Imagine, you’re 14 year old and you have a business idea. Soon after, you get a 30 million USD offer by a major company for the patent of your idea…   Well, for 8th grader Taylor Rosenthal this is no imagination: it’s the real story of the 14-year old from Opelika in Alabama. By the way, Alabama is the sixth …

Romania’s economic growth accelerated in the first quarter of 2016 more than estimated. The GDP (Gross domestic product) rose by a preliminary 4.3% according to the National Statistics Institute. This makes Romania the second fastest-growing economy in the EU only behind Ireland. I’m quite sure you’ve read or heard about this ‘success‘ in local media. There is only one big …

2016 looks to be a profitable year for gold investors. The price per ounce of the precious metal rose about 20% (in USD) since January. That’s not too bad for a safe asset like gold, while bondholders and savers around the world suffer from low to negative interest rates (and, in the case of Romania, outrageous retail-banking fees). Gold demand …

At the end of last month, it became official: The smartphone market has gone flat. The first quarter of 2016 saw the smallest growth ever recorded. Even Apple, which seemed unstoppable, saw sales drop for first time since the iPhone’s launch in 2007. The stock market’s reaction in recent weeks was harsh. Yesterday, Apple shares fell to 90 USD, the lowest …

Exactly 4 months ago, bitcoin developer Mike Hearn, wrote a post on Medium that rocked the community of people who believe in the future of the digital currency and its technology. Bitcoin, he wrote, has failed. “It has failed because the community has failed.. Worse still, the network is on the brink of technical collapse.” The post led to screaming headlines about …

In politics and economics, it may not all be smooth in Romania and there is a lot of room for improvements. However, Romania is a paradise compared to other countries in the world: Every year, the Cato Institute publishes a list of the world’s most ‘miserable countries’ by using a simple economic formula to calculate the scores. Described as a Misery Index, the tally for …

In October 2015 in Zurich and yesterday at the Hilton in Bucharest, I attended two conferences about romanian/swiss business and investment relations.  Switzerland is currently the 7th largest foreign investor in Romania, according to Banca Naţională a României with over 2600 registered companies and almost 1 billion EUR in subscribed capital. Among the best known Swiss companies present in Romania …

About the high value of YouTube for value investors and business leaders YouTube, the world’s second most popular website, is also one of the most underappreciated investor resources, says Andrew Hunt, author of Better Value Investing:  Founded in May 2005 and acquired by Google in 2006 for 1,65 billion USD, YouTube has over 3 billion page views every day and would …

Currently I’m hooked on the TV-series ‘Billions’, subtitled ‘Power Is The Ultimate Currency’. It’s a fascinating power struggle in the ego-driven world of high finance between a highly successful hedge fund manager (who 15 years ago was the only 9/11-survivor of his company) and the US Attorney who is determined to proof that insider trading and bribery is the true source of …

Next month, swiss people will decide in a vote whether all 8 million citizens and legal residents of Switzerland should be guaranteed a generous and unconditional free monthly ‘Grundeinkommen’ or basic income.  A ‘yes’- vote on June 5, would mandate the swiss government to guarantee each adult citizen and legal resident of Switzerland a monthly tax free income of 2’500 CHF …