All of us have to deal with various types of recurring expenses – ones that knock on our doors, once a month, a quarter or a year. In this post, I would like to discuss some simple ways to handle these on auto-pilot with minimal maintenance. Perhaps this post maybe a bit too simple for experienced…
Continue reading →The NSE maintains 15 strategy indices, each of which are based on a unique quantitative method. Collectively, they are referred to as a smart beta strategies. In this post, I would like to present a short introduction to six of them which I believe could be more stringent alternative benchmarks for mutual funds. They could (and are)…
Continue reading →The Nifty Low Volatility 50 Index (NLV50) is a portfolio of 50 stocks that has the least volatility among all the stocks listed at the NSE. This is referred to as a smart beta strategy. Considering the way it is constructed, its performance (much of which is backdated) has been quite interesting and I think…
Continue reading →With the government having approved the 7th pay commission pay hike for government employees, there is a furore and anger that the hike is not large enough. As with each pay commission, non-government employees grumble about how the govt servant is overpaid and not accountable enough. Next month I complete 10 years of contiguous govt employment….
Continue reading →The 11th version of the freefincal automated stock analyzer now has an easy-to-understand graphical analysis of the factors that are used to calculate the Altman Z-score. The Z-score is a measure of financial health and in particular, how close the business is to bankruptcy. If this is your first encounter with the freefincal stock analyzer, you can…
Continue reading →Here are ten steps that could aid successful Investing. I strongly recommend going over these steps before considering any investment. “Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.” It is disputed whether Abraham Lincoln actually said those words. Nevertheless, it is a great quote. Too many investors…
Continue reading →Financial health refers to ‘where we stand today’ with respect to our finances and what we need to do in the coming years to handle future expenses and financial goals. In this post, I would like to describe a simple exercise to assess our personal financial health. This process can be automated with the integrated financial…
Continue reading →This post showcases a presentation by Aparna C K to her office colleagues. I am delighted that she kindly consented to let me share this here. Regular readers may be aware that Aparna has written two guest posts for freefincal which became instant hits: Guide to efile Income Tax Return For AY 2014-15 Guide to efile Income Tax Return:…
Continue reading →Arbitrage mutual funds suddenly came into the spotlight after the recommendations of Budget 2014, which adversely affected investors in debt mutual funds. They would now have to wait 3 years to apply indexation benefits to their capital gains from debt funds. For durations below or equal to three years, gains will be added to income…
Continue reading →The government has announced premature closure norms for PPF accounts. This includes a rather harsh retrospective penalty which is illustrated in this post. The order was passed on 18th June 2016. Thanks to Basu(nivesh.com) for pointing this out. When can a PPF account be closed prematurely? In Feb. 2016, a circular said, “Premature closure of…
Continue reading →We all understand the importance of living within our means and strive to implement it on a day-to-day basis. If the Indian government manages to do the same over a financial year, it would grab headlines! When I heard about the term fiscal deficit (expenditure > revenue) for the first time, I was shocked to…
Continue reading →Here is a guide to investing in the National Pension System (NPS) with suggestions for existing and potential individual, corporate and government subscribers. Over the past few years, the government has tried hard to make the National Pension System popular. First, it used the magic phrase tax-saving by allowing an additional 50,000 invested in Tier 1 to be discounted from…
Continue reading →The charges associated with a Unit linked Insurance Plan (ULIP) can significantly impact the returns from the policy. A two-part discussion on ULIPS: first how charges reduce returns and then a category-wise study of ULIP returns and how to compare them with mutual funds. This post is entirely due to an interesting thread started by Guru…
Continue reading →Tracking gold-price movements in terms of USD and INR is a simple, but intuitive way to understand the strength of our economy. Here are some observations from staring at the historical gold price movement in USD and INR. The domestic price of gold, that is INR is the equivalent price in USD times the exchange rate….
Continue reading →Health insurance policies offered by banks in association with health insurers are game changers in terms of cost. However, the terms and conditions of these policies could be quite different from the individual health plan, or the floater health plan available directly from the insurance at a higher cost. Before you buy a group health…
Continue reading →