Lesson 26: Percent Of A Quantity: Fill & Download for Free

If Forbes Magazine only took liquid assets into account, its list of billionaires would be filled with leaders of drug cartels and similar criminal organizations.A liquid asset is defined as an asset which can be quickly converted into cash without significant decrease in its value.Besides cash, liquid assets include things like bonds, stocks and precious metals. These items can be quickly sold at face value in exchange for cash.Illiquid assets include assets such as real estate, intellectual property and goodwill associated with corporate branding. (1) These assets cannot be easily sold to raise cash. For example, the Coca Cola brand name is worth $73 billion, but the Coca Cola corporation can’t exactly sell that to raise $73 billion in cash.While guys like Jeff Bezos and Bill Gates theoretically own tons of shares in their companies and in other companies, their holdings are for all intents and purposes illiquid, since they give up ownership of a company (and therefore the source of their wealth), every time they sell shares, not to mention the fact that selling a ton of shares at once can send the value of the remaining shares tumbling downwards.And in any event, neither Gates nor Bezos need much in the way of cash, since businesses would be more than happy to extend lines of credit to them, or their respective companies could pick up the tab.The drug trade is fundamentally a cash business.Due to its nature as contrabrand, drugs must be purchased with cash, or another type of liquid asset such as precious metals.That means that in order to conduct day to day operations, the leader of a drug cartel must have large quantities of cash on hand to purchase drugs from wholesalers such as farmers or chemists. When drugs are sold, most customers pay the dealer using cash.Additionally, other contraband goods such as firearms and explosives must also be purchased in cash, or the equivalent thereof. This extends to illegal services too, such as assassination, bookkeeping, or prostitution.A regular business does not need to have so much cash on hand to ensure normal operations. Their ability to obtain lines of credit with banks and vendors is not something that a drug cartel can rely upon.Even large cartels with highly efficient money laundering schemes will have far more cash in circulation than an above-ground company of equivalent size.Now the reason why Bill Gates doesn’t just keep giant piles of cash lying around isn’t just because cash doesn’t accrue interest, it’s also because every rich person drawn a lesson from what happened to this guy:Pablo Emilio Escobar Gaviria (1949–1993)At the height of his power, Pablo Escobar was worth around $30 billion dollars, much of it in cash. However, he would have been better off trying to launder more of it, since large piles of cash tend to have issues all their own.To simplify things, I’ll just quote the entry from Escobar’s Wikipedia page:“During the height of its operations, the Medellín Cartel brought in more than US $70 million per day (roughly $26 billion in a year). Smuggling 15 tons of cocaine per day, worth more than half a billion dollars, into the United States, the cartel spent over US $1000 per week purchasing rubber bands to wrap the stacks of cash, storing most of it in their warehouses. Ten percent (10%) of the cash had to be written off per year because of "spoilage", due to rats creeping in and nibbling on the bills they could reach.”Not only is storing huge piles of cash a bad investment, you actually end up losing money to the rats.(1): What Is a Liquid Asset?

[Observation 04/16/2020: We’re in it now].[Observation 03/12/2020: It appears that our Black Swan event (coronavirus), dumpster fire (U.S. response or lack of) and shit-storm (bear market) have arrived! We’ll just have to wait and see how this all sorts out in the next few months.][Observation 02/02/2020: Happy Ground Hog Day. “I’m baaack!” screamed the Inverted Yield Curve. While briefly inverting in intra-day trading on Tuesday, the yield curve of the 1- and 2-month Treasuries compared to the 10-year closed inverted on Thursday, while the 3mo/10yr and 6mo/10 year closed at 0.00%. At the COB on Friday, all four were inverted. Meanwhile the CAPE/Shiller PE has recently been above 32 and on 1/30/2020 the World Health Organization declared the current coronavirus an international public health emergency. Not a good mix.][Second update 11/25/2019: Well, the yield curve inversion has come and gone and in late April I did a more thorough regression of the yield curve data using daily data back to January1, 2017. But, the yield curve always re-opens after an inversion months ahead of the next recession. By that time any damage to be done has been done.In summary:Quarterly GDP is trending down;Fed policy has shifted;The trade wars may be a bigger factor than before;Year-over-Year (YoY) housing starts have been a mixed bag; and,The Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) has been below 50 for three months, also a recessionary signal.I’ve looked further into how some common asset classes behave before, during and after a recession.As before, all updates/revisions below are in italics and original numbers, dates and text are [in brackets] for your reference][Updated 4/19/19: My answer here was originally posted on May 29, 2018. As I said in the next to last paragraph back then, I will provide an update in early 2019 (after March 15, after I have given a presentation on this topic to our local chapter of the American Association of Individual Investors (AAII). As of now the Yield Curve has not inverted, but has closed considerably, Year-over-Year Housing Starts have gone negative; and, the trend for GDP is downward. But not all may not be doom and gloom as Fed policy has shifted; however, we need to be vigilant. All updates/revisions (except typos) are in italics and original numbers, dates and text are [in brackets] for your reference.]This is a question that has been of interest to me and a subject of personal research for over two years, particularly to use for planning how to reallocate our portfolio for the recession and reallocate again to maximize growth during the recovery in the stock market. In May 2018 I gave a presentation on this topic presenting my findings at our local monthly meeting of the American Association of Individual Investors and an updated version to the same group in March 2019. A few caveats, then the answer and a brief explanation of how I got to that conclusion, plus some additional remarks relative to the recent change in Fed policy. DISCLAIMER: Also, the following is the result of a two presented studies (© 2018, 2019. Kurt Moore), and presented here for educational and discussion purposes only in keeping with the spirit of Quora and not to be relied upon as professional investment advice.First, “predicting” (for lack of a better word) the exact date (by this I would say month) that a recession will start is a fool’s errand in that the data available has so much statistical variation that a date range (I used +/- one standard deviation from the average to define the range) is the best answer. Second, one can only make such an assertion based on the data on hand, which is all past history. However, one can define trends and analyse those trends in the data to offer a meaningful answer.That said, my research (in line with what other financial organizations posit) is that the next recession most likely starts in 2020, with a range of starting between [December 2019] March 2020 and [originally October, then November] December 2020 and a midpoint of [originally May] { then July] now August 2020. How did I get to that conclusion? Read on.I started with sifting through candidates of potential leading economic indicators that could reliably predict statistically (within a range based on standard deviation) the onset of a future recession, either by themselves or in conjunction with one or two other indicators. Let’s toss out the ones that do not work.First is GDP which is a lagging indicator and the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) defines a recession as “a significant decline in economic activity spread across the economy, lasting more than two quarters which is 6 months, normally visible in real gross domestic product (GDP), real income, employment, industrial production, and wholesale-retail sales”. It generally takes NBER staff at least a month to analyse data and then declare that we are in a recession - and at that point we have been in one for 6–7 months. Historically, it was just simply two consecutive quarters of negative GDP, but the result is the same. However, GDP does slow leading up to the recession, but hasn’t turned negative yet. GDP may not be a predictor, but appears to be one of two corroborating signals I use.As of 11/25/2019 the GDP has been trending down for 2019 posting 3.1% for Q1, 2.0% for Q2 and the latest estimate for Q3 is 1.9. Two new tools I discovered since the last update are GDP forecasting tools from the Atlanta Fed (GDP Now) at GDPNow and the NYC Fed (Nowcast) http://athttps://www.newyorkfed.org/research/policy/nowcast. The Atlanta forecast for Q4 is 0.4% and the NYC forecast is 0.71% for Q4. Both forecasts are updated twice a month. Clearly the economy is slowing.Unemployment rates (UE3) are not a reliable indicator. High unemployment is a consequence of recessions. The UE rate may continue to drop historically up until th e month before the recession starts. It may stall, but does not go significantly up before a recession.As of 11/25/2019, the UE3 rate was 3.6% for October 2019, barely up from 3.5 the month before. Since these figures are at 50-year historical lows, it may be that the drop in unemployment has stalled.A sustained low unemployment rate and continued consumer spending may be the only thing to keep us out of a technical recession as in 1966-67 or to just prolong the inevitable.Consumer sentiment index (maintained by the University of Michigan) isn’t a good predictor. An Index of 100 is normal, above that consumer are happier, below that feeling worse off. It seems like a logical indicator, but the data (maintained only since the 1960s) shows that the index is below 100 way more often that above 100 even in times of positive GDP and low unemployment. Little to no correlation at all. For what it’s worth, the Consumer Sentiment Index has bounced around from 91.2 in January 2019, to a high of 100.0 in May and currently 95.5 for October 2019.The Institute for Supply Management’s (ISM) Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) of durable goods orders also is not indicative. I did take a second look at it and in some recessions it goes below 50 a few months before a recession and at other times doesn’t start to drop until a recession forms. It behaves a lot like GDP correlating with the recession, not foreshadowing it. And the consumption side as in Durable Goods Consumption, sometimes leads, sometimes lags. However, it is worth keeping an eye on it since the manufacturing sector takes the biggest hit in recessions.The final indicator I looked at was the Year-over-Year (YoY) Housing Starts data. It has some promise to be used as a corroborating indicator, but not a leading indicator. The data set only has a time depth back to 1960. Therefore, it is not of use looking at the 1960 recession and also has months-long stretches of negative performance in relatively good economic times. However, each recession since 1969 has been preceded by a sustained period of YoY housing starts going negative. As of 11/25/2019 Housing Starts had turned negative in October 2018 through March 2019, but it has bounced around a bit, mostly positive since then except for May and August.The best candidate to emerge is the “Yield Curve” which is the difference in interest as a percentage paid by short-term Treasury bills (currently the 2-year bill) and longer term 10-year Treasury. You will see this mentioned in the press as the 10–2 yield. In normal times, the 10-yr bill pays a higher percent than the 2-yr bill. When the spread between the two gets loser, it is said to be tightening, and when the 2-yr yield is higher than the 10-year yield, it is said to have inverted. (NOTE: If you look at analyses of past recessions, the 3 month bill (introduced in the 1930s) or the 1 year bills (introduced in 1959) are substituted for the 2-yr bill which was not introduced until 1976).As of 11/25/2019 the inversion has come and gone. In my first analysis I used end-of-month data from Sept 2015 to March 2019 and used the forecast function in Excel to derive a projected date for when the 10 year Treasury would trigger a sustained inversion against the 3 month, 1 year and 2 year Treasury yields (the most common measures), as well as the 1 month, 2 month and 6 months yields since I was collecting the data anyway. Since exact dates are impossible to predict, I was looking for a range of dates between these various notes and generated a range from May 10 to May 30 for the 1 month through 1 year notes and June 20 for the 10/2 inversion.There was a brief inversion of the 10 year note against the 1-, 2-, 3-, 6-month and 1-year notes at the end of March none lasting more than six days before trending back open. The 10/2 gap got within 13 basis points during these few days. The sustained inversion began May 22 and 23 (in keeping with the predicted range) for the 1 month through 6 month notes, staying inverted for four and a half months. The 1 year note (although it also briefly inverted for seven business days on May 23) did not have a sustained inversion until August , only remaining inverted for two months. The 10/2 gap closed at 0 on August 22 and stayed at 0 or negative for only 6 business days.Every post-WWII U.S. recession has been preceded by a tightening of the yield curve and every recession since 1959 has been preceded by an inversion of the yield curve. You may have read this in the press, but a couple of qualifiers about those remarks. The 3-month bill was not allowed to float until 1947. When the 3-mos bill was allowed to float it went from a 0.38% payout to 1.22% just before the 1948 recession, while the 10-year rate also slipped, but only about 0.10%. Similarly the 1953-54 and 1957 recessions see a similar tightening. All coincide with a period of declining GDP, followed by a sustained period of negative GDP that defines the ensuing recession. Monthly YoY housing starts data was not collected then.One exception, of course. While it is true that all recent recessions are preceded by a period of a sustained (4–6 months) inversion of the yield curve, not all sustained inversions of the yield curve result in a recession, 1966 being the exception. The economy was in very good shape, with high GDP and low unemployment, therefore no recession. BUT…the S&P500 went into a 22% bear market and generally recessions and bear markets go together, so Consolation Prize to the analysis. And there was also a period of negative YoY housing starts. In a weaker economy, there would have been a recession. I emphasize a “sustained” inversion of the yield curve as there are times when the yield curve went negative for May 1998, averaging zero in July and back to positive by August.And this is where I am going with this analysis concerning usefulness of the data analysis - how can I use predicting the possibility and timing of a recession to maximize my portfolio? And remember, falling GDP is an economic event, a falling portfolio is a market event. Short of losing your job or being a small business owner, most people can weather a recession. Having your portfolio cut in half like the 2008 recession has consequences for a lot more people, from those trying to save for retirement, those living off of their portfolio and especially retirees using that portfolio income to make up the income gaps between social security, any other income and what they need monthly. If you can see the storm clouds gathering, you have time to plan, such as reallocating investments to things that do relatively better than the market in a recession (i.e. lose less), to fixed income that may “only” yield 2% while the market falls -56%, or move to precious mineral that may produce a double-digit return during the market decline.So, how did I use these findings to come up with the target date for the next recession? I crunched numbers in my now [20] 26-page excel spread sheet of economic data on yield curve, market declines and YoY Housing starts going back to 1945 (housing starts data only goes back to 1960). I also did a regression of the current trend line in the yield curve to determine a target date for an inversion. Here is summary of what I found:The average time (rounded to nearest whole number) from a yield curve inversion to the start of a recession (negative GDP) is [15] 14.4 months with a standard deviation of [5] 4.6 months, so a range of 10–[20] approximately 19 months from inversion. (I had rounded numbers in my original post).The average time from the beginning of a sustained YoY decline in housing starts is [12] 12.3 months, with a standard deviation of [6] 5.6 months, so a range of approximately 6–18 months before the recession.The market (defined as the S&P500 index) reaches a new top and then starts a decline [8] 7.6 months before the start of a recession with a standard deviation of [5] 4.5 months. A lot of variability, but this is not an indicator, but something you pay attention to. On average the market is already down -8.4% when the recession starts.The market on average hits a bottom 10 months into the recession (+/- 6 months). Research from Goldman Sachs (G-S) puts the average bear market decline at -30%. “Recovery” is defined differently by different organizations. G-S puts the average market recovery at 22 months after a 13 month decline, a 35 month period. They define recovery as when the market reaches the point where it was when the recession started. Earlier, I mentioned that when a recession starts, the market has already been in decline. I prefer using previous market top to new market top since after all, we are investors trying to make money, not just an academic exercise. The average time from top to top is [45] 44.2 months and getting longer - 82 months for the dotcom recession, 66 months for the housing bubble.The yield curve was at 0.46% at the end of April 2018 and has been closing since September 2015. When I originally posted this piece, the regression of that trend line points to the yield closing and inverting in February 2019.As of March 2019 (I use last business day of the month data points), the yield curve was at 0.14% (2.27% on the 2-yr bill and 2.41% on the 10-year bill) and the regression analysis indicated that the curve would hit 0.0% at the end of April 2019, then going negative.As of 11/25/2019 the inversion has come - May 2019 - and gone - October 2019.Taking [Feb 2019][then April 2019] now second half of May 2019 as the point where the curve [inverts] inverted (and stays inverted for at least 4 months), if we use the average lead time of approximately [15} 14.5 months (+/- approximately 5 months) the projected date for a recession (based on current data is [originally May] [was July] now August 2020, but perhaps as early as [originally December 2019] [was February/March 2020 ] now April 2020 or as late as [originally October] [was November] now December 2020. Just in time for national elections in the U.S.!Look for confirming signals in [July 2019] by September 2019. If a recession is imminent the 2019Q1 and 2019Q2 GDP should be lower than 2018 GDP. GDP for Q3 2018 and Q4 2018 are trending lower from a high in Q2 2018. Also YoY housing starts should have turned and stayed negative starting in April 2019. Actually, YoY housing starts are already trending negative, since October 2018. Now remember these are statistical averages and at 1 standard deviation it only accounts for 68% of the variation in the data, so if some figures are off a month or so, that is to be expected, so keep monitoring.If everything is indicative of a coming recession, I’ll rebalance my portfolio in early- to mid-2019 (I started in April 2019) to ride it out and rebalance again when the market turns, which on statistical average would be early 2021. On average, the market should set a new high in August/September 2019. It did, followed by new highs in October and again in November 2019. However, markets are generally flat in the summer, so I will seriously think about rebalancing between Feb 2019 and July 2019. My rebalancing will probably continue through Feb 2020 because of the timeline stretching out.I’ve actually started, taking some funds out of equities after the September high and putting them into guaranteed income funds and more recently after the markets recovered from the December 2018 sell off into a short-term US government bond fund. Unless we get a Santa Claus rally at the end of 2019, the stock market may not get appreciably higher than last September and perhaps not at all. But, I don’t have a crystal ball.[Following paragraph from April 2019 revision] Now, here is the fly in the ointment. At the end of January, the Fed signaled that there may be no rate hikes in 2019 and confirmed that at their March 21, 2019 meeting. As a result, the yields on both the 2-year and 10-years bills are slightly up and the gap has widened to 0.19% as of this revised post. Since inversions, and subsequent recessions, are caused by Fed tightening of the money supply, they may be taking a breather in part to let that gap widen before new rate hikes in 2020 (they signaled two). Also employment is strong and inflation below the Fed’s target amount. Additionally, in past recessions, the Fed needed to make rate cuts on the order of approximately 4.5% to jump start the economy. At an effective Fed money yield rate between 2.4-2.5%, they do not have 4.5% to work with without going to negative yield rates like some European countries did.As of 11/25/2019, the Fed reversed policy initiating 3 rate cuts in 2019 with no more on the short-term horizon. Now, the Fed only has about 1.75% wiggle room to work with in case of a recession.Perhaps they learned something between endless analyses of the yield curve since it began being seriously studied in the 1960s as an indicator of future economic activity, and more specifically tied to recessions and the business cycle in Harvey Campbell’s doctoral thesis in 1986 (published in 1988 in the Journal of Financial Economics). It has been more specifically used as a forecasting tool since 2005 and the amount of leeway one needs to have to cut rates (The Yield Curve as a Leading Indicator: Some Practical Issues by Arturo Estrella and Mary R. Trubin, Current Issues in Economics and Finance, Vol 12, No.5, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, 2005). At an effective yield of [was 2.5% in April 2019] now 1.75% in November, we are [only] less than half-way to normalized interest rates which in the previous decades were at least in the 5-6% range. Letting the yield curve widen more, so that it could accommodate one or two rate cuts in 2020 without the risk of inversion and subsequent recession would be an unprecedented feat to financial engineering. In my opinion, it is an experiment worth trying as we know that too much tightening, too fast, leads to recession and subsequent loss of jobs and wealth. Well as of November, it looks like they did not go this route.For the last few years, many economists at the leading financial institutions have stated that going forward, we should expect an extended period of low/slow growth in market returns. Taking a pause in rate hikes could do that. But, I’ll take that over a recession. However, if 1966-67 is a lesson, there is still the possibility of a bear market (market loss in excess of 20%) in the near future. While there have been 12 recessions since 1945, there have been 3 additional bear markets outside of recessions, plus 28 market corrections between negative 10-20%.As of November 2019 we have a second fly in the ointment and that is the trade war with its accompanying tariffs. It has introduced volatility in the stock market and contributing to a slowdown in various sectors such as agriculture and manufacturing. While a tight money supply and inversions tend to be the primary drivers of a recession, each recession seems to be associated with an “event” that has a financial fallout such as the dotcom bust in 2000-2001 wiping out a lot of overvalued stocks and the housing meltdown in 2007-2008 associated with the mortgage back derivatives market. A prolonged trade war may be the trigger for the next recession.Let’s revisit this question [in early 2019 and thru] again in 2020 to see if I am (or was) on to something, close, or completely off base. Comments and suggestions welcome.[Currently (April 2019), I am working on taking this project the next step and looking at asset classes and market sectors that would be appropriate for different stages of a recession, recovery and ensuing next business cycle. I plan to post them as an update when finished].My subsequent research on asset classes show that all equity sectors fall during a recession and almost all asset classes to likewise. Even gold dips at the beginning of a recession, but is among the first asset class to recover, while equities are still falling. For those who would like to invest in gold, but not physically own it in large quantities, there are two ETFs that invest directly in gold (not mines, futures, derivatives or anything else related to gold) whose symbols are GLD and IAU. Real estate did well in the 2000-2002 recession, but we all know what happened in 2007-2009. The only asset classes that do well (make money) are U.S. government bonds/funds and bear funds that short the market (very risky).For those who are generally invested in stocks via mutual funds in 401K (or similar plans) or individual stocks in either taxable accounts or tax-deferred plans Fidelity Investments has a page at https://eresearch.fidelity.com/eresearch/markets_sectors/sectors/si_business_cycle.jhtml?tab=sibusinessshowing how various industry sectors perform during the different phases of the business cycle, of which a recession is one phase.U.S. Treasury bonds or bond funds such as VUSTX are also a good place to stash funds.As of November 2019 I am also evaluating (via back-testing) two models plus my own for market exit/rebalance and re-entry. The “fattailed” model, based on when NBER declares a recession is at https://fattailedandhappy.com/thoughts-on-business-cycles-recessions-and-financial-markets-part-3/ but read all four parts; and, a model based on presidential election cycles can be found at https://www.marketwatch.com/story/how-to-take-advantage-of-fear-then-relief-in-the-stock-market-leading-up-to-the-presidential-election-2019-11-16 . The latter is not as directly tied to portfolio balancing as is the fattailed model.My model is very similar to the fattailed model with two significant and one minor difference. In the fattailed model, the author exits equities for bonds when the yield curve inverts and returns to equities in 12 equal monthly purchase when NBER declares a recession. In my model, based on my research and timeline, I will exit equities for bonds seven months after the inversion and return to equities in 10 equal monthly installments within a month of the market turning back up. Both are essentially dollar cost averaging models for re-entry.I have back-tested my and the faittailed models for the 1991, 2001 and 2008 recessions, comparing them to just staying in the market 100% in stocks. Next I need to do that analysis with a 60/40 portfolio. I used end of the month data with the funds VFINX as a proxy for the SP500 and VUSTX as a proxy for the government bond market starting with 1000 shares of VFINX at the first month of the inversion for those three recessions and the cycle ending 12 months after the faittailed model has been totally reinvested in the stock market.For 1991, if you had stayed in the market you would have done better than my (-6.7% vs stock market) or the faittailed approach (-21.6% vs the SP500), so both our models failed in that they both underperformed the market, although you would have had more than you started with in all three scenarios. It was a short and mild recession with the SP500 hitting a new market top at the beginning of the recession and recovering in less than a year.For the 2001 recession, both my and the fattailed model greatly outperform the market, which one year out from the end of the recession, the market is still about 20% below when the recession started. The fattailed model is 52% higher than the market and up 18% from where we both started. Mine is up +87% over the market and +46% higher than where we began.For the 2008 recession, both my and the fattailed model again greatly outperform the market, which is still about 18.8% below where it was when the recession started. The fattailed model is +56% higher than the market at that point and up 20% from where we both started. Mine is up +46% over the market and +18.5% higher than where we began.It’s harder to replicate this analysis for the 1973 and back to back 1980 and 1981 recessions as VUSTX did not exist then and older government bond funds tend to be mortgage bond funds, so not exactly an apples-to-apples analysis.Again, comments and feedback appreciated, especially other allocation models to consider.

You are just a resource, nothing more.You are replaceable, everybody is, including the CEO so don't have that mentality that you are very important.A resignation of another employee is an opportunity for you to pitch in and get yourself noticed. However, most people cry about more work.Company bonds are highly subjective matter. Some cases, if an employee breaks the bond, action is taken, sometimes they don't care.Planned leaves are expected to be planned as per project deliverables.Managers are not idiots, don't think they don't know the time you spend on morning tea, breakfast, lunch, evening snacks and dinner. They definitely know that you are not working the hours you are billed for. However, as long as work is getting done and quality issue is not there everything is smooth.If one is working in shifts, don't assume managers are not keeping an eye on you. They login Skype and check if you are on time or you come late than expected. If your manager is smarter, they go offline and frequently keep a check on you.In one organization, it's only once you got to build a reputation. Then is only comfort zone ahead, this is the main reason for people not switching. They are fine with less money as they are used to that laid back lifestyle.Prevention Against Sexual Harassment (POSH) is applicable in all companies and cases are registered and action is taken. Once a manager or employee has a POSH filed against, consider it a life long blot so be careful.Romantic couples in live-in relationships is common.Manager and employee 1:1 meetings are just an obligation. Nothing fruitful comes out of it.No employee works with the mindest to meet the goals that are recorded in the performance cycle. Yet, at year end he/she he is expected to explain how he met the goals.No matter how much quantity work you do, deliver 100 percent quality there will always be scope of improvement given.People have no work satisfaction. Work is very monotonous.Free food, work from home and free cab attracts employees.Employees steal biscuits, tea sachets, energy powder sachets, tissue, etc proudly stating that companies owe them for the extra work they do.Creepy men and women are everywhere. You know, he/she knows but due to office environment nobody approaches or complains to avoid unnecessary drama.Abortion, one night stands, friends with benefits, marriage, divorce and affairs are entertainment news.Those creepy people, sit in pantry and stare at you, they will stalk you in all social sites but will not approach you. Thanks to the fear of HR complaint, that may result to professional reputation hit.For salary hikes, every few years one changes organization and end up meeting old colleagues so don't fight, badmouth etc anyone.Office outings are usually in resorts, avoid drinking to avoid judgements.Indian emails use words - kindly, request, thank you to add lick the ass of foreigners who usually lead the projects. Non-indians use these words occasionally, only when they mean it seriously.Be ready to work in any weekends, deliverables are first priority.Time coding has hours coded by inky-minkey-ponkey mindset. This is because more break is taken which is not shown in time sheet.SOPs are read once during the honeymoon period when one has newly joined the organization. Post that, amendments and version updated SOP are run at a tab and signed off without reading.An employee serving a notice period, never reveals the organization they are jumping to. All lie, just act like you believe and later his/her manager will confirm the organization. Thanks to the security check call the manager gets.