CIMB is hiring for 3 positions in #brunei. CIMB is ranked #4 in M&A League table.

// January 31st, 2010 // No Comments » // Business

I spotted a job ad on Page 57 of the weekend Borneo Bulletin which I thought was worth sharing.

CIMB Group is hiring for: Senior Manager (3-5 years work experience, Master degree advantageous), Executive (1-3 years work experience, fresh graduates encouraged) and Assistant Executive (1-2 years experience with a Diploma).

FYI, CIMB (Commerce International Merchant Bankers Berhad) is the 5th largest bank in South East Asia by total assets. I think the job posting is blog worthy because:

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Al Salam Bahrain and TAIB form a strategic partnership

// September 21st, 2009 // 1 Comment » // Business

The Al Salam Bahrain bank recently announced a strategic partnership with TAIB from Brunei. The two institutions are involved in the Burj Al Safwa Tower in Mecca – a premier piece  of residential and commercial real estate. BSH:SALAM is one of 50 or so publicly-listed company trading on the Bahrain stock exchange.

I currently invest in some “TAIB deposit certificates”, which are also called “TDCs”. These offer variable returns in a range that competes with other debt instruments but give no capital protection. Yet. the impression I get when I buy them is that they are structured “like” equity instruments to address the whole “Shariah compliance” problem of calling it “debt” that pays a stream of interest payments to the lender. Instead they pay off “profits” sourced from the businesses which TAIB “invested” in on the investee’s behalf. Fascinating. I’ll call them “quasi-equity” instruments for now. One of these days I’ll research the implications of IFRS accounting for the Islamic Financial Services industry and blog aboout it.

I’ll be following the developments of the Al-Salam Bahrain – TAIB – Joint Venture which much interest, since I am quite likely, a part investor in the project.

Corporate Finance in Brunei

// April 19th, 2009 // No Comments » // Business

Skimming the newspaper yesterday I caught sight of UOB’s one-page advert (in both the BB and the BT) about its award-winning Asset Management division. So I thought of reading up a bit on on Brunei’s financial services industry – particularly in the Corporate side of things. For example … who should Brunei SMEs consult when seeking advice on how to best arrange their Treasury operations? Or how about for SMEs that are struggling with managing cash flows, and need ways to finance the acquisition for badly needed income-generating assets and arrange the insurance thereon? Or how about for SMEs that need expansion capital and want to seek ways to invite more Equity participants in to their business?

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Cost of Equity estimates in Brunei

// April 12th, 2009 // No Comments » // Business

How does one estimate a Cost of Equity (K_e) for a business in Brunei?

Here’s a rough-and-ready way to estimate a Cost of Equity, using the timeless Capital Asset Pricing Model:

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