To augment its Tier II capital State bank of India is coming out with a micro issue of Rs. 500 crores. I am deliberately calling this a micro issue, because there is a huge appetite for such coupon rates (9.2% to 9.5%) from such a great borrower (a AAA rating through the life of the […]

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Many people send me their portfolio and ask me to review it. These are the tell tale signs of a losing portfolio: 1. People who brag about their ‘success’ : One person who was so proud of his investment in one particular scheme. He said it had given him a 32% CAGR over the past […]

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“The government issues a half baked scheme and expects people to buy it?” This is exactly what a person who had a choice told me. He was talking about the NPS. Many people have hailed it as a great scheme. I have serious misgivings. The debt instruments that the NPS buys are not indexed. So […]

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A friend asked me to see value research online – and see the lead story on why you should distrust your adviser. I was amused because ‘How to select a financial adviser’ is a topic with which I have often grappled for and on behalf of many friends. Let us take a typical ‘media’ answer […]

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Though I do not claim to help in reducing investor ignorance or awakening the investor…somewhere I guess it must be happening. Other blog writers like Ranjan Verma, Deepak Shenoy, and Manish Chauhan are all people with whom I have had conversations from time to time, and frankly there seems to be no ‘business model’ in […]

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A few days ago I was watching a personal finance program on ET TV. How some statements are now being thrown about is very surprising – and amusing if one were not bothered about the side effects. A portfolio for a 55 year old individual (5 years to go for retirement) was about 50% in […]

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Mutual fund loads abolished – let us look at how each constituent is likely to react: Investor: He is supposed to be the biggest beneficiary. Most of them will not know about it. A few handful of people (who had the option even earlier) can go direct. However to the best of my knowledge the […]

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