Archive for March, 2009

Job loss and insurance premium

When an insurance advisor approaches us, we are normally not in too much of a mood to buy life insurance! So when you are short of money, or if you (or your spouse) have lost your job the first casualty is the life insurance premium! You have just joined the 500,000 people who have lost [...]

Research: How to do?

I have a brilliant friend who has worked for many big and important media houses. He told me once – when he was heading a magazine – “I have made up my mind, please do not confuse me with the facts!”. This was when he was doing a story on mutual funds and unit linked [...]

Middle class losing its homes!

It is amazing that strategies which looked very smart in a bull market can make you look very foolish in a bear market. One ‘house marketing’ company based in the suburbs of Mumbai had a big team to sell ‘second homes’. Obviously the team included marketing people, branding, sales, call centre…etc. These were people who [...]

What is a CSGL Account?

CSGL Account stands for Constituent Subsidiary General Ledger Account (phew!). Certain SGL holders like corporates, PF trusts, individuals, institutions, state governments, Nri, Ocbs, FIIs, – registered with Sebi/Rbi can open a CSGL account but not a SGL account. It is a second SGL account at a PDO so that they can act as a custodian [...]

Retirement: what does it cost? step 1

Retirement Planning – sounds very intimidating to many people. However, like all long journeys it begins with a small step. First of all you need to accept that you will retire, and like all events in life the person who is better prepared will face it better. So retirement planning can be made to look [...]

Chasing alpha is a crime!

I am sure you have been shocked by the headline! I find just too many people who think they can beat the index every year for a long period of time. In case you see the history of equity markets there are only a few people who have beaten the index returns consistently over long [...]