I don’t know about you, but I think I couldn’t digest my bagel this morning. I was reading the financial news about the heated financial corporation meltdown in Wall Street. After Lehman and Merrill Lynch’s fates were concluded, the wolves or the reporters are now waiting at the main office entrance of AIG in New York. I don’t think they’re looking for a specific person to interview. I think they’re trying to take shots and comments from AIG employees leaving the building. They’re probably doing an eerie montage as a precedent for the “dreaded” things to come…like bankruptcy.
Lehman, Merrill Lynch and now AIG? Although I’m concerned about the world’s financial industries in general, because that’s where I’m at right now, I know it’s already gone personal when alarm hits AIG. Damn it! AIG is one of the largest insurance Companies based in New York. But biggest, oldest and most respected do not really matter now, huh? American Insurance Group or the parent company of PHILAM LIFE here in the Philippines is on the verge of filing for bankruptcy. Lord, help me! I may not be a certified graduate of commerce, and I may not be an expert to explain nor fully understand the nitty gritty details that go behind the financial stage, but I do follow economic newsletters and broadsheets to keep me afloat somehow. I may not see the micro side and the whole arguments on derivatives, stocks and trading, but I react as a part of the public and the investor community.
Some of my savings, well…most of it, I have invested in this upgraded personal insurance that I got when I was 20 years old, using my own hard earned money. I’m paying it semi-annually for five years and I only have 1 more year to go before I just wait for it to mature. I’ve been a very responsible client and I pay on time. I’m the investor who really doesn’t mind not having enough Current or Savings money in my bank account as long as I dispose my money in insurance, something that could really secure my future. AT the current moment, I’m still building up my finances from scratch after a year of study and hiatus while spending on bigger things like necessities, parties and such. It’s hard and I take these things seriously. Ever since 19 years old, I’ve never asked my parents for anything. I pretty much spend on my own needs. I may not be that proud on my current savings now, but I’m happy I’ve invested in insurance, being independent enough to spend for my own lifestyle, necessities and luxuries, and still manage to survive no matter how financially bruised I am. But please, having AIG on the brink of bankruptcy, is something I’m not quite prepared to handle.
I may be missing salient points here or I might be making an investor’s frantic reaction, but I can’t help but express my worries since AIG is the parent company of Philamlife Insurance, my insurance. I called my mom and told her my story and expressed how I wanted to safeguard my money. My mom told me that Philamlife is the biggest, most stable insurance company in the Philippines and I shouldn’t make rash decisions that would make me end up in the losing end. I’m just being paranoid, as usual. But, the layman and normal JOE syndrome constantly nudge me. I may be making an uneducated and uninformed analysis, but sometimes, as humans, we tend to worry and make our needs and options as primitive as can be. Protect your resources, protect your future.
But don’t worry. If you’re thinking that I’m hyperventilating now, making a few phone calls and harassing my agent to pull out something. I’m not. I’m still pretty much incorporating things objectively and trying to soak up whatever information I could gather from financial colleagues, broad sheets, economic newsletters and seasoned financial experts. I may be worried and being too primitive to protect my resources right now, but I’m still in full control to learn and understand what’s happening before I result to rash decisions. In fact, I’m not deciding anything. I’m just studying and letting the big guys, the guys who certainly know more about this than I do, handle it. Because they might be CEO’s, executives and full blown experts in the technical and macro side of it, but they’re human and they know what these investments mean to us normal people (I sincerely hope so). And I’m pretty much sure, that they have investments as well. So, I’ll just be silent, let them be, and pray I get my investment back, with profit, please!
http://manilatimes.net/
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/
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