• As we had said earlier, the market is now decoupled. Even though the markets went down yesterday in US Indian markets have gone up.
• Indian markets have gone down, in keeping with Global Trends…Kospi is down, Hangseng is down….so is Nifty
• Markets are down…this is the single biggest fall..it is down by 500 points (the shrillness in the voice remains the same whether the index is at 9000 or 21000 for the sensex or it is for the 4500 Nifty)
• It is a great time to be buying gold….everybody is buying it…and experts say it will reach…..by Dec…
• Do you realise that Mr. Ratan Tata has lost Rs. 900,000 crores in market capitalization in the past 6 days?
• Markets have hit a low of 4800…and there is a good chance that it will hit a further low of 4500…
• Markets have hit a high of 20840..and is within a spitting distance of the previous high…

I am convinced that I can create a software with about 50 sentences which it will pick and produce stories.

Now let us look at the sentences in an astrological mag:

• Those single may be attracted to a person of the opposite sex
• Children will bring joy for some
• Children do well academically, but take care of their health
• Parents health may cause concern
• Job will be fine, but boss may cause some irritation

Get the drift of what I am saying?

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There is one question which I HAVE TO ANSWER:

‘How much money as a corpus do I need to retire?’ – and if I say Rs. 2.8 crores there is either a denial or followed up by another question – IS THIS CORRECT AND FINAL’. That question I have not been able to answer.

What a planner tells you is an approximate number. Cannot promise whether this will be correct PERMANENTLY! There are so many dynamics in the market – inflation rate, market performance, your health, your monthly expenditure (most of them do not have a number picked from excel, it is only an ESTIMATE). My argument is that based on

- estimated current monthly expenses

- estimated year of retirement

-estimated rate of return on the assets

- estimated year up to which the client will be alive

NOBODY – repeat NOBODY will be able to give you an EXACT estimate of what you require for RETIREMENT….

HERE is an article on Wall Street Journal read on…

http://www.smartmoney.com/personal-finance/retirement/retirement-math-is-best-done-in-pencil/

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About the Book : – To most people retirement is an age. It of course depends on your health, the company you work for etc. However in the first chapter I would like to introduce you to the concept that retirement is an amount of money! After all, if you have that magical amount why not retire early?

The second chapter takes you through the steps and importance of planning, and to the dangers of not planning.

Like any financial goal, retirement is also a goal and has to be approached in a financial planning mode. So Retirement Goal Setting becomes a very important and is perhaps the first step in Retirement planning.

How much money is adequate for a person to retire? Here is a generic answer telling you what are the factors to consider while trying to answer this question. This chapter has many pointers and a calculator which leads you towards the answer. Remember this is dynamic.

Can you really retire by investing an amount as little as Rs. 40 a day? The answer is yes it is the power of compounding. If you do have or time on your side, it is possible to create a retirement corpus on an amount as small as Rs. 40 a day. And the fantastic thing is that this small amount can be got by making very simple changes in your life style.

If you have accumulated money for your retirement, you should also know how to withdraw. Here we deal with what is annuity, what are the methods of creating annuities, what options are available, and the works about annuity.

Retirement savings and investments are invested in various instruments. A book cannot really do justice to all the schemes that are currently available- neither has the author attempted that. There are books specializing in information about investment products which are updated regularly – like In the Wonderland of Investments by Mr. Shanbag.

A few chapters are devoted to answering how much and what type of insurance should you look at during retirement, the attitude of the Indian family to retirement, the need to make a will, some retirement blunders, etc.

What is interesting are the tables at the end of the book telling you how much to save and invest – and case studies about portfolio make over for retirement.

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Youth pride: ‘I am young’ is what Shankaracharya called ‘yovana garvam’. It is there is man right through childhood to old age!

Money: “I am rich’ is also a very strong pride / ego booster. Normally associated with people who have earned their own money. However there are some inheritors who could also have this pride without contributing to the corpus. Have you seen the Pramod Mahajan family? LOL.

Strength: ‘I am strong’. Strength is a very big source of pride. Compliment a man on his muscles or a woman on her well toned body and they will go ga ga over their regular habits, gym, swimming, running…..blah blah…

Drinking: Surprisingly being able to hold say ’8′ pegs or ’12′ pegs is a great source of pride! Actually to me this looks almost stupid. If booze does not make you tipsy, you might as well have water.

Illness: We are in such a competitive environment that even illness are found to be a source! Have you noticed people saying “i have diabetes” or ‘I have blood pressure. This is the ownership mentality? On the other hand ‘I have great health’ is also a source of pride.

Capacity to do a lot of work: I have been working all day and night for the last few days is a common ‘sigh’. It may not mean that they really work hard, but they create an atmosphere of creating an impression of working hard. Many a times they take on work far more than what they can handle – but they like martyrdom, so they continue to do so…

Educational Pride: Being educated well and knowing more than the common man in any field leads to what is called ‘Jhana’ gauravam. However this is very risky – how educated you are is a clear function of what kind of crowd you are sitting with!

………many more to go……..

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You are a function of what you chose to be.

If you are happy you make the choices to be happy and successful – so success follows happiness and not necessarily the other way around!

Happiness is a state of mind – money is important but the importance we give to money is just too much. It is not so important as we make it out to be. It is just like health – you need to have it, but those who have health do not jump up and down saying they are healthy. Those who do not have it know how much it means.

I met a taxi driver (If Meru had a frequent user, I could benefit)…and got talking. He said he went to a barber’s shop and paid Rs. 20 for a shave. On probing I found that he normally spent Rs. 10 for a shave and that meant Rs. 100 a month – Rs. 1200 a year. Then I asked him about his food – he said he eats out every day – that meant about Rs. 100 a day ATLEAST – Rs. 36000 a year.

If he choses to buy a Gillette shaving blade (Rs. 20?) and it lasts him 15 days – he would end up spending Rs. 40 a month or Rs. 480 a year. He could of course choose some unknown brand and save still more! If he ate food from a ‘dabba’ packed by his family he could clearly save Rs. 25000 a year and save some stomach aches too!

If you are in HR do you think it is your responsibility to tell people such basic things? No. Because HR (like most other professionals) do not ever get rewarded for avoiding trouble. If there is trouble and you sort it out you get rewarded!

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