Smart Investing..

I t might seem ridiculous to talk about safe investments and sound returns at a time when the equity markets are down 34 per cent + since last year and a tumbling real estate market is giving most of us sleepless nights. One thing that the glum developments of the last 18 months have taught us is that when things go wrong, it's time to go back to the basics. When everything around us is crashing, the only comfort is in the simple and staid; like listening to an old song, or eating your mother's cooking. For our money lives, this new reality of volatile markets indicates the need to go back to old options and invest in products that our parents relied on, the ones we turned our noses up at as too cumbersome, or even too boring. These options, debt products with fixed returns mostly sold through post offices, are the safest possible as the government guarantees them. Read More here Source www.business.rediff.com 

Indian stocks may extend their “impressive run,” helping the Bombay Stock Exchange Sensitive Index climb to 15,000 by June 2010, Macquarie Group Ltd. said. The economy may “bottom out” in the second half of 2009, aided by the government’s fiscal and monetary policies, Macquarie analysts led by Seshadri Sen wrote in a report today. Read more of the articles here: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601091&sid=ahsyvlFT6ifA&refer=india Source: Bloomberg.com

In continuation to my post   Real Estate Prices in India face slowdown   I happened to read the below public notice in todays (May 07, 2009) Times of India Bangalore Edition, page 20.  This is also available in their online newspaper edition called e paper( I am not able to put the link here) but go to  http://epaper.timesofindia.com/Default/Client.asp?Daily=TOIBG&showST=true&login=default&Enter=true&Skin=TOINEW&GZ=T  and check out for page 20.  I dont know how true  it is that DLF tried selling the residential property in bangalore without approval as claimed in the notice, but one thing is for sure if it is right then its one of the worst things to happen to DLF and to the real estate markets.  Real Estate Trends 2009: Pretty sad to see the state of affairs in Real Estate companies. In fact if you read my earlier post on real estate you will find that the actual correction should have been close to 30% in various markets. I still feel there is lot of room for real

T he New Pension Scheme (NPS) has been launched on ‘Labour Day’ on Friday for all the citizens. This followed the confirmation by the National Interim Pension R egulator of the scheduled launch of the Mega Pension Plan from Friday. This scheme will be for for employees of private sector, self employed and extended it to everyone in the country. The Pension Fund Regulatory Development Authority ( PFRDA ) has decided to bring in some changes in the new pension scheme with effect from May 1, 2009.   The   new pension scheme(NPS)   will allow the fund investment of nearly 50% in the high risk stock markets. Six major fund managers were shortlisted for the   new pension scheme   in the month of February. They include Reliance Capital,ICICI Prudential Life Insurance,State Bank of India,Kotak Mahindra Bank,UTI,IDFC. An expert panel was formed under the guidance of HDFC chairman Deepak Parekh to look into the matters of   new pension scheme . The   PFRDA   has made a strict limit of inve