The Death of Confucius

The Death of Confucius

From age 56 to 68, the Chinese philosopher Confucius wandered from state to state hoping that somewhere he could put his political doctrine into practice. During these years he never lost confidence in his cailling as political mentor of the Empire.

At age 57, when he returned to his native state finally, he lamented in a poem that, “men are without insight, quickly the years pass.” He said, despite all his wanderings through nine provinces there was still no goal in sight for him.

Confucius spent his last years peacefully in Lu. He accepted no government position. He seems to have undergone a profound change. A hermit once said of Confucius: “Is that not the man who knows that striving is without hope and yet goes on?” He studied the I Ching, or Book of Changes, so rich in secrets and completed his systematic groundwork for a new mode of education by committing traditions to writing and by instructing a group of young men.

One morning Confucius felt the approach of death. He walked about the courtyard, humming the words: “The great mountain must collapse, the mighty beam must break, and the wise man wither like a plant.”

When an alarmed pupil spoke to him, he said: “No wise ruler arises, and no one in the Empire wishes to make me his teacher. The hour of my death has come.” He lay down and died eight days later at age 73.

Kadamba Temple, Gudnapura in Karnataka

Kadamba Temple, Gudnapura in Karnataka

Gudnapura in North Kanara district is just five kms from the famous ancient city of Banavasi which was the capital of the early Kadambas. Gudnapura suddenly became famous because of the discovery of an inscription of Kadamba Ravivarman. The inscription has been inscribed in box-headed characters of Brahmi of the sixth century AD. This inscription furnishes some very important evidences regarding Gudnapura which perhaps was the area where a large number of royal buildings existed. The inscription states that king Ravivarma built a temple for Manmatha and set up this pillar with this inscription. While mentioning the boundaries of the temple it states that to the right of the temple was a palace of the king while to the left there were two dancing halls (nrityashala) and in front was harem (antahpura). Taking the clue from these details, the Archaeological Survey of India conducted excavations at the site and this resulted in bringing to light two brick structures, with various antiquities.

Kadamba Temple of Gudnapura in Uttara Kannada District, Karnataka

One of the brick structures has been identified as a temple. It consisted of a garbhagriha and a longish mandapa and both are enclosed within a prakara. This provides inner circumbulatory passage. The mandapa had wooden pillars. The mandapa had two entrances. A large number of flat but apsidal small tiles have been discovered in the excavation and perhaps they were used for the ground and roof. Some of these tiles have small holes. Large number of iron nails have been found in the excavation and hence it is suggested that these roof tiles which had holes were fixed to wooden beam with the help of these nails. The bricks used here are of high quality and some of them measure 38 by 19 by 17 cms.

In front of the temple is another structure made of laterite bricks and it may belong to a slightly later period. Unfortunately there is no clue to know the god which had been consecrated in the garbhagriha of this temple.

It is of interest to note that the Gudnapur inscription mentions a temple for Manmatha and some scholars equate Manmatha with Bahubali. Perhaps this temple can be identified as the one mentioned in the Gudnapur record. A copper casket with a lid in the form of a tortoise was found in the excavation. Thus the excavation has yielded very interesting data regarding the temple architecture of the early period at Gudnapura, close to ancient Banavasi of the early Kadamba period.

Lessons from Edgar de Picciotto

Edgar de Picciotto of Union Bancaire Privee

Edgar de Picciotto, an early promoter of hedge fund investing, passed away on Sunday 13 March 2016 after a long sickness. On November 12, 1969, de Picciotto opened his own asset-management bank in a city dominated by such well-known private banking names as Pictet Group, Lombard Odier, Darier and Hentsch.

Edgar de Picciotto founded Union Bancaire Privee (UBP) in 1969. UBP is one of the most favorably capitalized private banks in the world, and a leading player in the field of wealth management in Switzerland with $110 billion in assets under management at the end of December 2015. Edgar de Picciotto, who was born of Syrian-Lebanese parentage, moved to Switzerland in the 1950s and worked as a financier before founding UBP’s predecessor in 1969. From the bank’s inconspicuous headquarters on one of Geneva’s chief luxury-shopping drags, he built a customer base of affluent individuals and institutions all over Europe, the U.S., and the Middle East.

De Picciotto was born in Beirut and hailed from a lineage of businesspersons, which lived from the 14th to the 17th century in Portugal, moving in later centuries via Italy and Syria to the Lebanon. He afterward lived with his parents and brothers in Milan, ultimately deciding to study mechanical engineering in France. However, it was financial engineering, which took his perpetual fancy. He earned his spurs and made financial contacts, working in his previous father-in-law’s bank in Geneva. In its 2015 annual report, UBP recalled,

As our 2015 Annual Report was going to print, we learnt with deep sorrow that Edgar de Picciotto, the Chairman and founder of Union Bancaire Privee, had passed away at 86 years of age.

Edgar de Picciotto was a recognized creative visionary and pioneer in a wide variety of fields in the banking industry. He quickly rose to become a leading figure of the Geneva financial hub, and one of the most respected authorities on investments around the world.

In just a few decades, Edgar de Picciotto turned UBP into one of the world’s biggest family-owned banks. Very early on, he also set up a governance structure designed to ensure the Group’s longevity by integrating the second generation of his family into the business.

UBP is his life’s work. UBP is his legacy to us. It now falls to us to grow UBP with the same entrepreneurial spirit that he used to create the Bank, by perpetuating the values that Edgar de Picciotto would wish to see upheld every day and in everything we do.

Edgar de Picciotto’s children and all the members of UBP’s management are determined to carry on the spirit that its founder instilled in it, and they know that they can rely on the professionalism and dedication of all UBP’s staff members to continue to grow the Bank’s business, while also maintaining its independence.

In 2002, news of merger talks between two family-controlled private banks, Union Bancaire Privee (UBP) and Discount Bank & Trust Company (DTBT) over forming one of Geneva’s biggest private banks became newest sign of the altering attitude among the country’s private banks. Withdrawing from UBP’s operational management 20 years ago, de Picciotto set up a governance structure designed to guarantee the bank’s durability. His son Guy de Picciotto has been chief executive officer since 1998, while his daughter, Anne Rotman de Picciotto, and his eldest son, Daniel de Picciotto, are on the board of directors.

Byron Wien, vice chairperson of Blackstone Advisory Partners, had the pleasure of calling Edgar de Picciotto his mentor.

My purpose in reviewing Edgar’s thinking over the past 15 years is to show how he consistently tried to integrate his world view into the investment environment. That was his imperative. He wasn’t always right, but he was always questioning himself and he remained flexible. When he lost money, it tended to cause minimal pain in relation to his overall assets, and when one of his maverick ideas worked, he made what he called “serious money.”

Lessons from Edgar de Picciotto of Union Bancaire Privee

Edgar de Picciotto as a Mentor

Mentors fall into two categories: there are those you work with every day who are incessantly guiding you to enhanced performance. The ability to serve as a great mentor is one of the most undervalued and underappreciated skills in finance. Perhaps better branded as a “role model,” an outstanding mentor can provide not only a wide-ranging knowledge base and technical skills, but also the sagacious financial judgment that implies the high-class investor. Perhaps of even larger importance, a mentor can express a “philosophy of practice,” including the optimal interaction with clients and economists, a procedure for remaining current with advances in the field, and a thorough concept of how the practice of finance fits into a full life. A sympathetic mentor can also provide counselling in selecting the best practice opportunity and can maintain a close relationship for many years.

Mentors are significant to all of us, as they teach us what can’t be learned from books or in the classroom. They set aside a concrete example of “how to get it done,” and, sometimes more importantly, what to be done, when to do it, and whom to engage in the effort. Their inspiration often carries us through when nothing else does.

  • Understand the consequence of understanding the macro environment. “Many people describe themselves as stock pickers … but you have to consider the economic, social, and political context in which the stocks are being picked.” De Picciotto indubitably showed he had a good nose for trends.
  • Meet as many people of authority as you can. “For him, networking never stopped.” De Picciotto took great pleasure from knowing smart people and exchanging ideas with them.
  • “Nobody owns the truth.” De Picciotto would test his ideas on those he cherished and, and if he ran into a convincing conflicting opinion, he would contemplate on it seriously and sometimes change his position. While he never lacked principle about his ideas, he was unprejudiced and malleable.
  • Value the trust and the delight of friendship and the vainness of resentment. De Picciotto was gratified of his own success but also an enthusiast of the success of others who were his friends.
  • Never talk about overlooked opportunities except when you are disapproving yourself. Be your own harshest critic. Even if you are an intellectual risk taker, you will make many mistakes. Diagnose them early, but never stop taking risks, because that is where the tangible opportunities are and your life will be more invigorating as a result.

Buddhist Concept of Nirvana

An 18th century painting of a reclining Buddha during the transition from this world to nirvana

Nirvana is the Hindu/Buddhist concept of the state of enlightenment achieved when karma and craving are extinguished.

The concept of nirvana originated with the historical Buddha, Siddhartha Gautama (c. 563-483 BCE), during the sixth century BCE. Though Buddhism is grounded in Hindu philosophy, it is a heterodox approach to spiritual cultivation that eschews some of the core tenets of Hinduism, and the belief in nirvana epitomizes this philosophical shift.

The Sanskrit word nirvana literally translates as “snuffing out,” and refers to the eradication of the karma (a force generated by a person’s actions) and craving that bind an individual to the cycle of rebirth (samsara). One of the central ideas of Buddhism is anatman, which is a rejection of the Hindu notion that there is a permanent, essential self (the atman, or soul) that is one with ultimate reality. Because there is no self to whom karma can attach, Buddhism explains the transfer of karma using a candle metaphor: just as an old candle (one’s dying body) begins to peter out, its flame (karma) ignites the wick of a second candle (an infant’s body). Thus, karma is able to transfer without having to attach to a self. Nirvana occurs when one has reached enlightenment and eliminated ignorant attachment to false ideals, which snuffs out karma and allows one to exit the cycle of rebirth.

Theravada Buddhism divides nirvana into two stages, the awakening of the arhat (enlightened being) and parinirvana (the exit from samsara upon death), though practitioners in the Mahayana tradition take the bodhisattva vow to not enter nirvana until all sentient beings have been awakened.

Though nirvana signifies a key split from Buddhism’s Hindu origins, the concept has influenced Hinduism and is present in the 700-verse scripture the Bhagavad Gita, in which Krishna uses the concept of brahama nirvana to describe the state of liberation in which karma is eradicated and one has achieved union with Brahman (ultimate reality).