Expense AccountPersonal FinanceNovember 19, 2013by Monika Halan0From a wannabe MF, the NPS should go back to basics
To take a great financial product and corrupt it takes a particular bent of mind. We're seeing it happen with the NPS in India.
Consumer RightsPersonal FinanceNovember 12, 2013by Monika Halan0Sebi gives RBI a chance to clean up mis-selling by banks
Regulatory turf wars hurt consumers of finance. Mis-selling mutual funds by HSBC Bank fell in the cracks between RBI and Sebi.
Consumer RightsExpense AccountPersonal FinanceOctober 29, 2013by Monika Halan0Dr Rajan, will RBI look after consumer protection finally?
RBI needs to wake up and smell the coffee. Banks need to be regulated when they sell third party financial products.
Expense Account, Mint After I finished a masters in economics from the much venerated Delhi School of Economics where we worked on complicated three-page equations that would solve the economic problems of the world, I realized I was financially illiterate. I couldn’t sign a check nor manage my bank accounts properly. It took some hefty...
Expense Account, Mint The date is 5 October, 2011. Bob Shiller arrives 15 minutes late to class. He’s teaching his signature Behavioural Economics course and it’s the Fall Semester at Yale. I’m sitting in the class as one of the several World Fellows who’ve taken the course as part of our work during the semester...
Expense AccountOctober 9, 2013by Monika Halan0Belafonte was right. The woman is smarter than you think
Expense Account, Mint Talk about money management to most women and you get the eye roll, the head shake and the disparaging half laugh that says—what, me, manage money? I get a variety of responses when I’m introduced as a personal finance writer. I get the self-deprecating confession: Oh, I know nothing about it—I simply...
Expense Account, Mint When I met the head of one of the largest private sector life insurance companies last week in Mumbai, he was clear that the 1 October 2013 deadline to re-engineer the traditional (money-back, endowment, whole life) plans in life insurance would at most be breached by two weeks to a month. (Market-linked...
Expense AccountSeptember 18, 2013by Monika Halan0Why Belgian and Dutch organ donation data are so different
Expense Account, Mint The past month has seen an escalation in insurance pitches. Personal calls, emails and SMSes have gone up as have questions received from readers and viewers and on Twitter. The pitch is simple: Life Insurance Corp. of India (LIC) will stop selling its best selling products from 1 October, so invest now,...
Expense AccountSeptember 11, 2013by Monika Halan0What slowing growth has to do with why we’re feeling so low
Expense Account, Mint Have you been feeling low lately? Generally pessimistic and grumpy? I met a colleague in the lift bay and swapped stories. A fund manager drops by to meet me and we discuss how everybody feels much older than before. That the last 10 years feel like 20. Many conversations over the past...
Expense AccountSeptember 4, 2013by Monika Halan04.5% growth can’t sustain 9% growth pegged lifestyles
Expense Account, Mint The looming clouds of disaster are now overhead as economic data quarter after quarter show how serious the downturn is and expose the government lies, doublespeak and market talk-up over the last three years. As veteran employees, we learn to decode the signals of a slowdown fairly quickly. At the beginning of...