Moon For Sale

The final frontier of commerce - space - is attracting increasing attention. In the coming decades it's possible we might see the start of a galactic real estate boom. Or perhaps if you believe in the work done by Dennis Hope - a pioneer of space real estate. Although the issues are complex e.g. sovereignty, property rights, someday soon these issues could be a day to day fact of doing business out of this world. But as interesting as extraterrestrial real estate is, another potential boom area could be space-sourced commodities. In this documentary they talk about Helium-3 (a potential energy source), but already there is a company set up to investigate and mine asteroids. It's hard to say when the technology will exist to bring space commodities down to earth, but it's worth keeping an eye on as it would have clear implications for terrestrial commodity and financial markets. Indeed, the next big stock market sector could be something like space resources. In the mean time enjoy this documentary on moon commerce.

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Finance Documentaries: http://www.financedocumentaries.com/2013/05/moon-for-sale.html

The Age of Big Data

This BBC Horizon documentary looks at the arrival of the age of "big data". While data has been around since the dawn of time, only recently has the technology evolved that has allowed us to more efficiently capture, store and interrogate the data. This has profound implications for financial markets, but it also has many other real world applications. The documentary looks at four case studies on the use of big data, and also looks back a hundred years into the past at a pioneer in the field of big data and epidemiology. First up is a pilot program being run in the city of LA where a massive crime database is used to predict where and when future crimes will happen. Then there's a look at a big quant hedge fund, which employs over 100 PhDs and scientists; taking a scientific approach to trading and investment through the use of an enormous amount of data. Then we see how data can be used to make advertising more relevant and ultra-targeted. Finally the explosion of data is viewed in a cosmological context, with South African astronomers looking to catalogue the entire cosmos. See also: Quants: The Alchemists of Wall Street and Trillion Dollar Bet (The Midas Formula)

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Finance Documentaries: http://www.financedocumentaries.com/2013/04/the-age-of-big-data.html

Land Rush

This documentary combines economics, commodities, private equity and hedge funds, with industry and demographic trends. In other words this documentary looks at how a systematic rise in agricultural prices has made it a potentially profitable venture for investors with the capital and expertise to buy up large tracts of land in Africa and transform agricultural practices to global best practice. Of course there's always room for complications, conflict, and exploitation. These issues are important and worth noting and understanding, but the idea that advanced agricultural techniques be brought to Africa to improve crop yields should be a positive. There is certainly scope for this investment to positively impact on the local economy and to provide new opportunities for the locals - indeed partnerships promise mutual benefits - but this is not a given and probably requires a good policy and regulatory setting, as well as investors that approach it as a partnership and not just a way for a quick buck.

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Finance Documentaries: http://www.financedocumentaries.com/2013/04/land-rush.html

Trading on Thin Air

This documentary provides an alternative view on the creation of a carbon credit market. While the presenters clearly have their biases, the carbon trading framework does have its limitations. However the carbon credit model is an exciting innovation that offers the prospect of harnessing the energy of the free market and the spirit of capitalism to create incentives to reduced pollution and increase investment in green projects. Indeed the concept of carbon credits actually creates a new commodity that can be traded and upon which derivative contracts can be designed. This innovative approach to environmental conservation not only promises good environmental outcomes, but can foster and promote a new set of carbon and sustainability industries; carbon traders, carbon investment banks, carbon fund managers, carbon research organisations, carbon auditors, carbon microfinance, carbon private equity, and so-on. The possibilities are there, but so are the doubts and the criticisms - as with any new thing - but challenges are no excuse to forego an opportunity.

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Finance Documentaries: http://www.financedocumentaries.com/2013/04/trading-on-thin-air.html

The City Uncovered - When Markets Go Mad

This BBC documentary takes you through the so-called "madness of markets". It begins by looking at just what is a market, what role does a market and its participants serve in the economy. Essentially markets exist as a mechanism for price discovery as demand meets supply. As the prices vary, economic agents vary their behaviour and the "invisible hand" adjusts the supply-demand balance. The presenter, Evan Davis, has some interesting interviews with a range of people to get their perspectives; professors, traders, fund managers, mortgage lenders, borrowers, and investment bankers. This documentary offers a fascinating look at the role of humans (and thus the role of psychology) in markets. At the end of the day, markets are made by people, and the behaviour of prices depends as much on the behaviour of people as it does on the economic fundamentals.

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Finance Documentaries: http://www.financedocumentaries.com/2013/04/the-city-uncovered-when-markets-go-mad.html

Black Wednesday - When the Pound Sterling Crashed

What happened when the pound sterling crashed? Why did it crash? And what was this thing about George Soros taking on the Bank of England and winning? This documentary addresses all of these questions and more - it looks at a financial crisis which happened back in 1992. Black Wednesday referred to the day where the UK was forced to withdraw the pound or GBP from the European Exchange Rate Mechanism as the Bank of England was unable to keep the GBP exchange rate above the agreed lower limit. George Soros made over a billion dollars betting against the GBP - foreseeing it's inevitable capitulation. This crisis just goes to show the fallacy of a one-monetary-policy-fits-all approach; it also shows the futility of fighting the market, and how easy a crisis can precipitate. This event also shows how traders can make money in a crisis if they are prepared to do their homework, understand the drivers and get conviction to take a position.

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Finance Documentaries:http://www.financedocumentaries.com/2013/03/black-wednesday-when-pound-sterling.html

Life and Debt

This documentary looks at the sovereign debt crisis in Jamaica during the 1980's (one of many third world countries to run into trouble as easy foreign loans lead to wasteful spending and poor economic policy). Specifically the documentary takes a critique on the involvement of the international financial institutions; the IMF and the World Bank in working to resolve the island nation's debt crisis and efforts to put the country back on a sustainable footing. In fact the IMF and World Bank involvement attracted a lot of criticism and controversy because their rescue loans required conditionality - that the country would implement economic reforms such as trade liberalisation, privatizations, and regulation. But these structural adjustments are hard for the masses to understand and to accept and politically troublesome, so often these programs don't end up getting fully implemented. In this day and age with the European situation, it makes sense to study previous sovereign debt crises; it helps gain perspective, learn lessons from the past, and perhaps improve the way we are dealing with today's crises, and even ideas for preventing future economic disasters.

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Finance Documentaries: http://www.financedocumentaries.com/2013/03/life-and-debt.html

The Money Fix - The Almighty Dollar

This documentary presents an alternative view on economics and the monetary system. While it is not mainstream or generally accepted it does provide an insight into the frustrations that people have with various facets of the modern economy and monetary system. "Money is at the intersection of nearly every aspect of modern life. Most of us take the monetary system for granted, but it has a profound and largely misunderstood influence on our lives. The Money Fix is a feature-length documentary exploring our society's relationship with the almighty dollar." This documentary is probably worth watching though for understanding some of the alternative arguments, and to get an insight into the thinking of those who think the monetary system is the source of all problems. However it is quite biased and largely based on opinion. Points for rounding out the views and economic debate.

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Finance Documentaries: http://www.financedocumentaries.com/2013/02/the-money-fix-almighty-dollar.html

The Food Speculator

This documentary from VPRO Tegenlicht examines the global commodities futures markets and aims to understand the role of speculation on food prices. The presenter raises a small pool of capital to trade agricultural commodities so he can gain a first hand understanding of the role of the speculator. He travels to Tunisia - a country where rising grain prices saw bread become unaffordable; which ultimately lead to an uprising and regime change, i.e. "the Arab spring". He also attends some futures trading industry symposiums to speak to the industry participants and travels to Chicago - home of the CBOT to find out what "good speculators" and "bad speculators" are. When you think about the key function of commodity futures markets, the main purpose is to help producers and buyers of commodities to manage price risk i.e. hedging. Speculators play a vital role of providing liquidity - in other words in order to conduct a futures trade to hedge crop output you need an active market that provides price discovery and low cost and timely trade execution. Interesting viewing, also note parts of the documentary are in Dutch with English subtitles. See also: Anatomy of a Trade - The NYBOT

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Finance Documentaries: http://www.financedocumentaries.com/2012/12/the-food-speculator.html

George Soros - Markets are Always Fallible

George Soros is one of the most interesting, inspiring, and influential investors of our time. From his upbringing during World War 2, to his large hedge fund positions that broke the Bank of England. George Soros is a self-made billionaire, hedge fund manager, philanthropist, and philosopher; certainly an individual we can learn from. This Bloomberg video, "Eye to Eye", features an engaging interview with George Soros and profiles his life from his formative years - his inspirations, learnings, challenges, through to the years where he wielded significant power and influence as an investor. The video also talks about his work toward "open societies" and what he sees as the irreversible decline of the west, he also talks about how the old way of thinking about economics needs revamped and reviews his theory of reflexivity as a concept for understanding global financial markets and economies. Watch and learn from the master.

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Finance Documentaries: http://www.financedocumentaries.com/2012/11/george-soros-markets-are-always-fallible.html

A History of Microfinance - Muhammad Yunus

This lecture by microfinance pioneer and Nobel Peace Prize winner, Muhammad Yunus, outlines the history of microfinance - the origins of the idea, how it works, and what the future holds. Microfinance is a fascinating and empowering innovation in finance, and essentially deploys the power of the market to help people help themselves. The main point is to help people in poverty to be able to become entrepreneurs; be it buying a goat to milk, or chickens to lay eggs to sell, or buying a sewing machine, or bike; the point is to provide low cost financing on a small scale to empower people to lift themselves and their families out of poverty through small business. Thanks to technology and the internet we can all now easily participate in microfinance through websites like Kiva - think of it like microfinance 2.0

Prof. Muhammad Yunus is a Bangladeshi economist and founder of the Grameen Bank, an institution that provides microcredit to help its clients establish creditworthiness and financial self-sufficiency. In 2006 Yunus and Grameen received the Nobel Peace Prize. Yunus himself has received several other national and international honors. He is a member of advisory board at Shahjalal University of Science and Technology. Previously, he was a professor of economics at Chittagong University where he developed the concepts of microcredit and microfinance. He is the author of Banker to the Poor and two books on Social Business Models, and a founding board member of Grameen America and Grameen Foundation.

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Finance Documentaries: http://www.financedocumentaries.com/2012/11/a-history-of-microfinance-muhammad-yunus.html

What Are Economic Bubbles?

What is one of the most exciting phenomenon of finance and economics? That's right - bubbles. Periods of hype, euphoria, mass hysteria, and case studies in crowd psychology - economic bubbles represent the extremes of some of the fundamental forces that drives the financial system, and the real economy. Through history there has been a wide array of bubbles; the tulip bubble, the 1920's stock market boom, and of course the dot com boom. This documentary from the open university focuses on the dot.com bubble where Internet companies were the hot new thing, attracting wild valuations - driven more by the belief in a new age (the new economy), rather than fundamentals or financial strength. These periods of boom provide excellent case studies in investor behavior, they can also be beneficial to society (i.e. when the bubble is driven by a new technology e.g. Internet, biotechnology), and of course some speculators can get rich during a bubble. But bubbles can also be disruptive and damaging - particularly in the case of credit booms such as the enormous credit and housing bubble in the mid 2000's which lead to the global financial crisis. Bubbles are a fascinating and exciting thing to study and experience, and through studying past bubbles we can develop insights on finance, economics, and for our own investing and wealth.

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Finance Documentaries: http://www.financedocumentaries.com/2012/11/what-are-economic-bubbles.html

Masters of Money - Friedrich Hayek

Friedrich Hayek, a Nobel Prize winning economist, was a major contributor to the field of economics, and truly one of the great thinkers of the ages. His views on the power of the unfettered free market rubbed up against the traditional schools of thought that said regulation was needed to tame the beast of capitalism. Indeed at the core of his philosophy was the idea that the less external regulation there was, the better the internal or self-regulation of the system. His ideas influenced some of the world's most powerful leaders and economic policy makers. But what place does his ideas have in today's world? How has the financial crisis affected the practicality and workability of his ideas - was it a case of too little regulation, or was it a case of too much interference and a culmination of distortions created by regulation and intervention? This documentary addresses these questions and gives a look at Hayek's life and the development of his ideas, thinking, and influence. Highly recommended viewing. See also: Masters of Money - John Maynard Keynes

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Finance Documentaries:http://www.financedocumentaries.com/2012/10/masters-of-money-friedrich-hayek.html

Overdraft

Europe is presently in the spotlight of the bond market due to the fiscal excesses and unsustainable sovereign debt loads in certain countries. But there are other countries in the world with equally alarming debt loads - Japan is an obvious one with its debt upwards of 200% of GDP depending on the measure, but the USA has also become a culprit of fiscal irresponsibility - you only need to refer to the downgrade it received from Standard and Poor's last year to see the gravity of the situation. But what do people mean exactly when they say the US has a debt problem? This documentary reviews the US federal budget records, the seemingly insurmountable debt load that has piled up, how the financial crisis of 2008 exacerbated the situation - but also delves into some of the potential ways forward; how to solve the problem before it becomes a crisis. This documentary makes for compelling viewing for Americans, but also everyone in the world - as America's economic and financial influence on the rest of the world is as systemic and important as ever.

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Finance Documentaries: http://www.financedocumentaries.com/2012/10/overdraft.html

Carry On Banking

This BBC Panorama documentary essentially seeks to answer the question: 'have investment bankers and financial institutions learned any lessons from the meltdown or is it back to the old days?' I would say that it's back to the new days, and certainly this documentary shows the desperation to get back to business as usual - albeit with a few tweaks. Bankers in certain parts of the industry i.e. loan origination and structuring, derivative sales, risk management and treasury, and of course leadership at all levels, certainly deserve criticism for the way they acted or failed to act in the lead up to the crisis. But there is a role for finance in facilitating a strong real economy, it is probably a lot plainer and simpler than much of what presently goes on in finance, but finance i.e. borrowing and lending of surplus funds and provision of transaction services are a social/public good. So while financial institutions do need to do some soul searching, the onus is really on the regulators and politicians to help reshape the industry and the incentives. One key problem is that a lot of investment bankers are not actually bankers in the traditional sense, rather they are agents of profiteering - in the old days it was called merchant banking, and 'investment banks' were partnerships, and 'banks' for the most part just borrowed and lent money; maybe that was a better structure? What do you think? - add your comments below...

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Finance Documentaries: http://www.financedocumentaries.com/2012/10/carry-on-banking.html

Masters of Money - John Maynard Keynes

John Maynard Keynes (1883 - 1946) is one of the most influential thinkers in the field of economics. His ideas have recently been drawn upon as policy makers looked to avoid another great depression by engaging in expansionary fiscal policy. Indeed, Keynesian economics forms the basis for many of today's economic policies, such as using fiscal policy and monetary policy to stabilise output over the business cycle. As one of the most important contributors to the field of economics, this documentary on Keynes is must see viewing for anyone with an interest in economics, politics, policy, and investing. Keynes' life and formative years are also of great interest (including his investments - which ultimately made him very wealthy). Highly recommended viewing! See also: Masters of Money - Friedrich Hayek

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Finance Documentaries: http://www.financedocumentaries.com/2012/09/masters-of-money-john-maynard-keynes.html

The Great Euro Crisis - 2012

The Eurozone is at a cross roads. The single currency idea is presently being put hard to the test. Will Europe and the Euro become stronger and more united? Or does this crisis present the harbinger of the disintegration of the single currency? Certainly there has been a lot of effort, investment, and political willpower put into the formation of the Euro, but a lack of fiscal and banking union has exposed the weaknesses of the Euro. This documentary probes into what may come of the Euro - will Greece stay in, will get kicked out, or will it opt out. One thing is for sure: the Euro will not look the same in 5 years time; but it remains to be seen what will come..

Self-confessed Eurosceptic Michael Portillo visits debt-stricken Greece. He believes that the euro crisis must have shaken the Greeks' faith in Europe's single currency and wonders if there'll be a desire to revert to the free-floating drachma. In Athens he meets everyone from a destitute young family to the former finance minister and the outgoing Prime Minister, and is surprised by some of their answers. Meanwhile in Germany, Europe's economic powerhouse, Michael encounters the taxpayers who are paying most towards Greece's mammoth financial bailout while having to watch angry Athenians burning the German flag.


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Finance Documentaries: http://www.financedocumentaries.com/2012/08/the-great-euro-crisis-2012.html