If you do a web search on the terms "privatisation" and "India," the resulting headlines say it all: "Reserve Bank of India [Get Quote] employees plan strike", "Protest against privatisation of ordnance factories", "Government employees stage demonstration".

Since India's ruling coalition, dominated by the Congress party with support from the communists, came to power in 2004, the country's privatisation drive has all but stopped. But there is one big exception - aviation. Praful Patel, India's reformist civil aviation minister, has helped drive the privatisation of Mumbai and 's moribund airports, overcoming initial protests by employees.

Now he plans something equally ambitious - the sale of 15 per cent of Air India, the state-owned flag carrier, in an initial public offering, possibly next year. Kapil Kaul, of the Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation, believes this is part of a process in which Air India could be fully privatised within five years.

Already, Mr Patel and V. Thulasidas, Air India's chairman, have engineered the airline's merger with the state-owned domestic carrier Indian Airlines. Privatisation is seen as essential if Air India is to cease being a burden on government finances.

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But as with every attempt at privatisation in India, it may be one step forward, two steps back. Mr Thulasidas is to retire next year and Mr Patel faces elections the year after. If both go, it is anyone's guess whether the privatisation of Indian aviation will get fully airborne.

Bank's rating looks safe

Structured investment vehicles have become the problem child of the capital markets, and stronger banks such as HSBC have been keen to advertise their stamina by adopting them. But Standard Chartered's assumption of $1.68bn of assets held by a SIV called Whistlejacket falls into a different category.

SIVs issue short-term "commercial paper" loans to raise funds for investing in higher-yielding assets such as mortgages and corporate loans. A sponsoring bank will usually both manage and invest in the SIV's assets but will have no formal obligation to fund it if - as happened this year - the commercial paper market dries up.

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Whistlejacket seems to have struggled like other SIVs to get commercial paper away lately. But its asset quality has been good enough to convince its investors to participate, along with external buyers, in the liquidation of about 41 per cent of its portfolio. Standard Chartered, itself an investor in the vehicle, has wisely joined in.

The bank had little choice but to do so. It could ill afford to be seen to be taking a back seat. All the same, the fact that investors have been willing to take on so many of Whistlejacket's assets reflects well on the bank.

It is evidence both of the capital strength of Standard Chartered's co-investors, and the underlying quality of the assets in question.

Standard Chartered is well placed to be SIV-friendly. There aren't many lenders whose year-end trading statements report strong income growth almost across the board and boast that they are providers of liquidity to the strained interbank lending market.

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True, headwinds are gathering force. It is hard to believe that a slowing US economy will not affect the emerging market boom that has fuelled Standard Chartered's growth and immunised it against the credit squeeze. But for the time being, the bank's premium stock market rating looks safer than ever.

Vodafone tactics backfire

Vodafone's spoiling tactics against its main European rivals that have secured exclusive rights to market Apple's must-have iPhone seem to be backfiring.

The UK-based mobile phone operator claimed an initial victory in Germany a few weeks ago when it secured a temporary injunction against T-Mobile. This obliged the Deutsche Telekom subsidiary to make the gadget available over other networks and not exclusively under its own network with customers locked in a two-year contract. T-Mobile complied and offered an unlocked iPhone at the exorbitant price of �999 compared with �399 for its lock-in option. Not only was the German company baffled by the demand for the gadget, even at the unlocked price, but was delighted when the court reversed the injunction this week.

The last thing T-Mobile wanted was to lose out to Vodafone, its main rival in the German mobile phone market. At the end of September, T-Mobile had 34.5m German subscribers but Vodafone was close behind with 32.5m.

The problem for Vodafone is that its campaign smacks of sour grapes. The UK group had probably felt it was in pole position to negotiate iPhone agreements with Apple in Europe. After all, it is the only mobile phone operator with a significant presence in most of the mainstream European markets. But it lost out to O2 in the UK, to Orange in France and T-Mobile in Germany. In each case, Apple opted for the market leader.

Of all these countries, France is the one with the toughest consumer protection laws. This forced Orange to offer both unlocked - at a high price, of course - and locked iPhones. Vodafone hoped Germany might replicate the French system. This, however, was never likely to happen. Indeed, Vodafone's competitors claim it was simply trying to disrupt the Christmas market for T-Mobile.

Vodafone is unlikely to appeal against the latest ruling since any hearing would probably take place only in January, well after the Christmas season. At the same time, the German litigation has simply provided the iPhone with even more publicity, helping T-Mobile's Christmas marketing efforts. Last but not least, upsetting Apple's European partners is not going to make future negotiations any easier in other European markets, such as Spain and Italy, where Vodafone will be competing to secure, presumably, exclusive iPhone marketing rights.

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