laddering

The Life Savers Called Online FDs

June 10, 2018 4 Comments

wealthymatters The one good think about fixed deposits is the absolute predictability of returns, as long as they are not closed prematurely. Add to this that unlike a lot of other fixed income instruments, fixed deposits are available for all tenures upto 10 years, and you can now use fixed deposits to design your own financial products.

The only drawback is the extremely low deposit insurance in India.The Deposit Insurance and Credit Guarantee Corporation provides insurance to each customer of a Scheduled Bank for deposits up to Rs 1 lakh in case of bank failure. This limit is applicable across all the deposits, including savings, current, fixed and recurring. This limit remains Rs 1 lakh even if the sum of all deposits (including accrued interest) exceeds the same. Worse, non-scheduled banks ,companies and other institutions offering fixed deposits don’t provide this small comfort either. Of of what use is predictability of returns if basic security and return of capital is not guaranteed ? Read more of this post

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Last Chance ELSS

January 22, 2012 Leave a comment

wealthymatters.com ELSS =Equity Linked Savings Scheme ,is a special category of mutual funds that invest predominantly in stocks. They are very comparable to diversified equity funds. The only differences between regular diversified equity funds and ELSSs are the 80C tax benefits on investments upto 1 lakh and the lock-in period of 3 years,incidentally the least among all 80C tax-saving avenues. It means that once you invest in an ELSS , you cannot withdraw your investment for a period of 3 yearsHowever,the DTC proposes to phase out the tax breaks on ELSS , so this avenue may be closed in the coming years.But, you can still invest in it this year and get tax breaks.

The best ELSSs have not done too badly during downturns and have given excellent returns in boom times.The reason has been the lock-in period. These funds have not suffered due to large scale redemptions when the market sentiments have tanked.Moreover, fund managers keep a portion of the mutual fund corpus, around 7-10%, as cash,even in good times, so that they can meet all redemption requests. This cash is invested in very short term debt investments, generating meager returns. This impacts the overall returns of the mutual.Since the fund manager of an ELSS knows that funds cannot be withdrawn for 3 years, he can invest all the funds in equities and keep less money as cash and provide good returns in the long term. Read more of this post

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Recurring Deposits

April 24, 2011 3 Comments

wealthymatters.com A Recurring Deposit(RD) is a type of term deposit account opened by a person/persons with a bank or a post office wherein the investor or investors deposit a fixed amount of money every month for a fixed tenure . This scheme is meant for investors who want to deposit a fixed amount every month, in order to get a lump sum at the end of the tenure. The interest on RDs normally offered by banks is one percent below Fixed Deposit(FD) rates compounded quarterly.Often there is nothing extra by way of interest offered for senior citizens.Otherwise the rules for operating a RD account are the same as that for a FD account.The PO offers a fixed 7.5% interest compounded quarterly for a 5 year term.

RDs are great for people to develop the savings habit.It is especially useful to teach kids to save especially the Post Office Recurring Deposit (PORD) which has a minimum deposit of 10 rupees per month.Often banks package RDs as schemes to become or to make your child a lakhpati,millionaire etc or as schemes to build the down-payment on a house or vehicle. Read more of this post

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April 10, 2011 4 Comments

Normally,for fixed income instruments , the interest rates corresponding to longer terms are higher than those for shorter terms.However,locking in money for longer periods is not always an option.One way of ensuring a greater degree of liquidity while taking advantage of the higher rates offered for the longer tenures is laddering.

If you want to create a 5 year ladder you could buy a 1year, 2year, 3year,4year and 5year instrument .Then after the first year,renew the matured 1 year instrument for a term of 5 years.Then the following year do the same with the matured 2year instrument.Continue the process.

Laddering ensures that at least some of the higher interest rates are locked in and that the average rate is higher than the rates at the lowest point in the interest rate cycle.

If you are drawing an income from your fixed income instruments say to pay or part pay you a pension,your EMIs,a tution fee or get some passive income,laddering smoothes out the variations.

Laddering is possible with bonds,NCDs,FDs,CDs etc.