Stupid question? Well let us attempt an answer first…then decide whether the question is stupid…. The full repayment of principal and interest is guaranteed by the government, so there is no way how you will get less than what you paid for. So in a way it is safe. However if you have a 8% [...]
Which is the highest rated debt paper in the world? Well it is AAA. However a country does not get its debt paper rated. When I ask my class ‘why does a country not get its debt rated?’ I normally get a wrong answer….well not normally it is always! Let us see why sovereign [...]
Ever wondered what is Market Stabilisation Scheme? In 2002-4 the Rupee started strengthening. This was because of the amount of foreign currency that came into India for being invested. This put a lot of pressure on the Rupee – and the strengthening hurt the exporters (remember the great software industry which did not tell you [...]
Financial markets do what all markets do – price discovery. Fish markets find the price of fish, gold markets the price of gold, job markets determine your salary. The price of money means the financial markets mobilize savings into investments – and channel them for various uses. It determines the prices of bonds, equities, warrants, [...]
Last week I was travelling and therefore watched Television – and it was Utvi Bloomberg that I watched. Here the very sensible (and not so shrill) Surabhi Upadhyay was doing a program on debt reduction / consolidation. Funnily it is perhaps the only program on the borrowing side. Most other channels and ‘personal finance’ experts [...]
I love contradicting myself..but this is not contradicting the earlier post…. When a 38 year old says…’My wife is tired of working…and she is quitting her job. She is getting Rs. 32 lakhs as Provident fund, …etc. should I use this amount to pay down my (our) housing loan of Rs. 44 lakhs..my answer is [...]