Economist Conference and my interview to National Television

Economist Conference: The best place to be, if interested in “high level” of PR…
The only common thing that Intercontinental of Athens shares with Intercontinental of Bucharest is just the name. Unfortunately the Greek one can not be compared with the Romanian version and I felt it once more entering the halls for the conference. The problem is not the lack of luxury, I personally don’t care about it. But the difference at service, quality and food is VERY visible… I hope that the Romanian one will soon decide to upgrade its approach to clients, regaining its position as a meeting point in the heart of the city.
Monday was quite a hot day in Athens. I think the temperature reached 32 degrees. So it was not so easy for my brother Grigoris and me to move around the city wearing our summer suits and ties. But there is no other suitable dress code for someone who wants to attend The Economist Conference. Ministers and important politicians from many countries, all the top Greek ones, tens of “impossible to reach” owners of business groups and lots of low profile “market leaders” were there this year too.
Even if the crisis had knocked Greece’s door, even if Monday and Tuesday were busy days, several hundreds of people paid the 1.500 euro ticket so as to be there, to shake hands and exchange business cards. As you enter in the hotel, you see in front of you the stairs which lead you down. Passing by the reception on your right, after the detector, some more stairs bring you “in the center of Greek business world’. The Lobby of the conference is always an excellent place for photo opportunities and important connections, between cameras, journalists, businessmen and politicians. Especially if you are crazy like me, sometimes you don’t even need to be known by someone. You can go directly and talk to him (having ofcourse something serious to say).

Crisis is expected to hit Greece after summer…
Talking about the discussions and the speeches, it was very interesting to hear people officially expecting the crisis to hit Greece right after the summer (which I keep stating since the end of last year). The atmosphere was a bit negative… Greek and foreign important politicians were talking (off camera) for a very difficult period coming up. And when the biggest economy of Balkans is ready to enter in turbulence, the news is not good for the other economies too.
On the other hand, plenty of serious well established businessmen stated an opinion with which I fully agree: “Let us hope that crisis will finally arrive. We will lose profits, we will work harder, but also in the end of the day we will get rid of the biggest part of all the crooks who exist today in the market, ruining business without offering any added value to it. Also, during the crisis the opportunities are multiplied and the upcoming period is an excellent one for careful selections and investments”. It sounds hard, but it is true, crisis will make us wiser and will also give a lesson to most of unserious people who are the majority in markets like Greece, Romania and many more…
My warm thank you and my congratulations to all the team of the company which organizes this Econimist conference and especially to Mr Panayiotis Tsafaras, the Public Relations director. Once more he showed to everyone how to organize major events, working hard, being attentive to the smallest detail and finally succeed without causing problems, blaming others or pretending to be more important than his own clients. Plenty of Romanians who claim to be in the same business should ask him for lessons…

(PS. Keeping the… tradition, I gave my predictions to my friend Akis for the results of the European elections in Greece. It will be interesting to find out if I will be right this time too. But I hope he will also remember the numbers I told him and he will not try to “escape” like he did with the bet about the time for national elections, when I won and then he said I didn’t reply early enough…)

Short interview to National Television
First time I had met him when he came in Romania together with the deputy minister of Foreign Affairs of Greece, covering the trip. Mr Nektarios Notis is considered one of the best Greek journalists of the new generation in the field of economy. He is the host of a daily tv show for economy at the National Television and in the team of a very successful business portal in Greece (www.capital.gr). We met again during the conference and he invited me to go to his show yesterday.
Having several years of experience in the top Greek televisions, he has created a programme with very high tempo, change of subjects and persons, which allows to the viewer to get fully informed about the Greek and the World economy in just half an hour, avoiding the long “theories and stories” of “experts”. I was asked to speak about the new report of CITI Bank, showing the Real Estate prices in Eurozone during the period of 1996 – 2009. Also i was questioned regarding the market and the opportunities for income properties and some advices to potential buyers.
Hopefully in the new version of the blog (under construction now) you will watch this interview too. During the next days I will give you a short brief of my opinion regarding those questions.