wealthymatters

The New Case For FDs

February 27, 2018 Leave a comment

wealthymatters You can’t run a shop without cash in the till. And in the same way you can’t get through life smoothly without a certain cushion of readily accessible cash that you can dip into as per your need. For quite a while now, readily accessible money meant various types of bank accounts, stocks and mutual funds that you could cash in fast whenever needed even as they continued to grow quietly in the background.

However, this year’s budget has changed the situation a bit on account of the 2 quotes below:

The return on investment in equity is already quite attractive even without tax exemption. There is therefore a strong case for bringing long term capital gains from listed equities in the tax net. However, recognising the fact that vibrant equity market is essential for economic growth, I propose only a modest change in the present regime. I propose to tax such long term capital gains exceeding Rs1 lakh at the rate of 10% without allowing the benefit of any indexation. Read more of this post

Filed under Paper Assets Tagged with Bank Fixed Deposits, FD calculators, long term capital gains tax, Mutual Funds, postaday, savings, stocks, Tax Deduction at Source, TDS

Beware ICO Scams

February 26, 2018 Leave a comment

wealthymatters Today the vast majority of people would find it hard to explain what block-chain, cryptocurrency, initial coin offers (icos) etc. really are. But all of them probably have read at least one media story of instant fortunes having something to do with such buzz words and quite a few people are eager to try their luck at making their own fortune.

Ignorance and greed is a deadly combination and a whole world of scamsters have jumped in to rip0ff people. Not only is the internet full of ads for initial coin offers but scam artists have bought their way into the pages of mainstream financial papers in India to talk about the success of their icos in other countries, including places like Panama.

Of all the ICOs world-wide last year, its believed that over 60% of the businesses have simply disappeared by early this year.

Its truly easy to run an ICO scam. All scamsters have to do is : Read more of this post

Filed under Alternative Assets Tagged with ICO, ICO scam, initial coin offer, postaday, scam alert

SmartOwner – Connecting Investors And Developers

February 13, 2018 Leave a comment

wealthymatters There is no getting around the fact that the real estate business requires cash. Though not always a whole lot of your own cash – other people’s money and borrowed money works just as well! What matters, ultimately, is the cost of capital and the terms and conditions on which the money is procured.

There is also no getting around the fact that in the last few decades real estate has made many Indians a great deal of money, often more than their lifetime savings, perhaps even lifetime earnings. This wealth building effect of real estate has really seeped into the Indian psyche, so much so that these days you find builders in the Mumbai Metropolitan Area urging people to pay a small EMI and secure the future of the next seven generations of their family! So, these days, there is a large number of people hoping to get onto the real estate ladder, and an equally large number looking to invest their surplus cash in more real estate.

The Turf War To Issue Currency

February 9, 2018 Leave a comment

To be able to issue currency or determine what passes for money and on what terms, is the ability to impose your will on others and settle deals in your favour.So small wonder that governments, bankers, billionaires and would-be-billionaires see the benefit in fighting to issue money. Go back to history and you see kings have issued currency, bankers/ moneychangers/ money movers and central bankers have issued currencies and then again desperate societies have often come up with tokens for use amongst themselves…………The same old game is playing out again.

Following speech is a sample of a banker trying to ally with state power to squish private money issuers. Read the arguments,file them away for future reference. If you hear these arguments repeated in the media, know them for the propaganda they are. Are they all rubbish arguments? NO. But neither are they the whole story. And passively swallowing them doesn’t serve your best interests. Read more of this post

Filed under Tidbits Tagged with Augustin Carstens, Bank of Amstredam, Bank of England, Bank of Hamburg, bank of international settlements, Basel, Bitcoin, Brigitte Haar, commodity money, cryptocurrency, debasement of currency, Deutsche, Deutsche Bundesbank, digital money, distributed ledger technology, forking, free banking era, gold standard, Great Financial Crisis, Kipper- und Wipperzeit, Monetary Authority of Singapore, Money, money flower, postaday, private money, regulation of cryptocurrency, Sustainable Architecture for Finance in Europe, wildcat banking

Cryptocurrency – The Whales’ Game

January 30, 2018 Leave a comment

wealthymatters

Cryptocurrencies have captured the public imagination as the price of bitcoin et al skyrocketed and made lakhiers and crorepatis of both famous and obscure people. Never mind that many lost their fortunes even before they could start celebrating ! The adrenalin rush is a siren song to certain personality types……..

And I daily get calls, messages and e-mails asking what I think of cryptocurrency investments. The querants range from Sotheby’s-Gulf to small businesspeople from Russia. So here’s my answer : Are you a whale? Do you want to be one? Can you be one ?Do you fancy your chances playing against whales ?

Think:

Bitcoin was built by a tight-knit community of technology buffs and entrepreneurs, and a relatively small number of them own an outsized share of the cryptocurrency. As few as 1,000 people may own around 40% of all existing bitcoin.

As smaller investors enter the market drawn by the price action, the question to ask is whether those “whales” are in a position to take advantage of the newcomers?

Can whales actually coordinate among themselves to move the market? Read more of this post