Teaser rates

ICICI Bank cut home loan rates by bringing back its old teaser home loan rate product till the end of the month (read news).

Wanted to find out what teaser rates mean.

Investopedia says:

“An initial rate on an adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM). This rate will typically be below the going market rate, and is used by lenders to entice borrowers to choose ARMs over traditional mortgages. The teaser rate will be in effect for only a few months, at which point the rate will gradually climb until it reaches the full indexed rate, which will be a static margin rate plus the floating rate index to which the mortgage is tied.”

In most cases, a teaser rate will be quite attractive to the prospective customer. The rate is usually less than the current market rate for comparable services, which helps to grab the attention of consumers. Along with the introductory rate, the provider also quotes the rate structure that will be in place once the short-term teaser rate expires. Unfortunately, many consumers tend to overlook this data until the expiration takes place, and find themselves saddled with a rate that is above current market standards.

Silo effect

The silo effect is a phrase that is currently popular in the business and organizational communities to describe a lack of communication and common goals between departments in an organization. It is the opposite of systems thinking in an organization. The silo effect gets its name from the farm storage silo; each silo is designated for one specific grain, and a lack of communication causes departmental thinking to lack ideas from other departments. A notable example of the silo effect in the real world is the beer distribution game, whose goal is to meet customer demand for cases of beer, through a multi-stage supply chain with minimal expenditure on back orders and inventory. Communication is against the rules so feelings of confusion and disappointment are common.

An information silo is a management system incapable of reciprocal operation with other, related management systems. A bank’s management system, for example, is considered a silo if it cannot exchange information with other related systems within its own organization, or with the management systems of its customers, vendors, or business partners. “Information silo” is a pejorative expression that is useful for describing the absence of operational reciprocity. Derived variants are “silo thinking”, “silo vision”, and “silo mentality”.

Read more.

Oxbridge

Oxbridge is a composite, or portmanteau, of the University of Oxford and the University of Cambridge in England, and the term is now used to refer to them collectively, often with implications of perceived superior intellectual or social status.

In addition to being a collective term, Oxbridge is often used as shorthand for characteristics that the two institutions share:

• They are the two oldest universities in continuous operation in England. Both were founded more than 800 years ago, and continued as England’s only universities until the 19th century. Between them they have educated a large number of Britain’s most prominent scientists, writers and politicians, as well as noted figures in many other fields.
• Because of their age, they have established similar institutions and facilities such as printing houses (Oxford University Press and Cambridge University Press), botanical gardens (University of Oxford Botanic Garden and Cambridge University Botanic Garden), museums (the Ashmolean and the Fitzwilliam), legal deposit libraries (the Bodleian and the Cambridge University Library), and debating societies (the Oxford Union and the Cambridge Union)

Although both universities were founded more than seven centuries ago, the term Oxbridge is relatively young. In William Thackeray’s novel Pendennis, published in 1849, the main character attends the fictional Boniface College, Oxbridge. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, this is the first recorded instance of the word.

Green Field Projects

Was reading an article in ET about Unitus (I think this was the company) launching some greenfield project. This made me think what a “Green field” project is. Is it something that is very lucrative with lots of govt. support? environment friendly? what exactly?

Wiki says

In wireless engineering jargon, a greenfield is a project which lacks any constraints imposed by prior networks. The first cellular telephone networks were built primarily on tall existing tower structures or on high ground in an effort to cover as much territory as possible, quickly, and with a minimum number of base stations. They were developed with no regard for future capacity considerations or Frequency reuse.

Similarly in other disciplines like software engineering, a greenfield is also a project which lacks any constraints imposed by prior work. Greenfield also has meaning in sales. A greenfield opportunity refers to a marketplace that is completely untapped and free for the taking.

Blurb

A blurb is a short summary or some words of praise accompanying a creative work, usually referring to the words on the back of the book but also commonly seen on DVD and video cases, web portals and news websites.

According to Wiki, a blurb on a book or a film can be any combination of quotes from the work, the author, the publisher, reviewers or fans, a summary of the plot, a biography of the author or simply claims about the importance of the work. Many humorous books and films parody blurbs that deliver exaggerated praise by unlikely people and insults disguised as praise.

The word blurb originated in 1907 when American humorist Gelett Burgess’s short 1906 book “Are you a bromide?” was released. The dust jacket promoting the word proclaimed “YES, this is a ‘BLURB’!” and the picture was of a (fictitious) young woman “Miss Belinda Blurb” shown calling out, described as “in the act of blurbing.” The name and term stuck for any publisher’s contents on a book’s back cover, even after the picture was dropped and only the complimentary text remained.