To companies trying to compete and thrive in 2017 and beyond, it’s becoming increasingly apparent that the traditional budgeting process is providing less and less value. It’s taking sophisticated on-the-fly modeling (OTF) to better understand how your organization may look over the next month, quarter, and year.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) has moved beyond merely capturing our imaginations - it is now replacing jobs, it is augmenting our skill sets, it is driving new discoveries on a daily basis - AI is already here, but why? How did this happen? A nexus of forces have fortuitously converged to deliver enormous growth in AI’s ability to deliver valuable real-world application in the financial services sector (and elsewhere). Before delving deeper into these forces - it’s beneficial to first look at what AI is, what forms it comes in and what areas are particularly interesting to the world of Finance.
Budgeting is an interesting topic to discuss in the greater context of planning, forecasting, and decision-making in the 21st century. Corporate financial budgeting (as we know it) was born in the Age of Jazz, when flappers and sheiks ruled supreme.
In my previous article, I explained the mechanics of the Blockchain and how blocks are linked into an immutable chain with clever crypto functions. These blocks contain many transactions which are supposed to be anonymous. But what do you need to do to prove these transactions are yours without revealing your identity?
According to Warren Buffet: "Price is what you pay. Value is what you get." In other words, don't focus on short term swings in price, focus instead on the underlying value of your investment. Beware the investment activity that produces the applause, the great moves are usually greeted by yawns.
Great businesses tend to exceed expectations thanks to strong fundamentals, quantitative and qualitative information that contributes to the economic well-being and the subsequent financial valuation of a company. But knowing fundamentals are not enough to be successful in the financial markets. According to Sir Warren Buffet, apart from knowing “What to do?”, one shall also have knowledge of “What not to do?”, to reduce significant chances of making mistakes. The case of Jet Airways is there to tell you what not to do in the market.
Is it ever easy to predict a revolution? It has obviously become easier to predict unrest in any area of the world since we now live in what is termed the information age. But this is merely a transitory period on the journey to the next big event in human evolution. How did my counterpart in Paris in 1789 or Moscow in 1917 know that change was coming? Were there subtle hints or did wholesale change become the only option ?