25,000 Visitors

Reached a new milestone, 25,000 visitors to this blog. I hoped initially to be able to blog at least once a day, but I could not sustain that due to work commitments. However, visitors continue to come to this blog, about 200-250 per day, even when I don't blog.

Most visitors of course come from Malaysia, about 10% from Singapore, others from US, Australia, UK, Russia, Taiwan, Hong Kong, South Korea and Canada.

Posted so far 150 times and received 160 comments on them, not bad but I always hope for more feedback.

Not all feedback was positively, that was to be expected, the blog is also too controversial to link to from the more conventional sites, no surprise. I do have a legal council stand by, who has actively advised me about certain issues, a necessity I am afraid.

Most popular blogs:

http://cgmalaysia.blogspot.com/2011/09/muib-and-pmcorp-horrible-deal-from-past.html

One of the most horrific deals I have ever seen, and it simply got through, all layers that are supposed to prevent bad deals failed hopelessly. Although the case is 7 years old, I still hope that the authorities will look into it, minority shareholders of PMCorp deserve some justice. Authorities also should look into the writers of the prospectus and the independent advice (which found the deal "fair and reasonable" and advised minority shareholders to vote in favour, shockingly bad advice). The Malaysian public in general should be assured that this kind of deals will not be tolerated.

Interesting is also the privatisation of PMIndustries, from the same stable of companies.

http://cgmalaysia.blogspot.com/2011/09/sime-darbys-e-bod-poses-policy-dilemma.html

The Business Times in Singapore was the first newspaper who wrote about this case from this angle, I copied the text and it was frequently linked to. It was an awkward situation for the authorities, the kind of situation that simply should not arise.

http://cgmalaysia.blogspot.com/2011/08/when-smoke-signals-are-right.html

About (possible) insider trading on Bursa Malaysia, enforcement is very weak on this issue. Added to this the conflict of interest of Bursa Malaysia, on one hand maximizing profits for its shareholders, on the other hand responsible for important parts of enforcement. Not a good situation.

On the AsiaSentinel side where I publish most Malaysian articles, many articles received around 5,000 hits, I am very surprised by that. Most popular there:

http://www.asiasentinel.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3898&Itemid=619

Jail sentences for former Transmile directors, but the auditors seem to get away scot-free.

A case I wrote a lot about and which reached its third anniversary is the Maybulk/POSH case:

http://cgmalaysia.blogspot.com/search/label/Maybulk

Authorities (Securities Commission but mostly in this case Bursa Malaysia) had three full years to look into complaints, but still no action has been taken, extremely disappointing.

If the authorities want to increase Corporate Governance standards by market participants, journalists and bloggers highlighting issues, then they better start to increase its speed of handling complaints. Who can still remember the details of cases that happened three years ago, where is the encouragement to file complaints if the pace is so slow? The authorities really have to step up their game if they want to be taken seriously.