Would Ukraine be such a pushover if it had that nuclear stockpile?' asks Shekhar Gupta.
'It makes sense to have gold in one's portfolio keeping the political and economic risks of 2024 in mind.'
When will Vladimir Putin end this war and its devastation?
Olympic medallist who fled Belarus forced into exile again as Ukraine attacked
Will G20 showcase an India that is inclusive, culturally rich, diverse and tolerant, asks Ramesh Menon.
Although India-US relations have strengthened significantly in recent years, partly because of the security situation in the region, the Indian policy establishment would have to be prepared to protect India's interests in a world that could get more unpredictable.
Global rating agency S&P on Tuesday said even though the US and the Euro zone are headed to recession, India is unlikely to face the impact given the "not so coupled" nature of its economy with the global economy. "Indian economy is a lot decoupled from the global economy than we normally think of, given its large domestic demand, even though you (India) are a net importer of energy. "But you have enough forex reserves on one hand and your companies have managed to maintain healthy balance sheets," Paul F Gruenwald, S&P global chief economist and managing director, told reporters in Mumbai.
'When human beings develop these dangerous toys and leave their control in the hands of aggressive megalomaniac politicians, the threat of a nuclear holocaust is always lurking on the horizon.'
India was the world's biggest importer of Russian oil in February, exceeding China by 20 million barrels.
Domestic commercial-vehicle (CV) sales volume will witness significant growth over the next few years and the overall CV volume is likely to reach close to 1-million units by FY24, a report said on Wednesday. The report by credit ratings agency Fitch Ratings also expects growing demand and the resultant rise in operating leverage to boost the profitability of the domestic CV-focused original equipment manufacturers after FY22, despite elevated production costs. A recovery in medium and heavy CVs from multi-year lows, along with sustained growth in light CV categories, will help overall CV volume to reach close to 1-million units by FY24 - the level of the last cyclical peak recorded in FY19, it said.
Out of 24,230 IIT and NIT grads, about 8,000 students didn't find any takers during campus placement drives this year.
FPIs have turned net sellers in 2022 after being net buyers in the last three years.
'With over 50 per cent of medical seats reserved for those who have the ability to pay a fee ranging from Rs 50 lakh to Rs 1.5 crore for a five-year MBBS course and quotas in accordance with affirmative policies in government colleges, the band of seats available for the not-so-rich and non-OBCs is very narrow.'
India is expected to contribute 15 per cent to the global growth in 2023, an International Monetary Fund (IMF) official said on Tuesday. "Both India and China are expected to contribute 50 per cent of the global growth in the upcoming year (2023). "However, the share of India's contribution to global growth is expected to be around 15 per cent," Krishna Srinivasan, director, Asia and Pacific Department (APD) at IMF said at a roundtable with reporters from south Asian countries.
Private equity investments into domestic companies fell sharply year-on-year by 42 per cent to $23.3 billion in 2022, which is the lowest since 2019, when it was $15.8 billion, according to an industry report. The numbers reflect the overall funding winter that the startup space in particular, and the overall foreign investments in general have been witnessing since the Ukraine war began last February. Private equity investment inflows into the country fell by a sharp 42 per cent in 2022 from last year to $23.3 billion -- the lowest annual inflows since 2019 when it was a low $15.8 billion, but still relatively elevated compared to historical levels, said Elaine Tan, a senior analyst at Refinitiv, the LSEG business arm that provides financial markets data and insights.
Equity mutual funds attracted an all-time high net inflow of Rs 28,463 crore in March, on continued interest by retail and HNI investors, who used market correction as a good buying opportunity.
The increase in India's military spending was "mainly a result of growing personnel and operations costs" which made up almost 80 percent of the total military budget in 2023, the SIPRI report claimed.
In January, Visa's chief executive officer, Al Kelly, said during an earnings call that "there's been a burst of the balloon in valuations in the fintech world". Noting that the trend of lower valuations "is a helpful characteristic of the current environment", he added: "We will look for capabilities and management teams that will bring more value to Visa than we can bring ourselves." Data from KPMG's Pulse of Fintech H2'22 shows that global fintech investment - via mergers and acquisitions (M&As), private equity (PE) and venture capital (VC) firms - at $164.1 billion in 2022, was down 31 per cent over the year before. Indian fintechs held up better during this timeframe, attracting $6 billion, or a fall of 24 per cent.
Here are some facts about Rishi Sunak and his India connections.
After declining for three consecutive quarters, the value of FPI investment in Indian equities rose 8 per cent quarter-on-quarter to $566 billion in the July-September period, according to a Morningstar report on Wednesday. A fast-changing global macroeconomic landscape, sentiments and opportunities that the Indian equity markets have to offer impacted the direction of flows by Foreign Portfolio Investors (FPIs). Through the quarter, the value of the FPI holdings in domestic equities surged by 8 per cent to $566 billion from $523 billion recorded in the previous quarter.
When Kasturi Rajamurty won a gold medal in powerlifting at the WPPL World Cup in Russia, she sure had come a long way. From a life of penury to constantly being short of funds to fuel her passion, she had finally triumphed, and how.
rediffGURU Dr Pananjay Tiwari lists the options and cost of pursuing an MBBS education outside of India.
The likelihood is that India will maintain a moderately upbeat economic tempo -- well short of tearaway growth, explains T N Ninan.
Economic growth, which we are taking for granted, slows for a completely different set of local or global factors and the Modi premium vanishes, observes Debashis Basu.
Shigeru Ishiba is expected to prioritise strengthening Japan's military capabilities and fostering deeper international partnerships, particularly with India, with whom Japan shares significant strategic interests, explains Dr Rajaram Panda.
'We suggest investors with suitable risk appetite to consider allocating 40-50 per cent in large-caps, 25-30 per cent of funds in quality mid and small-caps and the rest in debt and high yield products.'
'There are ominous portents of an isolationist administration not only building a physical wall to the south to prevent unwanted immigrants from entering the land of milk and honey, but also trade walls not just against China, but all nations,' foresees Sreekant Sambrani.
If a 5% to 10% fall in the equity market gives you sleepless nights, you are not cut out for a 75% to 80% allocation to equities and must reduce it.
'Continue with your SIPs to get the benefit of lower average prices in this challenging market environment.'
The White House said on Tuesday that there is no specific information about the role of Iran in the latest terrorist attack against Israel by Hamas, but it is complicit in a broad sense for funding the military wing of the terrorist group.
Small stocks of Dalal Street grappled with turbulent times in 2022 as high volatility and higher interest rate regime sapped investors' appetite for these scrips but the horizon ahead seems less cloudy for the New Year. While the 30-share Sensex scaled multiple record peaks with bluechips glittering, small stocks underperformed and the BSE smallcap index declined more than 3 per cent this year. In comparison, the BSE Sensex climbed 2,673.61 points or 4.58 per cent till December 27.
New Delhi has a chance to rid itself of its image as the bully in the subcontinent by helping a neighbour tackle problems that India, for once, has no role in creating. It should grab the opportunity with both hands, suggests Aditi Phadnis.
An escalation in the already simmering tensions between North and South Korea, China and Taiwan, and Russia and Ukraine could prove to be a bigger worry for the markets over the next few months rather than central bank policy action, said analysts. The markets, they said, are still not fully factoring in this possibility. "The conflict between Iran and Saudi Arabia is another geopolitical worry.
United States President Joe Biden said that he is 'outraged' by the reported death of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny.
The government has decided to postpone the release of the new Foreign Trade Policy (FTP) and extend the existing one by six months on account of global uncertainties and currency fluctuations. The government was scheduled to announce the new FTP by the end of September. The current policy was to end on September 30.
Biden said over a year later Russian President Vladimir Putin has "failed and he continues to fail".
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman has said the recent interest rate hike by the Reserve Bank was not surprising for her but the timing was, asserting that the rising cost of funds will not impact the government's planned infrastructure investments. For the first time since August 2018, RBI had on May 4 delivered a blunt 40 basis points increase in key repo rate to 4.40 per cent, and also hiked the cash reserve ratio by 50 basis points to 4.5 per cent after an unscheduled meeting of the rate setting panel, citing increased inflation pressures following the Ukraine war and the resultant spike in crude oil prices. Retail inflation printed at 6.9 per cent in March and the April reading is forecast to top 7.7 per cent.
The silver lining for India's presidency is likely to be the support by almost all G20 countries to its proposal to include the African Union as a permanent member of the bloc that has emerged as perhaps the most influential multilateral forum after the United Nations.
Watch all the action from both House of the Parliament.
Given the prevailing uncertainties, investors must maintain a 10-15 per cent allocation to gold in 2023.
