Are interest rates going up or going down? Very this is a trillion dollar questions at all points in time is it not? Well I did put in some money into the SBI bond issue – and was pleasantly surprised to see the limit was raised to Rs. 500,000 per application in the retail segment. […]

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On 3rd May, 2010 IRDA came out with an amended ULIP regulation…or whatever it isĀ  called. There is nothing special except that the reports in the media suggest that it is something new. Well the things are: No partial withdrawal from a pension plan – this will make the pension plan even more tax inefficient. […]

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NPS – New pension scheme or National pension scheme….does attract a lot of attention from many investors. However the jury is still out on whether one should invest in it nor not invest. One major (I mean MAJOR) DRAWBACK is you have no clue what will happen once you finish the accumulation stage and go […]

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A friend says it would be great if you could choose where to be born and as what. If you were born in 1900 you should have been born in England. If you were to be born in 1950 you should have been born in US. If you were born in 2000 you would be […]

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Uma Kannan wrote this piece on rediff.com….interesting..she called it “11 reasons not to buy ULIPs”. Easy to identify with some things she says…here it is…it appears in the Get Ahead section of the site.. I am sick and tired of writing about ‘should I buy a ‘ULIP or a MF‘ kind of articles. I know […]

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There was an amazing news item now. Mr. D Swaroop said Rs. 15,000 crores was paid as commission to the insurance distributors, so they have decided to eliminate commissions. Fantastic idea, should be immediately implemented! Vow! So the investors save Rs. 15,000 crores. A quick calculation showed that the insurance companies paid Rs. 22,000 crores […]

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Am doing this posting because a few journalists wanted me to talk about the Union Budget and the NPS. What a joke! There was NOTHING in the budget for the NPS at all. One cosmetic change is ‘on share purchases the NPS does not have to pay service tax’ – the impact at best can […]

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