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90 days has passed since that call from Mark Sherman of Addison Management Group Asia (see part 1) promising me a profit
of USD 26 425 in 90 days had I only taken him up on his offer to buy 10 000 shares of EM International Enterprises (EMIE.PK) from Addison Management Group Asia.
On Oct 12th 2009, the day I received this fantastic offer, EMIE.PK closed at USD 4.25 but Addison Management Group Asia offered me the shares for USD 4.00 since they had institutional buying power and passed the discount on to their customers. This discount story alone should make all your scam alarms go off – there is no not such thing as a “free lunch”.
Since then, there has been pretty much no movement at all in EMIE.PK (not before Oct 12th either for that matter) and the trading volume has been just under 2000 shares spread over 5 days in the 90 day period. The current close is USD 4.50. Check it here.
The small trading volume of EMIE.PK is also a warning sign that the offer is strange. I was offered 10 ooo shares, that equals the total trading volume in the period from March 7th 2008 to Oct 12th 2009.
Looks like Addison Management Group Asia was unlike with this one – EMIE.PK didn’t live up the expectations. I suggest that Addison Management Group Asia fire their analysts and secure the services of chimpanzee Lusha instead – she’s likely to pick better stocks and at a fraction of the cost – how much is a banana in India nowadays?
One person forwarded me an email he had received from “his” Senior Account Executive at Addison Management Group Asia. The email address is mail@addisonmanagementgroupasia.com (can someone teach their IT department how to create personal email accounts?). I ran an email header tracer on the email and it originates from GoDaddy servers in Arizona. No India connection on that one as far as I can tell.
Finally, the domain name (addisonmanagementgroupasia.com) expires on Feb 3rd 2010, registered for only one year.
What’s your guess, will Addison Management Group Asia renew it and continue their “successful” business?
For some strange reason I woke up this morning and realized that I had a newfound curiosity in fraudulent online behavior.
Wouldn’t it be cool to be able to check if the sender of an email really is the person he/she claims to be?
I am familiar email headers but not until now have I had an urge to understand more about how it actually works. An email header is little message travelling with every email containing information about the sender, the receiver, the subject and a few more things.
Your email client (Outlook, Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail, etc) will display parts of the email header, typically From: , To: and Subject:. It is very easy to fake the From: information in an email so you need retrieve the full email header with the complete information about the email message to try to find the true origin of the email. With the full email header you can see where the email started its journey and how the email has traveled across the internet so reach your inbox.
You retrieve the full email header in different ways depending on your email client. For Outlook 2007 just right-click on the email in your Inbox (don’t open the email) and in the Internet Headers section you see the full header information. For instructions on how to retrieve the email header in other email clients just Google on: view email header [your email client]. There’s also a guide to some of the most common email clients here: http://www.ip-adress.com/faq/view_email_header/
Ok, you’ve got the full email header now! The interesting part of it is the Received: lines. Scroll through the email header and look for Received: and the text immediately following.
Here is an example from an email from I received the another day from cqmw40mmg@urscorp.com.
URS Corp is one of the largest engineering design firms in the world and a major US government contractor. I was curios to see what they wanted to inform me of but reading the mail the Subject: and the Body: of the mail seemed very strange…
Continue reading Who sent that email?
As I could not let go of the fantastic investment opportunity I was offered by Mark from Addison Management Group Asia I thought I would check their latest newsletter to learn more about their view of the financial markets.
On their site I find that the latest newsletter is from February 2009. A bit old but maybe I can learn something about their investment philosophy by reading it.
The newsletter was quite interesting so I check to see the name of the journalist / analyst providing such insight. No references. Let’s try a little experiment: I copy-pasted the first paragraph of the newsletter to Google search and guess what I found!
Continue reading Addison Management Group Asia (part 2)
 Addison Management Group Asia Yesterday afternoon I received a phone call from a gentleman named Mark Sherman (isn’t that an unusual name for somebody with a distinct Asian-English accent? ) from Addison Management Group Asia (http://www.addisonmanagementgroupasia.com).
Got the first call from them about 3 months ago. A very pleasant lady who’s name I didn’t take note off, explained that since I am a “successful business professional” they would like to send me an introductory information pack about Addison Management Group Asia and their wealth management services. “Fine!” I responded. About 1 month ago I received a fancy glossy brochure.
Now this call about a fantastic opportunity to invest in EM International Enterprises (EMIE.PK). According to Mark, EMIE, is a furniture manufacturer and supplier to JC Penny, Nordstroms, etc and they have just signed a global preferred supplier contract with Tesco. Luckily for me the market hasn’t reacted to the news yet but when the market does (in 90 days according to Mark) the share price of EMIE.PK will move from the current level of USD 4.00 to USD 6.75. In 90 days. Blimey!
Mark offered me to buy 10.000 shares at USD 4.00 + 1% comission and when they sold EMIE at USD 6.75 in 90 days I would get my principal back and a profit of USD 26425.
“Fredrik, tell me, isn’t that a nice profit in just 90 days?” Mark continued.
Continue reading Addison Management Group Asia (part 1)
After two weeks of flu and recovery I returned to back to regular working-out again a week ago – or so I thought…. During the two weeks of flu and recovery I ordered and had delivered a pair of Vibram FiveFinger Classics and I was eager to go running in them. If this sounds crazy read the first part of Barefoot running (pt1) – Run as you were designed to.
 Almost barefoot running The FiveFingers sure look funny and I have received a lot of looks and comments wearing them for walks in the neighbourhood. “Hey, have you taken up ballet dancing?” is one of many more or less funny remarks.
They are fantastically comfortable to walk in, like walking barefoot without worrying what to step on. You feel the surface you walk on, the Vibram sole protects you from any sharp objects and you have fantastic grip, also when wet. After the first few hours of walking in the FiveFingers it was somewhat strange to wear sneakers again – so heavy, clumsy and no feel at all. From a comfort only perspective I could wear FiveFingers only. Not sure if Vibram has an office design of them on their product development roadmap.
Running in FiveFingers
If you’re familiar with the concept of barefoot running you will know that the barefoot running technique is different from the technique wearing modern running shoes . In essence: No heel strikes, light landing on the ball of your foot and your calves act as springs to absorb the impact of the landing and pushing you forward into the next step. Check the videos and articles in the first part of Barefoot running in this blog for more info.
I set out along the river Vltava running south on the east bank on the asphalt walking and biking path. Maybe not the optimal surface for a test run but anyway. I felt really light running, no problems adjusting the technique to stretch out the foot to land properly, found that it came more naturally with longer strides, with shorter strides the heel tended to drop and it was more of a flat foot landing.
Continue reading Barefoot running (pt 2) – Killing me softly
Assuming that your pistols are now fast and accurate it’s time to put the leg explosivity you’ve built to the test in the burpee!
 Burpee - exploding out of the deep squat! The burpee is a great allround exercise to build aerobic and anaerobic capacity. You build stamina through the complex movement with three jumps, you build leg explosivity in the jumps and upperbody strength in the push-up phase of the burpee.
- Stand tall with feet shoulder-width apart.
- Go down in a squat so deep that you can place your palms flat on the floor closely in front of your feet, you may need to balance up on your toes to be able to place your palms flat on the floor.
- With your palms flat on the floor jump back into a straight bridge, the starting position of the standard push-up.
- Perform a push-up.
- Once back at the top of the push-up, keep you palms firm to the floor and jump to place your feet closely behind your hands again.
- Remember to keep your back straight and explode upwards into a jump, reaching high with your hands.
- Land with your feet shoulder-width apart.
- Repeat.
Check out the burpee instructional video on www.crossfit.com!
On June 1st, time yourself completing 60 burpees. Practice hard during the month and time yourself again on June 30th!
Good luck and remember to post your June 1st time, your progress and your June 30th finish time.
Being interested in MovNat I came across Barefoot Ted and had an eureka moment realizing that I have taken the completely wrong approach to running. I’ve taken the approach the $20 billion running shoe industry wants me to.
 Re-learn how to walk For the past 15 years or so I have weighed in at around 85-90 kg (14 stones) and I have always had running shoes with thick cushioning to reduce the impact of all my kilos striking the ground heel first.
On top of this I have twisted both of my ankles a couple of times through the years. Last time it to 6 months before I could run without ankle pain again, I now run with extra cushioned running shoes and for a while even taped the ankles to prevent further injury.
Actually, as a kid I was walking too much (according to whom?) on the ball of my foot and the local doctor gave me special types of clogs with high firm heels to reduce the ankle flexibility and force me to land on the heel. It really worked….
The modern running shoe was essentially invented by Nike in 1972, and the running shoe industry has become a $20 billion industry. Loads of money involved and loads of fancy new features introduced to the running shoes every year so the shoe makers can gain market share over the competitors.
Hmm.. makes my wonder…..
Didn’t people run before 1972? If they did, was the injury levels dramatically higher than now?
Are running shoes preventing or causing injuries?
Read this article and check this video, to get a quick intro to barefoot running.
I am convinced, it all makes sense, I will retire the running shoes, get a wooble board to start building up the muscles of the foot and ankle again and investigate if to buy Vibram Fivefingers , maybe Feelmax , or have a go at making Huarache running sandals.
More reading:
The painful truth: Are running shoes a waste of money?
The Running Shoe Debate: How Barefoot Runners are Shaping the Shoe Industry
‘No evidence’ on running shoe safety
The Pistol Fight is the fitness challenge of May 2009.
 Join the Pistol Fight! This is how the challenge goes:
A pistol is a one-legged squat, one legged raised in front of you and kept parallel to the floor while slowly squatting down one your other leg and then pressing up again.
Voila! Easy right?
On the first of May make as many pistols as you can alternating between your left and right leg. Practice like crazy for a month and on May 31st try again. Greatest improvement wins! You challenge yourself here so set a challenging but realistic goal!
Tips for the novice!
If you’re struggling with one pistol start with half-pistols from a chair.
- Sit on the edge of the chair with a straight back, extend one leg and position the other leg on the floor as close to the imaginary vertical line extending from head to butt.
- Extend your arms in front of you to aid balance.
- Toes and heel to the floor (avoid balancing on your toes) slowly press yourself up to standing and in controlled movement sit back down again.
- Repeat for the other leg.
When you master 10 half-pistols on each leg I suggest you start practicing aided pistols.
Continue reading Join the Pistol Fight – the May challenge!
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