Jeremy Schultz

Watching a movie like “De Dana Dan” in a single screen theatre where people are hooting and clapping at crass humour on screen may give you an insight into Indian audiences.

This audience doesn’t really mind that Archana Puran Singh uses foul language or that people randomly slap their husbands and wives or that there is really no logic to speak of. They found all of the above hilarious.

I am not judging that audience. After all, we all have our own tastes. I guess this is what they mean about Hindi movies that you have to “leave your brain behind and then watch”.

Akshay Kumar plays Nitin, a down and out young man who works as a servant with a rich woman in order to pay off his father’s debt to her. He is in love with Anjali (Katrina Kaif) but doesn’t have the money to marry her. He meets Ram (Suniel Shetty), a courier deliveryman who also needs money to marry his rich girlfriend (Sameera Reddy).

They decide to kidnap Nitin’s mistress’s dog, which she holds very dear. However, the plan goes awry and that is the start of the “confusion” in the film. One mistaken identity leads to the other and yet another, until the plot becomes so convoluted that you lose track.

I am writing this an hour after watching the film and if you ask me for the rest of the plot, I will be unable to tell you. It baffles me as to how the scriptwriter remembered all the twists and turns.

For all the confusion however, the end is so lame you feel the entire team was so tired of the film they just put their hands up at one point and said, “That’s it, this is where we end it”.

There are no performances to speak of -- in fact none are required. The “Hera Pheri” team of Akshay Kumar, Suniel Shetty, Paresh Rawal and Priyadarshan don’t reproduce even half of the magic on screen.

This is entertainment at its lowest level. Take your chance though. To each his own.

Bargain shoppers turned out en masse across the land on Friday morning to observe Black Friday rituals, while retail temples from Target to Macy's to Saks slashed prices to get people to do one simple thing: buy more stuff.

But upscale stores -- and some their shoppers -- seemed to think the Black Friday extravaganza beneath them.

I got a sense of this while I was interviewing people outside Saks's flagship store on Manhattan's Fifth Avenue this morning. I asked a customer exiting with a Saks bag full of merchandise what she thought of the sales. She sniffed:"I'm not here for Black Friday. All the stuff I bought was full price!"

While Saks discounts many items by 40 percent between 8 a.m. and noon on Friday, other upscale rivals seemed to the think holiday discounts were déclassé. At 9 a.m. on Friday, while Saks and Tiffany were open, other upscale stores that line Fifth Avenue, such as Cartier, Versace, Prada, Piaget and even Bergdorf Goodman, were closed.

(Photo: Reuters)

Here's a Black Friday report from our colleague Joe Rauch:

In Charlotte, North Carolina, the banking capital of the New South, Black Friday's traditional retail flood was a relative trickle, thanks to residue from the recession. Several Black Friday shoppers said the economic downturn and the plight of the local banks would play a major role in how the city's residents spent during the holidays.

"We're spending very differently than we ever have, and I don't see that changing for a long time," said Rob Seidman, 39, a Charlotte resident and a banker. He declined to say which bank he worked for, only to say it "employed thousands here."

The signs of the downturn were most evident in hallways of the South Park Mall in the city's tony neighborhood of the same name, home to more than a few of Charlotte's bankers. The mall opened at 8 a.m., just like last year and three hours later than it did in 2007. Few shoppers were there to bolt inside. Many shoppers who arrived later said they had spent the morning's earliest hours fighting lines and crowds at discount retailers, like Target and Walmart, noting those stores were busier than they had ever seen them as shoppers sought bargains.

Charlotte resident Don Smith, 49,  came to the mall to buy some running shoes on sale, along with a few other items with his wife and two young daughters.

"This is the second time I've been out on Black Friday," he said. "I hate to shop this way, but there's no crowds this morning. It's a great day if you ask me."

A spokeswoman said the mall expected 200,000 visitors on today, a significant chunk of the 12million to 13 million who visit each year.

Several shoppers interviewed by Reuters said they were merely window shopping. Mall patrons walking around laden with bags were dwarfed by those walking around empty-handed. Seidman, sitting near one of the few hubs of activity -- the Apple Store -- said he was out shopping primarily to replace a broken family computer. While his wife was doing more holiday shopping, he was done for the day.

He said he and his family scrapped holiday vacation plans this year, were spending less on gifts for kids and adults and more closely adhering to a pre-determined budget. While he's still employed, the downturn has changed his spending habits forever, he said, as he's seen friends lose their jobs and in some cases their homes.

He's aggressively saving for retirement and squirreling away cash, rather than spending more as he did in the past, "because I've seen how some people in my neighborhood and who I work with lose it all so fast."

"Mine thankfully is an issue of psychology rather than an issue of need," he added, noting layoffs in the sector made him fear the worst and curb much of his spending. "I feel like I need more of a cushion in case something happens."

(Photo: Shadows gather over Charlotte, North Carolina. Reuters)

The banking index dropped 1.4 pct on Friday, dragged down by heavyweights ICICI Bank and SBI after Dubai said two of its flagship firms planned to delay repayment on billions of dollar of debt.

The move raised investor fears that debt defaults could hit other parts of the globe, and rattled global markets sending banking shares down.

Sensex heavyweight ICICI Bank tumbled over 4 percent in intra-day trade before closing 1.6 percent lower at 851.25 rupees.

Bank of Baroda, which has a total exposure in the UAE of around 100 billion rupees ($2.1 billion), saw its shares plunge about 7 percent before closing 4.6 percent lower at 521.40 rupees.

Other stocks in the banking index which felt the heat were Axis Bank (down 3 percent), Kotak Mahidra Bank (down 2.9 percent), Bank of India (down 3.6 percent) and SBI (down 0.4 percent)

Do you think this sector will see more erosion over the Dubai debt repayment crisis?

In Fort Worth, Texas, employees at the massive Cabela's -- a retailer that caters to the hunting, fishing and outdoor crowd -- said this Black Friday seemed quiet compared to last year's.

Early shoppers browsed for guns, fishing rods and camping gear beneath row upon row of stuffed animal heads. New York-listed Cabela's claims to be the world's foremost outfitter for hunting and fishing gear and specials included a pink (for the ladies) Ruger .22 rifle with a 10-round magazine at $259.99, a $30 savings. Various handguns were going for as much as a $120 off.

Business appeared brisk, though there were no long lines at the cash registers and store employees said Black Friday last year was busier. Several shoppers said they were loosening their wallets and buying more this year. Almost all of them said they were using cash or debit cards.

Shawn Scott, 48, has his own company training corporate jet pilots. He said his business had picked up this year after faltering during the depths of the recession. He still has an office in Fort Worth, but his family had moved to a remote part of Colorado and he was stocking up on ammunition that he said was hard to get in smaller towns these days.

"We are in a remote area and so we are stocking up," he said, noting that he was uncertain about the economy and so it was good to be prepared. "We're not survivalists but self-suffiency is important, given the distribution system in the United States today," he said.

Several shoppers came from other parts of north Texas and as far away as Oklahoma City -- 190 miles (300 kilometers) to the north. Walter Overtown, a 59-year-old who said he was in the aquaculture business, came from the town of Bowie in north Texas, about 100 miles (160 km) away. He said he was buying more this year "because my stocks are up." He had a big gun case in his shopping cart.

One middle-aged woman who just gave her name as "Mary" was browsing for sweaters and said she was "buying about the same but I wasn't hurt by the recession. My husband didn't lose his job and he even got a raise."

Amber Pletcher, 29, and her husband Brad, have their own business contracting out to a major tire company and came from Ardmore in Oklahoma, two hours' drive north, with their preacher's teenage daughter. They had also been to outlet stores in the Fort Worth area from midnight and were completing their Christmas shopping. "I think I'm shopping more this year because we are blessed," Amber said as she pushed a shopping cart filling up with outdoor clothing and outdoor-themed toys.

Debbie Braudaway, a 47-year-old school administrator, said she and her husband probably would buy no more or less this year as they both had steady jobs and incomes. She was disappointed that they had not found the knife their son wanted and so they planned to go to another store.

(Photo: A customer enquires about a weapon in the firearms section of a Cabela's store on the shopping day dubbed "Black Friday" in Fort Worth. Reuters/Jessica Rinaldi)

This week, both the Reuters Pictures wire and the submissions to Your View were dominated by pictures of the Muslim festival of sacrifice, Eid al-Adha. This photo from Saad Shahriar in Bangladesh clearly captures the desperation some people feel to get home to celebrate the festival with friends and family. Saad used a slow shutter speed to add a hurried sense to the chaotic scene.

View this week's Your View showcase here.

Dubai World's trouble paying its debt obligations may not be too surprising when you consider some of the dubious investments it has entered into over the past few years. A case point is Dubai World's ill-fated voyage into the business of building and selling submarines for recreational use.

In September, Dubai World filed a lawsuit in federal court in Florida against one of its former executives, claiming Herve Jaubert caused more than $30 million in losses for the Middle Eastern-based company. Dubai World claims Jaubert used a Florida-based company he controls to "overcharge'' Dubai World for submarines Jaubert either couldn't manufacture or didn't work.

Dubai World says it entered into a deal with Jaubert on the basis of his claims that "he had designed submarines that were ready for production'' and he was a "naval engineer who was an expert in submarine design.'' On the basis of those claims, Dubai World formed a company called Exomos in 2003 to oversee the manufacture and sale of "luxury recreational submarines'' and tapped Jaubert as the CEO of the new business.

But Dubai World, in court papers, says it subsequently learned that Jaubert did not have the expertise he claimed. The complaint alleges that a number of the submarines and submarine parts Exomos purchased from a company allegedly controlled by Jaubert either didn't work, or were sold at inflated prices.

One submarine, for instance, "caught on fire and was damaged.''

The Dubai World lawsuit is just the latest twist in an unusual story involving claims of fraud and false imprisonment. Jaubert, who now resides in Florida, has charged he was forced to flee from Dubai in 2007 over the matter and that Dubai World has maligned his character.

It will be up for the courts to sort this all out. But none of this speaks well of Dubai World's due diligence before going into a speculative ventures.

If  134 million Americans out there can get excited by the annual shopping "frenzy" called Black Friday, it's inevitable that a few of them will get excited enough to commit violence in the name of discounts.

I've been scanning the headlines for reports of injuries caused by shoppers whose quest for ecstasy means beating other people -- with their fists if necessary -- to things that big corporations sell to make customers temporarily feel better and to make shareholders feel better all the way through the fourth quarter.

It looks like fists flew at least once today. Here's the story, "Elderly woman shoved to the ground in Black Friday squabble," courtesy of 9News.com, reporting from Centennial, Colorado:

"[Police] say shoppers started arguing before the store opened as people jockeyed for line position. Deputies say some shoppers were pushing each other when a woman was pushed into a 78-year-old woman. The elderly woman fell to the ground. She told ambulance crews on scene that her hands hurt but she was not transported to the hospital and first responders say she did not receive any major injuries."

The story also said that she wound up in a crowd chasing the Zhu Zhu, a toy hamster that your kids will forget about a few months after you give it to them.

Any other reports of mayhem out there? Let us know. So far, we haven't seen any repeats of last year's tragic scenario, where shoppers trampled a Walmart worker to death as they raced to catch deep discounts.

Reuters photo

Paul Krugman today argues in favor of a financial-transactions tax on the grounds that it would discourage over-reliance on ultra-short-term repo markets, among other reasons. In other words, reliance on repos is a bad thing, and it's a good idea for government policy to "nudge" financial institutions away from it.

That's something that opponents of the Miller-Moore amendment should bear in mind, when they complain that it could hit the repo market hard. Here's Agnes Crane:

The repurchase agreement, or repo, market is a critical source of financing for dealers, hedge funds and others who use leverage to finance short-term trading positions. It’s a source of extra income for those holding virtually risk-free securities since they can squeeze out extra return by lending them out.

Such financing makes for a deeper and more liquid market that gives investors confidence that if they buy a Treasury note, for example, they can quickly sell it if they want to.

The problem is that we don't want to encourage the use of leverage to finance short-term trading positions. Indeed, from a public-policy point of view, we'd ideally want to discourage it.

Would a less liquid repo market mean, in turn, a less liquid Treasury market? I daresay it would. But that's no bad thing: the more liquid the Treasury market, the more that investors flock to it in times of crisis, exacerbating the systemic downside of the flight-to-quality trade, and reducing the amount of liquidity elsewhere in the markets, especially among credit instruments.

There are serious systemic consequences to living in a world where a Treasury bond -- or any asset, for that matter -- is considered a safe haven from all possible harm. Investing shouldn't be about safety: it should be about calculated risk. Excess demand for triple-A-rated risk-free assets, as we've seen over the past couple of years, can be much more systemically damaging than excess demand for risky assets like dot-com stocks. So yes, let's throw some sand into the wheels of the repo market, either through a Tobin tax or through the Miller-Moore amendment or both. Because liquidity is not ever and always a good thing.

(Photo: Haj pilgrims stone pillars symbolising the devil in Mena outside Mecca, 27 Nov 2009/Caren Firouz)

Around two million Muslim pilgrims stoned pillars symbolising the devil in a narrow valley in Saudi Arabia on Friday at what has traditionally been the most dangerous stage of the haj pilgrimage. The pillars stand at Mena, where Muslims believe the devil appeared to the Prophet Abraham.

The Jamarat Bridge in the valley of Mena outside the holy city of Mecca, where pilgrims stone the walls three times over three to four days, has been the scene of a number of stampedes, including one which killed 362 in 2006. But Saudi Arabia has erected a massive four-level building with several platforms for throwing stones to ease congestion and prevent stampedes at the Jamarat stoning areas.

(Photo: Haj pilgrims walk from camp to Jamarat to throw stones at pillars in Mena 27 Nov 2009/Caren Firouz)

Throngs of predominantly white-clad pilgrims filled the road that leads them to and from the Jamarat Bridge. Some stopped to buy fried chicken nuggets while groups from different countries formed human chains with their fellow countrymen to move more quickly through the crowds.

"Fighting evil temptations is a daily chore for every Muslim," said Mohammad Haq Shahinaz from Pakistan, holding hands with his wife as they struggled to push ahead in the crowded road to the Jamarat bridge.  "But by stoning these concrete pillars here we indicate that we only worship Allah and we will not follow Satan's path."

Fathi Ahmed Mohammed from Egypt  Egyptian threw seven stones at the pillar, calling out "Allahu akbar" after each throw. "We thanked Allah for His grace and ... prayed for the unity of Muslims to glorify Islam and help us prevail over the infidels and the Jews," he said.

Mohamed al-Yami, a Saudi from southern Najran province, pushed his way among the crowds after he finished the ritual.  "I have a sheep to slaughter," he said, referring to the sacrifice for Eid al-Adha (feast of sacrifice).

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