Gold – Give your portfolio the golden touch!

It was refreshing to meet some old friends outside a popular sandwich joint; especially after being home confined for almost 7 months. An unsaid ritual of sorts, I was asked for a “stock tip”. This time, I shared that ‘Gold’ seems attractive for the next few years. On expected lines, one of them quickly retorted “Markets are on steroids, so many stocks are flying up 5% & 10% daily. Of all the stocks in the world, you want us to buy gold, which is already at Rs. 50,000!”. Surely, a lot...
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REITs – “Office” in your Demat account!

Exasperated of being confined to home since Covid-19 outbreak, Mr. Kapoor & family finally decided to take a break and drive down from Mumbai to Khandala, a popular weekend getaway. While driving through Mumbai, his eyes fell on the glittering office buildings, first at the Bandra Kurla Complex (BKC) and later at Airoli/Ghansoli. A simple thought crossed his mind: “This work from home (WFH) trend would have reduced the property prices here too. Once Covid is over, these offices will o...
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Fixed Deposits – Something’s Surely Not Fixed!

Fixed Deposits – Something’s Surely Not Fixed! Like many Indians, Sonali prefers to park most of her savings in bank fixed deposits (FDs). She is well aware that due to the safe nature of FDs, the returns on them are low. Yet, she was in for a surprise when she had to renew one of her maturing FD, and could hardly believe that long term FDs were just yielding ~5.0%, the lowest in her lifetime. What’s happening today has happened before! Most of us do know that post-Covid, Central Bank a...
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Memo 30 – Market View: 100 Days & Counting!

It’s been 100 days to the lockdown and Covid19 is far from over. To add to this, there are tens of things to worry about – Will our kids forget the real world? Can our domestic help come back? Will our favourite restaurants, cinemas, parks, gyms re-open? Will our vacation travel resume? Will our employers survive this phase? But clearly, we are better prepared and slightly wiser too – we know that social distancing works, recovery rates are very high, medical infrastructure is getting better,...
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Memo 29 – Market View: Once in a Lifetime! Corona!

The Corona scare has not only disrupted normal life, but has resulted in a sharp downfall in stocks across the world. Indian stock markets and other world markets too have declined upto 30% in last few weeks. This has been the sharpest fall in such a short time frame - partly because of the uncertain nature of the beast that we are dealing with (Corona) and partly because of the large algorithmic trades from the developed countries. Based on our individual personalities, some people will see th...
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Memo 28 – Market View: And we all Fall Down!

“You can either have good news or good price, but you can rarely get both” There is lot of bad news around the stock markets & the economy. However, this can itself create some good news – that you can go out and get a large discount on practically anything – stocks, bonds, homes, offices, cars, bikes, clothes, etc. Economic slowdown - Fifteen months and still counting It’s been fifteen long months since the economic slowdown started and it has only intensified across sectors – electricity, r...
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Memo 27 – Market View: Feast & Famine at the same time!

Feast and Famine at the same time The only thing that is predictable about the stock markets is its unpredictability in the short term. The stock market indices not only touched new life time highs, and they did so in the face of India’s worst bond market crisis. However, there was no celebration this time. As a matter of fact, stock & mutual fund portfolios of most investors are nowhere near all time highs. “Josh” among investors is low to say the least :) The key reason for the above ...
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ULIPs – Smarter way for Tax Planning & Investing compared to Mutual Funds

As the year comes to an end, many of you would rush to make year-end investments for tax planning, while some of you may want to plan for the coming financial year. There are some important changes that have taken place over past year which should be included in your planning. • Change 1: Mutual funds will attract 10% Long term tax & 15% Short term tax from this year. • Change 2: ULIPs continue to remain exempt from long term tax. Some of you may remember that ULIPs had become a bad w...
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Gold Bonds – An Investment Opportunity

The lure of yellow metal for Indians has stood the test of time courtesy the well-entrenched cultural psyche of gifting gold during marriage, purchasing gold during auspicious occasions, etc. GreenEdge’s View on Gold Gold has been accepted as a store of value since the last ~5,000 years in the minds of human beings. No other currency can boast of such a feat. (We all know the fate of crytos, bitcoins today after the initial hoopla surrounding it. You can read our Bitcoin article here – Memo 22...
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Memo 26 – Market View: The Litmus Test – Over for India, but Continues for You!

It would be an understatement to say that a lot has happened between the previous article dated 18th Sep, 2018 – Memo 25: Market View – Who Shall Pass the Litmus Test? and this one Memo 26. The stock market decline that started in Feb, 2018 reached its nadir in October, 2018, with the panic spreading to bond markets as well. Interest rates spiked; currency went into free fall, touching almost Rs75/$; petrol prices touched an all-time high of Rs. 90/litre. Timely government intervention & sharp d...
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