Mordecai Richler. Duddy Kravitz Apprenticeship Essay

Mordecai Richler. Duddy Kravitz Apprenticeship - Essay Example In the whole novel we see Duddy as an ambitious but greedy person who holds no value for love and friendship and considers wealth as his ultimate goal. The major theme that runs in the story is the power of negative ambition, greed and materialism which overpowers pure emotions like love, decency and affection. From the start of the story we see that the family of Duddy plays an important role in taking Duddy’s ambition to a dangerous level. His grandfather advises him that "A man without land is nobody.† His father repeatedly tells him story of a young man who progressed from rags and riches by cheating people on his way. And then he sees his uncle who is extremely rich and successful and it burns a desire in Duddy’s heart to become wealthy. Duddy, in his greed and ambition fails to value relationships and we see him as a man who cheats on her girlfriend even though she loves him truly. Duddy also mistreats his long-time friend, Virgil and even cheats him out of his money when he is confined to his bed due to paralysis.

Fund managers combine assets into portfolios with attributes expected Essay

Fund managers combine assets into portfolios with attributes expected to be attractive to their clients. Identify and describe a - Essay Example The active strategies for financial investments are: proper stock selection; good market timing; appropriate bond swapping; and a ladder approach in multi-investments. Appropriate or proper stock selection involves the buying of undervalued stocks. The investor must be aware of any existing public information related to the stocks he/she is going to buy to be able to evaluate fairly well the best possible stocks that are being offered which will eventually yield the best possible growth and return. This type of investment technique keeps the portfolio streamlined and more manageable because the investor is well-informed about the stocks’ standing. Market timing strategy leads any potential investor to purchase stocks when the prices are low and to sell them when they reach their maximum peak values at a given time. This entails guessing the ups and downs of the money market that is usually dependent on various issues that affects marketable stocks. Bond swapping is an active i nvestment strategy that requires an investor to make a forecast as to when to sell long-term bonds and when to buy short-term bonds. The capital gains on bonds are based on the changes involved in interest rates, which normally fluctuates from time to time. Last but not the least active strategy for financial investment is the ladder approach where investors are encouraged or advised to invest in mixed or various types of investments that have different maturity dates and varying levels of risks. This particular active strategy is designed to provide the investor a more regular and fixed income that has lower risks (Norton, 2008a). The second type of investment strategy is the passive investment strategies. This type of investment strategy involves the following investment techniques: balance mutual fund; index portfolio, dollar cost averaging, buy and hold; and dividends reinvestment plan. The balance mutual fund is a diverse combination of investments offering various maturity dat es along with different risk intensities. This kind of investment strategy helps to make any investment portfolio more stable since the levels of risks vary and the returns augment losses if any. Next passive strategy is the index portfolio intended to copy a main index. Similar shares with the same proportion as the main index is bought with the primary aim of duplicating its performance and not out-performing it. This makes returns more predictable and is often utilized when investing in equities. The dollar cost averaging is another form of passive investment strategy where investments are purchased at standard periodic intervals without considering the fluctuation of market prices. Hence, if the price movement is downhill the average price for the investment is usually greater than the current market price. But if the price trend is uphill then the average cost is less than the market price. Buy and hold is another type of passive investment method which aims to provide the best possible return for a particular risk level. This method normally involves bonds and stocks that are held for long periods of time or until their respective maturity dates. The dividends reinvestment plan strategy is a type of passive i