Jun 17, 2009

Economic Outlook

Be carefull with the green shoots. Economic data / analysis is not all pointing towards a rosy future.
On the one hand, bigger than expected earning forecasts during the last week were released, supporting the rally experienced in the stock markets since march (because actually the earnings' improvement was in fact bigger than the rise by the stock markets).

But on the other hand, it was just released yesterday the June GEAB N°36, with gloomy perspectives for the months to come. Forecasting payment defaults in the UK and the US

... and (spanish):
Estas son las olas principales:
1- La ola del paro masivo. -> Massive unemployment.
2- La ola de las quiebras en serie, empresas, bancos, inmobiliario, estados, regiones, ciudades.
-> Wave of city councils, states, banks and corporation defaults.
3- La ola de la crisis terminal de los bonos del tesoro de EEUU, del dólar y de la libra y la vuelta a la inflación.
-> US' bond crisis. USD and GBP currency crisis, and back to (super)inflation times

Hope these guys are wrong bk otherwise the green shoots are going to get burned during the summer

So, be prepared for worst economic performance, and get a neutral/bearish market portfolio!
--
GEAB 36: http://tiny.cc/Qu0Qj

May 11, 2009

Diet > Carbohydrates > Glycemic Index


Harvard's new guide to healthy eating:









Glycemic Index: a ranking of foods based on their immediate effect on blood glucose-or blood sugar levels.
  • Carbohydrate foods that break down quickly during digestion have the highest glycemic indexes. Their blood sugar response is fast and high.
  • Carbohydrates that break down slowly, releasing glucose gradually into the blood stream, have low glycemic index values.


WHY LOW CARB DIETS ARE BAD?
Your body needs to maintain a certain glucose level in the blood to serve the brain and central nervous system. To ensure that glucose is readily available, your body stores it in the muscles and liver. This storage is called glycogen. If you are not eating the right amount of carbohydrates your body will take these glycogen stores, break them down, and convert them to glucose. Once the glycogen is used up, then starts breaking down muscle protein to synthesize glucose for vital organs. This will make you feel irritable, headachy and sick, and it causes a loss of lean muscle, tissue and water, two things that your body needs. It WILL NOT help you lose weight in the long run because the bodies fat stores can not be converted to glucose. So it's all about eating more of the "good" (complex), low glycemic index carbs, rather than lower amounts of carbs that will keep the weight off for good!


RECOMMENDATIONS:

First, to stabilize blood sugar levels, eat smaller more frequent balanced meals. According to some diets, each carbohydrate in your meals must be combined with a quality protein source and some sort of vegetables.

Good quality proteins include: eggs, fish, white meat, whey (by-product of cheese production).

Second, you should not have a diet too low in fat. The whole craze over high fat, high protein diets are to decrease spikes in insulin and to lower the GI index of foods and meals.

Third, you should purposely use mainly high glycemic carbs after you train. A carb drink with a scoop or two of a low fat protein powder will work wonders right after you train.

Finally, I would combine supplements like creatine, 10 grams of glutamine, and a good anti-oxidant with the post-workout drink. This will give you a big jump-start to recovery and glycogen replenishment.


GIs. These are examples of some good quality carbs:
100% stone ground whole wheat bread (GI=51)
Multi-grain breads(GI=49)
Fruits* act as a simple carb when eaten alone, add a fat and protein for it to become complex.
Vegetables
Bulgar
Beans
Lentils
Legumes
All Bran, or other high fiber cereals
Oatmeal


Beans
baby lima 32
baked 43
black 30
brown 38
butter 31
chickpeas 33
kidney 27
lentil 30
navy 38
pinto 42
red lentils 27
split peas 32
soy 18

Breads
bagel 72
croissant 67
Kaiser roll 73
pita 57
pumpernickel 49
rye 64
rye, dark 76
rye, whole 50
white 72
whole wheat 72
waffles 76

Cookies
Graham crackers 74
oatmeal 55
shortbread 64
Vanilla Wafers 77
Crackers
Kavli Norwegian 71
rice cakes 82
rye 63
saltine 72
stoned wheat thins 67
water crackers 78

Desserts
angel Food Cake 67
banana bread 47
blueberry muffin 59
bran muffin 60
Danish 59
fruit bread 47
pound cake 54
sponge cake 46
Grains
barley 22
brown rice 59
buckwheat 54
bulger 47
chickpeas 36
cornmeal 68
couscous 65
hominy 40
millet 75
rice, instant 91
rice, parboiled 47
rye 34
sweet corn 55
wheat, whole 41
white rice 88
wh. rice, high amylose 59
Juices
agave nector 11
apple 41
grapefruit 48
orange 55
pineapple 46

Cereals
All Bran 44
Bran Chex 58
Cheerios 74
Corn Bran 75
Corn Chex 83
Cornflakes 83
Cream of Wheat 66
Crispix 87
Frosted Flakes 55
Grapenuts 67
Grapenuts Flakes 80
Life 66
Muesli 60
NutriGrain 66
Oatmeal 49
Oatmeal 1 min 66
Puffed Wheat 74
Puffed Rice 90
Rice Bran 19
Rice Chex 89
Rice Krispies 82
Shredded Wheat 69
Special K 54
Swiss Muesli 60
Team 82
Total 76

Fruit
apple 38
apricot, canned 64
apricot, dried 30
apricot jam 55
banana 62
banana, unripe 30
canteloupe 65
cherries 22
dates, dried 103
fruit cocktail 55
grapefruit 25
grapes 43
kiwi 52
mango 55
orange 43
papaya 58
peach 42
pear 36
pineapple 66
plum 24
raisins 64
strawberries 32
strawberry jam 51
watermelon 72

Milk Products
chocolate milk 34
ice cream 50
milk 34
pudding43
soy milk 31
yogurt 38

Pasta
brown rice pasta 92
gnocchi 68
linguine, durum 50
macaroni 46
macaroni & cheese 64
spaghetti 40
spag. prot. enrich. 28
vermicelli 35
vermicelli, rice 58

Sweets
honey 58
jelly beans 80
Life Savers 70
M&M's Choc. Peanut 33
Skittles 70
Snickers 41

References-"The Glucose Revolution" Jennie Brand-Miller, PhD; Thomas M.S. Wolever, MD.,PhD; Stephen Colagiuri, MD., Kaye Foster-Powell, M. Nutr.&Diet.

"The Bottom Line", Harvard Publish Review.

Apr 21, 2009

eBooks

El ebook es un invento genial.
Con grandes ventajas y comodidades para ávidos lectores y nuevas generaciones de estudiantes. How the E-Book will change the way we read and write - WSJ

Por ejemplo, una buena forma de mejorar el inglés de forma autodidacta es leer libros a la vez que escuchamos la lectura del correspondiente audiolibro. Aunque hay ediciones especiales para ello -nivel medio/bajo- en las obras que ya han perdido los derechos originales, va a ser mucho más fácil conseguir ambos formatos, y de manera gratuita -los derechos de copyright se pierden a los 50 años de la publicación.

Aquí algunas ideas:

sun tzu, el príncipe // darwin // adam smith, locke, john ruskin, stuart mill, david ricardo, max weber, keynes // (liberalismo) mises, hayek, friedman, bastiat, ...

shakespeare, moby dick, dracula, pride and prejudice, the phantom of the opera, importance of being earnest, strange case of dr jekyll, great expectations, ...


--
20 Best websites to download free ebooks
- scribd
- manybooks
- pdf search engine
- pdf geni
- datasheet
- dailylit
- gutenber proj
...

Mar 30, 2009

Motivos para sospechar de nuestros políticos.

Vimos la semana pasada como después de que le pusieran limite a los planes de "impulso económico" a Gordon Brown, no contento con haber conseguido tamaño despropósito, hizo la maleta y se fue a pedir a sus vecinos europeos que hicieran lo mismo.
Y eso, no puede sino reafirmar nuestras sospechas sobre los políticos que nos gobiernan, y nuestras maltrechas economías mientras estén a su merced.

Ordeno por orden de eficiencia económica las diferentes opciones gubernamentales para afrontar la crisis:
No intervenir en la economía, que no lo hagan el resto de países.
No intervenir en la economía, que sí lo hagan el resto de países.
Intervenir en la economía, que no lo hagan el resto de países.
Intervenir en la economía, que sí lo hagan el resto de países.

Pues eso, G.B. no contento con mantener la segunda peor conducta económica, allí se fue a intentar convencer a sus colegas europeos de las bondades del gobierno para planificar la economía ¡!
Y es que si bien puede haber debate respecto de lo conveniente o no de reforzar las industrias nacionales a costa del bolsillo del contribuyente (keynesianos-liberales); de lo que no creo que hay tanta duda, es de que es mejor tener la menor competencia posible a la hora de colocar la deuda pública (1) y más importante, que el apoyo a las industrias que te dispones a impulsar se traduzca en una ventaja competitiva en los mercados internacionales (2): si todo el esfuerzo realizado finalmente no supone una ventaja frente a las empresas extranjeras porque ellas también se han beneficiado del dinero (subvenciones) gratis, flaco favor es el que les propicias a tus conciudadanos.

Respecto a diferentes puntos de vista, que vean en un mayor impulso económico europeo las alas para despegar de la economía inglesa (como espero que sea G.B.), cabe mencionar que Inglaterra no era precisamente una economía que viviera de la exportación de bienes (como sí lo es la alemana) y por tanto el beneficio económico quedaría muy diluido. Por otra parte, el efecto es equivalente al que se produciría con una mayor devaluación de la libra, sin tener que comprometer el bolsillo del contribuyente.