If you are in the financial services business or in the Information Technology business, remember competition can come from anywhere. When SGX saw an opportunity in the Nifty futures, they said, lets do it. Now while NSe has to get up every morning and worry about service tax, stt, Gaar, ..and well an occasional bandh […]

Read More →

  I have said this in the past too….and saying it again… “I have NO clue about what attracts big companies to the financial services sector” – repeat a zillion times. None of the so called ‘big groups’ have ever done well in financial services. Whether it is the Tatas, Birlas, Sundaram,….really only Hdfc as […]

Read More →

There are many people in the financial services business whose main job is to sell financial products. What they have been called has changed over the years….but largely the job is: 1. looking for a good product 2. tying up with the manufacturer of the product (a company which wants money or wants to lend […]

Read More →

The biggest risk in the financial services business today is the Regulatory risk. The more the regulators think that they can prevent frauds and cheating the more they will move into the controls of a business. Sebi has been making a lot of changes in the mutual fund business – there is a good chance […]

Read More →

Either the financial services industry is full of people who announce business plans for time pass or I have brilliant 20/20 vision. When Big Bazaar group entered the financial services business, there was a chuckle. However they hired a top notch very (and frightfully) expensive executive….rumored to be paid a few million dollars (US!) then […]

Read More →

Ok This is not about Friedman’s book…it is just that last week I got confirmation of this! In a complex world with a lot of barriers to information flow, it was possible to make money on information arbitrage. Not sure how many readers will believe that in the 1990s it was easy for foreign banks […]

Read More →

small investor, financial literacy, financial awareness, financial inclusion….what an amazing array of words we have created for bureaucrats, politicians, businessmen, capital market pundits to meet and eat! Frankly if you want to climb the Himalayas you need to join a Gym get into good shape and then climb the Himalayas. In the investment arena you […]

Read More →