SEBI supervision. | |1999 – 2000 |Rapid growth, significant increase in corpus of private players | | |Tax break offered created arbitrage opportunities | | |Bond funds and liquid funds registered highest growth | | |UTIs market share drops to nearly 50% | MUTUAL FUNDS : FLOW CHART A Mutual Fund is a trust that pools the savings of a number of investors who share a common financial goal. The money thus collected is then invested in capital market instruments such as shares, debentures and other securities. The income earned through these investments and the capital appreciation realised are shared by its unit holders in proportion to the number of units owned by them. Thus a Mutual Fund is the most suitable investment for the common man as it offers an opportunity to invest in a diversified, professionally managed basket of securities at a relatively low cost. The flow chart below describes broadly the working of a mutual fund: Mutual Fund Operation Flow Chart MUTUAL FUNDS INDUSTRY IN INDIA: The origin of mutual fund industry in India is with the introduction of the concept of mutual fund by UTI in the year 1963. Though the growth was slow, but it accelerated from the year 1987 when non-UTI players entered the industry. In the past decade, Indian mutual fund industry had seen a dramatic imporvements, both qualitywise as well as quantitywise. Before, the monopoly of the market had seen an ending phase, the Assets Under Management (AUM) was Rs. 67bn. The private sector entry to the fund family rose the AUM to Rs. 470 bn in March 1993 and till April 2004, it reached the height of 1,540 bn. Putting the AUM of the Indian Mutual Funds Industry into comparison, the total of it is less than the deposits of SBI alone, constitute less than 11% of the total deposits held by the Indian banking industry. The main reason of its poor growth is that the mutual fund industry in India is new in the country. Large sections of Indian investors are yet to be intellectuated with the concept. Hence, it is the prime responsibility of all mutual fund companies, to market the product correctly abreast of selling. The mutual fund industry can be broadly put into four phases according to the development of the sector. Each phase is briefly described as follows: FIRST PHASE 1964-87 Unit Trust of India (UTI) was established on 1963 by an Act of Parliament. It was set up by the Reserve Bank of India and functioned under the Regulatory and administrative control of the Reserve Bank of India. In 1978 UTI was de-linked from the RBI and the Industrial Development Bank of India (IDBI) took over the regulatory and administrative control in place of RBI. The first scheme launched by UTI was Unit Scheme 1964. At the end of 1988 UTI had Rs. 6,700 crores of assets under management SECOND PHASE 1987-1993 (Entry of Public Sector Funds) Entry of non-UTI mutual funds. SBI Mutual Fund was the first followed by Canbank Mutual Fund (Dec 87), Punjab National Bank Mutual Fund (Aug 89), Indian Bank Mutual Fund (Nov 89), Bank of India (Jun 90), Bank of Baroda Mutual Fund (Oct 92). LIC in 1989 and GIC in 1990. The end of 1993 marked Rs. 7,004 as assets under management. THIRD PHASE 1993-2003 (Entry of Private Sector Funds) With the entry of private sector funds in 1993, a new era started in the Indian mutual fund industry, giving the Indian investors a wid er choice of fund families. Also, 1993 was the year in which the first Mutual Fund Regulations came into being, under which all mutual funds, except UTI were to be registered and governed. The erstwhile Kothari Pioneer (now merged with Franklin Templeton) was the first private sector mutual fund registered in July 1993. The 1993 SEBI (Mutual Fund) Regulations were substituted by a more comprehensive and revised Mutual Fund Regulations in 1996. The industry now functions under the SEBI (Mutual Fund) Regulations 1996. The number of mutual fund houses went on increasing, with many foreign mutual funds setting up funds in India and also the industry has witnessed several mergers and acquisitions. As at the end of January 2003, there were 33 mutual funds with total assets of Rs. 1,21,805 crores. The Unit Trust of India with Rs. 44,541 crores of assets under management was way ahead of other mutual funds. FOURTH PHASE – SINCE FEBURARY2003 This phase had bitter experience for UTI. It was bifurcated into two separate entities. One is the Specified Undertaking of the Unit Trust of India with AUM of Rs. 29,835 crores (as on January 2003). The Specified Undertaking of Unit Trust of India, functioning under an administrator and under the rules framed by Government of India and does not come under the purview of the Mutual Fund Regulations. The second is the UTI Mutual Fund Ltd, sponsored by SBI, PNB, BOB and LIC. It is registered with SEBI and functions under the Mutual Fund Regulations. With the bifurcation of the erstwhile UTI which had in March 2000 more than Rs. 76,000 crores of AUM and with the setting up of a UTI Mutual Fund, conforming to the SEBI Mutual Fund Regulations, and with recent mergers taking place among different private sector funds, the mutual fund industry has entered its current phase of consolidation and growth [pic] SEBI REGISTERED MUTUAL FUNDS : 1. FORTIS Mutual fund 2. Alliance Capital Mutual fund, 3. AIG Global Investment Group Mutual fund 4. Benchmark Mutual fund, 5. Baroda Pioneer Mutual fund 6. Birla Mutual fund 7. Bharti AXA Mutual fund 8. Canara Robeco Mutual fund 9. CRB Mutual fund (Suspended) 10. DBS Chola Mutual fund, 11. Deutsche Mutual fund 12. DSP Blackrock Mutual fund, 13. Edelweiss Mutual fund 14. Escorts Mutual fund, 15. Franklin Templeton Mutual fund 16. Fidelity Mutual fund 17. Goldman Sachs Mutual fund 18. HDFC Mutual fund, 19. HSBC Mutual fund, 20. ICICI Securities Fund, 21. IL FS Mutual fund, 22. ING Mutual fund, 23. ICICI Prudential Mutual fund 24. IDFC Mutual fund, 25. JM Financial Mutual fund 26. JP Morgan Mutual fund 27. Kotak Mahindra Mutual fund, 29. LIC Mutual fund 31. Morgan Stanley Mutual fund 32. Mirae Asset Mutual fund 33. Principal Mutual fund 34. Quantum Mutual fund, 35. Reliance Mutual fund 36. Religare AEGON Mutual fund 37. Sahara Mutual fund 38. SBI Mutual fund 39. Shriram Mutual fund 40. Sundaram BNP Paribas Mutual fund, 41. Taurus Mutual fund 42. Tata Mutual fund, 43. UTI Mutual fund If the complaints remain unresolved, the investors may approach SEBI for facilitating redressal of their complaints. On receipt of complaints, SEBI takes up the matter with the concerned Mutual fund and follows up with it regularly. Investors may send their complaints to: SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE BOARD OF INDIA (SEBI) OFFICE OF INVESTOR ASSISTANCE AND EDUCATION (OIAE) EXCHANGE PLAZA, â€Å"G† BLOCK, 4TH FLOOR, BANDRA-KURLA COMPLEX, BANDRA (E), MUMBAI – 400 051. LEGAL STRUCTURE OF MUTUAL FUNDS IN INDIA: SEBI (Mutual Fund) Regulations, 1996 as amended till date define â€Å"mutual fund† as a fund established in the form of a trust to raise moneys through the sale of units to the public or a section of the public under one or more schemes for investing in securities including money market instruments or gold or gold related instruments or real estate assets. SEBI has stipulated the legal structure under which mutual funds in India need to be constituted. The structure, which has inherent checks and balances to protect the investors, can be briefly described as follows: †¢ Mutual funds are constituted as Trusts. †¢ The mutual fund trust is created by one or more Sponsors, who are the main persons behind the mutual fund business. †¢ Every trust has beneficiaries. The beneficiaries, in the case of a mutual fund trust, are the investors who invest in various schemes of the mutual fund. †¢ The operations of the mutual fund trust are governed by a Trust Deed, which is executed by the sponsors. SEBI has laid down various clauses that need to be part of the Trust Deed. †¢ The Trust acts through its trustees. Therefore, the role of protecting the beneficiaries (investors) is that of the Trustees. The first trustees are named in the Trust Deed, which also prescribes the procedure for change in Trustees. †¢ In order to perform the trusteeship role, either individuals may be appointed as trustees or a Trustee company may be appointed. When individuals are appointed trustees, they are jointly referred to as Board of Trustees. A trustee company functions through its Board of Directors. †¢ Day to day management of the schemes is handled by an Asset Management Company (AMC). The AMC is appointed by the sponsor or the Trustees. †¢ Although the AMC manages the schemes, custody of the assets of the scheme (securities, gold, gold? nd related instruments real estate assets) is with a Custodian, who is appointed by the Trustees. †¢ Investors invest in various schemes of the mutual fund. The record of investors and their unit? holding may be maintained by the AMC itself, or it can appoint a Registrar Transfer Agent (RTA). KEY PLAYERS OF MUTUAL FUNDS IN INDIA. SPONSORS The application to SEBI for registration of a mutual fund is made by the sponsor/s. Thereafter, the sponsor invests in the capital of the AMC. Since sponsors are the main people behind the mutual fund operation, eligibility criteria has been specified as follows: †¢ The sponsor should have a sound track record and reputation of fairness and integrity in all business transactions. The requirements are: †¢ Sponsor should be carrying on business in financial services for 5 years †¢ Sponsor should have positive net worth (share capital plus reserves minus accumulated losses) for each of those 5 years †¢ Latest net worth should be more than the amount that the sponsor contributes to the capital of the AMC †¢ The sponsor should have earned profits, after providing for depreciation and interest, in three of the previous five years, including the latest year. †¢ The sponsor should be a fit and proper person for this kind of operation. †¢ The sponsor needs to have a minimum 40% share holding in the capital of the AMC. Further, anyone who has more than 40% share holding in the AMC is considered to be a sponsor, and should therefore fulfill the eligibility criteria. TRUSTEE: The trustees have a critical role in ensuring that the mutual fund complies with all the regulations, and protects the interests of the unit? ]holders. As part of this role, they perform various kinds of General Due Diligence and Specific Due Diligence. The SEBI Regulations stipulate that: Every trustee has to be a person of ability, integrity and standing †¢ A person who is guilty of moral turpitude cannot be appointed trustee †¢ A person convicted of any economic offence or violation of any securities laws cannot be appointed as trustee Prior approval of SEBI needs to be taken, before a person is appointed as Trustee. The sponsor will have to appoint at least 4 trustees. If a trustee company has been appointed, then that company would need to have at least 4 directors on the Board. Further, at least two? ]thirds of the trustees / directors on the Board of the trustee company, would need to be Independent trustees i. e. not associated with the sponsor in any way. SEBI expects Trustees to perform a key role in ensuring legal compliances and protecting the interest of investors. Accordingly, various General Due Diligence and Special Due D iligence responsibilities have been assigned to them. The strict provisions go a long way in promoting the independence of the role of trusteeship in a mutual fund. AMC: Day to day operations of asset management are handled by the AMC. It therefore arranges for the requisite offices and infrastructure, engages employees, provides for the requisite software, handles advertising and sales promotion, and interacts with regulators and various service providers. The AMC has to take all reasonable steps and exercise due diligence to ensure that the investment of funds pertaining to any scheme is not contrary to the provisions of the SEBI Regulations and the trust deed. Further, it has to exercise due diligence and care in all its investment decisions. As per SEBI regulations: The directors of the asset management company need to be persons having adequate professional experience in finance and financial services related field †¢ The directors as well as key personnel of the AMC should not have been found guilty of moral turpitude or conv icted of any economic offence or violation of any Securities laws †¢ Key personnel of the AMC should not have worked for any asset management company or mutual fund or any intermediary during the period when its registration was suspended or cancelled at any time by SEBI. Prior approval of the trustees is required, before a person is Appointed as director on the board of the AMC. Further, at least 50% of the directors should be independent directors i. e. ot associate of or associated with the sponsor or any of its subsidiaries or the trustees. The AMC needs to have a minimum net worth of Rs10 crore. An AMC cannot invest in its own schemes, unless the intention to invest is disclosed in the Offer Document. Further, the AMC cannot charge any fees for the investment. The appointment of an AMC can be terminated by a majority of the trustees, or by 75% of the Unit? holders. However, any change in the AMC is subject to prior approval of SEBI and the Unit holders. Operations of AMCs are headed by a Managing Director, Executive Director or Chief Executive Officer. OTHER SERVICE PROVIDERS : CUSTODIAN: The custodian has custody of the assets of the fund. As part of this role, the custodian needs to accept and give delivery of securities for the purchase and sale transactions of the various schemes of the fund. The Custodian is appointed by the mutual fund. A custodial agreement is entered into between the trustees and the custodian. The SEBI regulations provide that if the sponsor or its associates control 50% or more of the shares of a custodian, or if 50% or more of the directors of a custodian represent the interest of the sponsor or its associates, then that custodian cannot appointed for the mutual fund operation of the sponsor or its associate or subsidiary company. An independent custodian ensures that the securities are indeed held in the scheme for the benefit of investors – an important control aspect. All custodians need to register with SEBI. RTA: The RTA maintains investor records. Their offices in various centres serve as Investor Service Centres (ISCs), which perform a useful role in handling the documentation of investors. The appointment of RTA is done by the AMC. It is not compulsory to appoint a RTA. The AMC can choose to handle this activity in house. All RTAs need to register with SEBI. AUDITORS: Auditors are responsible for the audit of accounts. Accounts of the schemes need to be maintained independent of the accounts of the AMC. The auditor appointed to audit the scheme accounts needs to be different from the auditor of the AMC. While the scheme auditor is appointed by the Trustees, the AMC auditor is appointed by the AMC. FUND ACCOUNTANTS: The fund accountant performs the role of calculating the NAV, by collecting information about the assets and liabilities of each scheme. The AMC can either handle this activity in house, or engage a service provider. DISTRIBUTORS : Distributors have a key role in selling suitable types of units to their clients i. e. the investors in the schemes. Distributors need to pass the prescribed certification test, and register with AMFI. COLLECTING BANKERS: The investors’ moneys go into the bank account of the scheme they have invested in. These bank accounts are maintained with collection bankers who are appointed by the AMC. Leading collection bankers make it convenient to invest in the schemes by accepting applications of investors in most of their branches. Payment instruments against applications handed over to branches of the AMC or the RTA need to be banked with the collecting bankers, so that the moneys are available for investment by the scheme. Through this kind of a mix of constituents and specialized service providers, most mutual funds maintain high standards of service and safety for investors. SOME FACTS FOR GROWTH OF MUTUAL FUNDS IN INDIA 100% growth in the last 6 years. Number of foreign AMCs are in the que to enter the Indian markets like Fidelity Investments, US based, with over US$1trillion assets under management worldwide. Our saving rate is over 23%, highest in the world. Only channelizing these savings in mutual funds sector is required. We have approximately 29 mutual funds which is much less than US having more than 800. There is a big scope for expansion. B and C class cities are growing rapidly. Today most of the mutual funds are concentrating on the A class cities. Soon they will find scope in the growing cities. Mutual fund can penetrate rurals like the Indian insurance industry with simple and limited products. SEBI allowing the MFs to launch commodity mutual funds. Emphasis on better corporate governance. Trying to curb the late trading practices. Introduction of Financial Planners who can provide need based advice. TYPES OF MUTUAL FUND SCHEMES IN INDIA: Wide variety of Mutual Fund Schemes exists to cater to the needs such as financial position, risk tolerance and return expectations etc. The table below gives an overview into the existing types of schemes in the Industry. TYPES OF MUTUAL FUNDS SCHEMES Mutual Funds can be classified into the following 4 broad categories: 1. Portfolio classification 2. Functional classification 3. Geographical classification 4. Structure and objective based classification How are mutual funds classified based on their portfolios? Portfolio classification of mutual funds is done on the following basis: †¢ GROWTH FUNDS: Investment objective: Capital appreciation of equity shares Investment avenue: Equity shares of companies with high growth potential For eg. Morgan Stanley Growth Fund †¢ INCOME FUNDS: Investment objective: Providing safety of investments and regular income Investment avenue: Bonds, debentures and other debt related instruments as well as equity shares of companies with high dividend payouts. There are 2 aspects of income funds viz. ow investment risk with constant income and high investment risk generating high income. For eg. Templeton Income Fund †¢ BALANCED FUNDS : Investment objective: Modest risk of investment and reasonable rate of return Investment avenue: Judicious mix of equity shares, preference shares as well as bonds, debentures and other debt related instruments. F or eg. GIC Balanced Fund †¢ MONEY MARKET MUTUAL FUNDS (MMMFs) Investment objective: To take advantage of the volatility in interest rates in the money market Investment Avenue: Certificate of deposits (CDs), call money market, commercial papers. Investors can participate indirectly in the money market through MMMFs. For eg. IDBI-PRINCIPAL Money Market Fund 1997 †¢ SPECIALISED FUNDS Investment Objective: To take advantage of conditions in a particular sector or a specific income producing security Investment Avenue: Specialised investments in securities of companies in certain sectors or specific income producing securities For eg. Kothari Pioneers Internet Opportunities Fund †¢ LEVERAGED FUNDS: Investment objective: To increase the value of the portfolio and benefit the shareholders by gains exceeding the cost of borrowed funds. †¢ INDEX FUNDS: Investment Objective: To increase the value of the portfolio in line with the benchmark index (for eg. BSE Sensex, SP CNX 50) Investment Avenue: Investments only in those shares that form a part of the benchmark index, in exactly the same proportion, so that the value of the index fund varies in proportion with the benchmark index. For e. g. UTI Nifty Index Fund †¢ HEDGE FUNDS: Investment Objective: To hedge risks in order to increase the value of the portfolio Investment Avenue: Employ speculative trading principles buy rising shares and sell shares whose prices are likely to fall. Not common in India How are mutual funds classified functionally? Functional classification of mutual funds is done on the following basis: †¢ OPEN ENDED SCHEME: Investors under this scheme are free to join the fund or withdraw from the fund at any time after an initial lock-in period. Such funds announce sale and repurchase prices from time to time. In an open-ended scheme, investors can resell units in the fund to the issuing mutual fund at the net asset value (NAV) of the units. This is because open-ended schemes are permitted to buy/sell their own units. For e. g. Alliance Capital 1995 Fund †¢ CLOSE ENDED SCHEME: Unlike the open-ended schemes, close-ended schemes do not issue units for repurchase redemption on a periodic basis. Its units can be redeemed only on termination of the scheme, or through dealings in the secondary market. In such schemes, the period of the scheme is specified at the outset. They have a definite target amount for the funds and cannot sell more after initial offering. For eg. UTI Master gain 1986 HOW ARE MUTUAL FUNDS CLASSIFIED GEOGRAPHICALLY? Mutual funds can be classified geographically on the following basis: †¢ DOMESTIC FUNDS: Domestic fund houses launch funds, which mobilise savings of the nationals within the country. These schemes could fall under any of the categories mentioned under portfolio classification and functional classification. Schemes launched by Indian MFs like GIC MF, UTI LIC MF, SBI MF, Canbank MF, Bank of Baroda MF, Bank of India MF, Morgan Stanley, Templeton, Alliance. †¢ OFFSHORE FUNDS: Offshore funds can invest in securities of foreign companies, after requisite permission from RBI. The objective behind launching offshore funds is to attract foreign capital for investment in the country of the issuing company. These funds facilitate cross border fund flow, which is a direct route for getting foreign currency. From the investment point of view, Offshore funds open up domestic capital markets to the international investors and global portfolio investments. What are the different plans that mutual funds offer? Mutual Funds in order to cater to a range of investors, have various investment plans. Some of the important investment plans include: †¢ GROWTH PLAN: Under the Growth Plan, the investor realises only the capital appreciation on the investment (by an increase in NAV) and does not get any income in the form of dividend. †¢ INCOME PLAN: Under the Income Plan, the investor realises income in the form of dividend. However his NAV will fall to the extent of the dividend. †¢ DIVIDEND RE-INVESTMENT PLAN: Here the dividend accrued on mutual funds is automatically re-invested in purchasing additional units in open-ended funds. In most cases mutual funds offer the investor an option of collecting dividends or re-investing the same. †¢ RETIREMENT PLAN Some schemes are linked with retirement pension. Individuals participate in these plans for themselves, and corporates for their employees. †¢ INSURANCE PLAN Some schemes launched by UTI and LIC offer insurance cover to investors. fixed date of a month. Payment is made through post dated cheques or direct debit facilities. The investor gets fewer units when the NAV is high and more units when the NAV is low. This is called as the benefit of Rupee Cost Averaging (RCA) STRUCTURAL AND OBJECTIVE BASED CLASSIFICATION †¢ Closed-end funds †¢ Open-end funds †¢ Large cap funds †¢ Mid-cap funds †¢ Equity funds †¢ Balanced funds †¢ Growth funds †¢ No load funds †¢ Exchange traded funds †¢ Value funds †¢ Money market funds †¢ International mutual funds †¢ Regional mutual funds †¢ Sector funds †¢ Index funds †¢ Fund of funds OPEN ENDED MUTUAL FUNDS: An open-end mutual fund is a fund that does not have a set number of shares. It continues to sell shares to investors and will buy back shares when investors wish to sell. Units are bought and sold at their current net asset value. Open-end funds keep some portion of their assets in short-term and money market securities to provide available funds for redemptions. A large portion of most open mutual funds is invested in highly liquid securities, which enables the fund to raise money by selling securities at prices very close to those used for valuations. CLOSED – END MUTUAL FUNDS: A closed-end mutual fund has a set number of shares issued to the public through an initial public offering. These funds have a stipulated maturity period generally ranging from 3 to 15 years Once underwritten, closed-end funds trade on stock exchanges like stocks or bonds. The market price of closed-end funds is determined by supply and demand and not by net-asset value (NAV), as is the case in open-end funds. Usually closed mutual funds trade at discounts to their underlying asset value. LARGE CAP FUNDS Large cap funds are those mutual funds, which seek capital appreciation by investing primarily in stocks of large blue chip companies with above-average prospects for earnings growth. Different mutual funds have different criteria for classifying companies as large cap. Generally, companies with a market capitalisation in excess of Rs 1000 crore are known large cap companies. Investing in large caps is a lower risk-lower return proposition (vis-a-vis mid cap stocks), because such companies are usually widely researched and information is widely available MID CAP FUNDS: Mid cap funds are those mutual funds, which invest in small / medium sized companies. As there is no standard definition classifying companies as small or medium, each mutual fund has its own classification for small and medium sized companies. Generally, companies with a market capitalization of up to Rs 500 crore are classified as small. Those companies that have a market capitalization between Rs 500 crore and Rs 1,000 crore are classified as medium sized. Big investors like mutual funds and Foreign Institutional Investors are increasingly investing in mid caps nowadays because the price of large caps has increased substantially. Small / mid sized companies tend to be under researched thus they present an opportunity to invest in a company that is yet to be identified by the market. Such companies offer higher growth potential going forward and therefore an opportunity to benefit from higher than average valuations. But mid cap funds are very volatile and tend to fall like a pack of cards in bad times. So, caution should be exercised while investing in mid cap mutual funds. EQUITY MUTUAL FUNDS: Equity mutual funds are also known as stock mutual funds. Equity mutual funds invest pooled amounts of money in the stocks of public companies. Stocks represent part ownership, or equity, in companies, and the aim of stock ownership is to see the value of the companies increase over time. Stocks are often categorized by their market capitalization (or caps), and can be classified in three basic sizes: small, medium, and large. Many mutual funds invest primarily in companies of one of these sizes and are thus classified as large-cap,mid-cap or small-cap funds. Equity fund managers employ different styles of stock picking when they make investment decisions for their portfolios. Some fund managers use a value pproach to stocks, searching for stocks that are undervalued when compared to other, similar companies. Another approach to picking is to look primarily at growth, trying to find stocks that are growing faster than their competitors, or the market as a whole. Some managers buy both kinds of stocks, building a portfolio of both growth and value stocks. BALANCED FUNDS: Balanced fund is also known as hybrid fund. It is a type of mutual fund that buys a combination of common stock, preferred stock, bonds, and short-term bonds, to provide both income and capital Balanced funds provide investor with an option of single mutual fund that combines both growth and income objectives, by investing in both stocks (for growth) and bonds (for income). Such diversified holdings ensure that these funds will manage downturns in the stock market without too much of a loss. But on the flip side, balanced funds will usually increase less than an all-stock fund during a bull market. GROWTH FUNDS: Growth funds are those mutual funds that aim to achieve capital appreciation by investing in growth stocks. They focus on those companies, which are experiencing significant earnings or revenue growth, rather than companies that pay out dividends. Growth funds tend to look for the fastest-growing companies in the market. Growth managers are willing to take more risk and pay a premium for their stocks in an effort to build a portfolio of companies with above-average earnings momentum or price appreciation. In general, growth funds are more volatile than other types of funds, rising more than other funds in bull markets and falling more in bear markets. Only aggressive investors, or those with enough time to make up for short-term market losses, should buy these funds. NO –LOAD MUTUAL FUNDS: Mutual funds can be classified into two types Load mutual funds and No-Load mutual funds. Load funds are those funds that charge commission at the time of purchase or redemption. They can be further subdivided into (1) Front-end load funds and (2) Back-end load funds. Front-end load funds charge commission at the time of purchase and back-end load funds charge commission at the time of redemption. On the other hand, no-load funds are those funds that can be purchased without commission. No load funds have several advantages over load funds. Firstly, funds with loads, on average, consistently underperform no-load funds when the load is taken into consideration in performance calculations. Secondly, loads understate the real commission charged because they reduce the total amount being invested. Finally, when a load fund is held over a long time period, the effect of the load, if paid up front, is not diminished because if the money paid for the load had invested, as in a no-load fund, it would have been compounding over the whole time period. EXCHANGE TRADED FUNDS: Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs) represent a basket of securities that are traded on an exchange. An exchange traded fund is similar to an index fund in that it will primarily invest in the securities of companies that are included in a selected market index. An ETF will invest in either all of the securities or a representative sample of the securities included in the index. The investment objective of an ETF is to achieve the same return as a particular market index Exchange traded funds rely on an arbitrage mechanism to keep the prices at which they trade roughly in line with the net asset values of their underlying portfolios. VALUE FUNDS: Value funds are those mutual funds that tend to focus on safety rather than growth, and often choose investments providing dividends as well as capital appreciation. They invest in companies that the market has overlooked, and stocks that have fallen out of favour with mainstream investors, either due to changing investor preferences, a poor quarterly earnings report, or hard times in a particular industry. Value stocks are often mature companies that have stopped growing and that use their earnings to pay dividends. Thus value funds produce current income (from the dividends) as well as long-term growth (from capital appreciation once the stocks become popular again). They tend to have more conservative and less volatile returns than growth funds. MONEY MARKET MUTUAL FUNDS: A money market fund is a mutual fund that invests solely in money market instruments. Money market instruments are forms of debt that mature in less than one year and are very liquid. Treasury bills make up the bulk of the money market instruments. Securities in the money market are relatively risk-free. Money market funds are generally the safest and most secure of mutual fund investments. The goal of a money-market fund is to preserve principal while yielding a modest return. Money-market mutual fund is akin to a high-yield bank account but is not entirely risk free. When investing in a money-market fund, attention should be paid to the interest rate that is being offered. INTERNATIONAL MUTUAL FUNDS: International mutual funds are those funds that invest in non-domestic securities markets throughout the world. Investing in international markets provides greater portfolio diversification and let you capitalize on some of the worlds best opportunities. If investments are chosen carefully, international mutual fund may be profitable when some markets are rising and others are declining. However, fund managers need to keep close watch on foreign currencies and world markets as profitable investments in a rising market can lose money if the foreign currency rises against the dollar. REGIONAL MUTUAL FUNDS: Regional mutual fund is a mutual fund that confines itself to investments in securities from a specified geographical area, usually, the funds local region. A regional mutual fund generally looks to own a diversified portfolio of companies based in and operating out of its specified geographical area. The objective is to take advantage of regional growth potential before the national investment community does. Regional funds select securities that pass geographical criteria. For the investor, the primary benefit of a regional fund is that he/she increases his/her diversification by being exposed to a specific foreign geographical area. SECTOR MUTUAL FUND: Sector mutual funds are those mutual funds that restrict their investments to a particular segment or sector of the economy. These funds concentrate on one industry such as infrastructure, heath care, utilities, pharmaceuticals etc. The idea is to allow investors to place bets on specific industries or sectors, which have strong growth potential. These funds tend to be more volatile than funds holding a diversified portfolio of securities in many industries. Such concentrated portfolios can produce tremendous gains or losses, depending on whether the chosen sector is in or out of favour. INDEX MUTUAL FUNDS: An index fund is a type of mutual fund that builds its portfolio by buying stock in all the companies of a particular index and thereby reproducing the performance of an entire section of the market. The most popular index of stock index funds is the Standard Poors 500. An SP 500 stock index fund owns 500 stocks-all the companies that are included in the index. Investing in an index fund is a form of passive investing. Passive investing has two big advantages over active investing. First, a passive stock market mutual fund is much cheaper to run than an active fund. Second, a majority of mutual funds fail to beat broad indexes such as the SP 500. FUND OF FUNDS: A fund of funds is a type of mutual fund that invests in other mutual funds. Just as a mutual fund invests in a number of different securities, a fund of funds holds shares of many different mutual funds. Fund of funds are designed to achieve greater diversification than traditional mutual funds. But on the flipside, expense fees on fund of funds are typically higher than those on regular funds because they include part of the expense fees charged by the underlying funds. Also, since a fund of funds buys many different funds which themselves invest in many different stocks, it is possible for the fund of funds to own the same stock through several different funds and it can be difficult to keep track of the overall holdings. ADVANTAGES OF MUTUAL FUNDS: The advantages of investing in a Mutual Fund are: Diversification: The best mutual funds design their portfolios so individual investments will react differently to the same economic conditions. For example, economic conditions like a rise in interest rates may cause certain securities in a diversified portfolio to decrease in value. Other securities in the portfolio will respond to the same economic conditions by increasing in value. When a portfolio is balanced in this way, the value of the overall portfolio should gradually increase over time, even if some securities lose value. Professional Management: Most mutual funds pay topflight professionals to manage their investments. These managers decide what securities the fund will buy and sell. Regulatory oversight: Mutual funds are subject to many government regulations that protect investors from fraud. Liquidity: Its easy to get your money out of a mutual fund. Write a check, make a call, and youve got the cash. Convenience: You can usually buy mutual fund shares by mail, phone, or over the Internet. Low cost: Mutual fund expenses are often no more than 1. 5 percent of your investment. Expenses for Index Funds are less than that, because index funds are not actively managed. Instead, they automatically buy stock in companies that are listed on a specific index Transparency Flexibility Choice of schemes Tax benefits Well regulated DISADVANTAGES OF MUTUAL FUNDS: Mutual funds have their drawbacks and may not be for everyone: No Guarantees: No investment is risk free. If the entire stock market declines in value, the value of mutual fund shares will go down as well, no matter how balanced the portfolio. Investors encounter fewer risks when they invest in mutual funds than when they buy and sell stocks on their own. However, anyone who invests through a mutual fund runs the risk of losing money. Fees and commissions: All funds charge administrative fees to cover their day-to-day expenses. Some funds also charge sales commissions or loads to compensate brokers, financial consultants, or financial planners. Even if you dont use a broker or other financial adviser, you will pay a sales commission if you buy shares in a Load Fund. Taxes: During a typical year, most actively managed mutual funds sell anywhere from 20 to 70 percent of the securities in their portfolios. If your fund makes a profit on its sales, you will pay taxes on the income you receive, even if you reinvest the money you made. Management risk: When you invest in a mutual fund, you depend on the funds manager to make the right decisions regarding the funds portfolio. If the manager does not perform as well as you had hoped, you might not make as much money on your investment as you expected. Of course, if you invest in Index Funds, you forego management risk, because these funds do not employ managers. ASSOCIATION OF MUTUAL FUNDS IN INDIA (AMFI) With the increase in mutual fund players in India, a need for mutual fund association in India was generated to function as a non-profit organization. Association of Mutual Funds in India (AMFI) was incorporated on 22nd August, 1995. AMFI is an apex body of all Asset Management Companies (AMC) which has been registered with SEBI. Till date all the AMCs are that have launched mutual fund schemes are its members. It functions under the supervision and guidelines of its Board of Directors. Association of Mutual Funds India has brought down the Indian Mutual Fund Industry to a professional and healthy market with ethical lines enhancing and maintaining standards. It follows the principle of both protecting and promoting the interests of mutual funds as well as their unit holders. THE OBJECTIVES OF AMFI The Association of Mutual Funds of India works with 30 registered AMCs of the country. It has certain defined objectives which juxtaposes the guidelines of its Board of Directors. The objectives are as follows: This mutual fund association of India maintains a high professional and ethical standards in all areas of operation of the industry. It also recommends and promotes the top class business practices and code of conduct which is followed by members and related people engaged in the activities of mutual fund and asset management. The agencies who are by any means connected or involved in the field of capital markets and financial services also involved in this code of conduct of the association. AMFI interacts with SEBI and works according to SEBIs guidelines in the mutual fund industry. Association of Mutual Fund of India does represent the Government of India, the Reserve Bank of India and other related bodies on matters relating to the Mutual Fund Industry. It develops a team of well qualified and trained Agent distributors. It implements a programme of training and certification for all intermediaries and other engaged in the mutual fund industry. AMFI undertakes all India awareness programme for investors in order to promote proper understanding of the concept and working of mutual funds. At last but not the least association of mutual fund of India also disseminate information’s on Mutual Fund Industry and undertakes studies and research either directly or in association with other bodies. PROCEDURE FOR REGISTERING A MUTUAL FUND WITH SEBI An applicant proposing to sponsor a Mutual fund in India must submit an application in Form A along with a fee of Rs. 25, 000. The application is examined and once the sponsor satisfies certain conditions such as being in the financial services business and possessing positive net worth for the last five years, having net profit in three out of the last five years and possessing the general reputation of fairness and integrity in all business transactions, it is required to complete the remaining formalities for setting up a Mutual fund. These include inter alia, executing the trust deed and investment management agreement, setting up a trustee company/board of trustees comprising two- thirds independent trustees, incorporating the asset management company (AMC), contributing to at least 40% of the net worth of the AMC and appointing a custodian. Upon satisfying these conditions, the registration certificate is issued subject to the payment of registration fees of Rs. 25. 00 lacs for details; see the SEBI (Mutual funds) Regulations, 1996. [pic] INTRODUCTION TO INSURANCE ORIGIN OF INSURANCE: Almost 4,500 years ago, in the ancient land of Babylonia, traders used to bear risk of the caravan trade by giving loans that had to be later repaid with interest when the goods arrived safely. In 2100 BC, the Code of Hammurabi granted legal status to the practice. This is how insurance made its beginning. Life insurance had its origins in ancient Rome, where citizens formed burial clubs that would meet the funeral expenses of its members as well as help survivors by making some payments. As European civilization progressed, its social institutions and welfare practices also got more and more refined. With the discovery of new lands, sea routes and the consequent growth in trade, medieval guilds took it upon themselves to protect their member traders from loss on account of fire, shipwrecks and the like. Since most of the trade took place by sea, there was also the fear of pirates. So these guilds even offered ransom for members held captive by pirates. Burial expenses and support in times of sickness and poverty were other services offered. All these revolved around the concept of insurance or risk coverage. In 1347, in Genoa, European maritime nations entered into the earliest known insurance contract and decided to accept marine insurance as a practice. The first step Insurance owes its existence to 17th century England. In fact, it began taking shape in 1688 at a place called Lloyds Coffee House in London, where merchants, ship-owners and underwriters met to discuss and transact business. By the end of the 18th century, Lloyds had brewed enough business to become one of the first modern insurance companies. DEVELOPMENT OF INSURANCE SECTOR Back to the 17th century, astronomer Edmond Halley constructed the first mortality table to provide a link between the life insurance premium and the average life spans based on statistical laws of mortality and compound interest. In 1756, Joseph Dodson reworked the table, linking premium rate to age. COMPANIES INTO INSURANCE†¦ The first stock companies to get into the business of insurance were chartered in England in 1720. The year 1735 saw the birth of the first insurance company in the American colonies in Charleston, SC. In 1759, the Presbyterian Synod of Philadelphia sponsored the first life insurance corporation in America for the benefit of ministers and their dependents. THE GROWING YEARS. The 19th century saw huge developments in the field of insurance, with newer products being devised to meet the growing needs of urbanization and industrialization. In 1835, the infamous New York fire drew peoples attention to the need to provide for sudden and large losses. Two years later, Massachusetts became the first state to require companies by law to maintain such reserves. The great Chicago fire of 1871 further emphasized how fires can cause huge losses in densely populated modern cities. The practice of reinsurance, wherein the risks are spread among several companies, was devised specifically for such situations. There were more offshoots of the process of industrialization. In 1897, the British government passed the Workmens Compensation Act, which made it mandatory for a company to insure its employees against industrial accidents. With the advent of the automobile, public liability insurance, this first made its appearance in 1880s, gained importance and acceptance. In the 19th century, many societies were founded to insure the life and health of their members, while fraternal orders provided low-cost, members-only insurance. INSURANCE IN INDIA Insurance in India can be traced back to the Vedas. For instance, yogakshema, the name of Life Insurance Corporation of Indias corporate headquarters, is derived from the Rig Veda. The term suggests that a form of community insurance was prevalent around 1000 BC and practiced by the Aryans. Burial societies of the kind found in ancient Rome were formed in the Buddhist period to help families build houses, protect widows and children. Bombay Mutual Assurance Society, the first Indian life assurance society, was formed in 1870. Other companies like Oriental, Bharat and Empire of India were also set up in the 1870-90s. It was during the swadeshi movement in the early 20th century that insurance witnessed a big boom in India with several more companies being set up. As these companies grew, the government began to exercise control on them. The Insurance Act was passed in 1912, followed by a detailed and amended Insurance Act of 1938 that looked into investments, expenditure and management of these companies funds. By the mid-1950s, there were around 170 insurance companies and 80 provident fund societies in the countrys life insurance scene. However, in the absence of regulatory systems, scams and irregularities were almost a way of life at most of these companies. As a result, the government decided nationalise the life assurance business in India. The Life Insurance Corporation of India was set up in 1956 to take over around 250 life companies. For years thereafter, insurance remained a monopoly of the public sector. It was only after seven years of debate after the RN Malhotra Committee report of 1994 became the first serious document calling for the re-opening up of the insurance sector to private players, that the sector was finally opened up to private players in 2001. The Insurance Regulatory Development Authority, an autonomous insurance regulator set up in 2000, has extensive powers to oversee the insurance business and regulate in a manner that will safeguard the interests of the insured. LIFE INSURANCE MEANING Life insurance is a contract for payment of a sum of money to the person assured (or failing him/her, to the person entitled to receive the same) on the happening of the event insured against. Usually the contra