carnage on halaal street today.:)

I am not a finance guy. However, I am trying to be more knowledgeable about it by listening to CNBC and trying to comprehend,recapitulate, and paraphrase(not copy and paste)the nuances. It can be full of bloopers.

It was a bad day for the market with a loss of 900 plus points. The dampeners can be prevelance of STT and higher short-term capital gains tax. Global cues remain disappointing. The banking sector took the beating as well after assurances of refund of farm loans. The recession worries are still persisting but there are speculations that the US market could rebound in Q3CY08. The post-budget wishlist is very much there and the FM is clarifying that it is not a case of 'Heads I win and tails you lose!'. Chidambaram has defended his budgetary loan waivers by citing the examples of legendary Rajaji in the late 30s and later of Janardan Pujari who fought for similar causes.
Many Maharashtrian farmers are not happy with the 5 acres ceiling and are saying that it is a case of too little too late.
On the other fronts there is news of maverick moves of maverick Branson's Virgin Atlantis and Tata group JV in telecom domain. It is now under DoT scanner. I could not comprehend the reason behind the glitch.
Vodafone too is involved in a litigation over tax related issues with the tax department. This appeared a bit nebulous too to my comprehension.
The tax holidays have not yet been extended to STPI's. This can lead to STPI's spaces being utilized by non-IT companies and will impact metros or mini-metros like NCR, Hyderabad, Pune or Bangalore.
Warren Buffet speaks on CNBC and is now candid about US recession. The motown is not happy as it finds that very little has been done to larger cars and small car segment is getting the advantage. Small wonders Maruti was the sole gainer with other auto scrips feeling the heat today.

I hope my efforts to learn a bit about finance were not a debacle!:)

A user friendly budget this time!

We used to be told in Technical Writing that writing has to be user friendly. We must take care of the fact,"What is there in it for me?" Something similar is happening in the budgets. The rail budget was hailed as the 'aam admi ka budget' with quite a few loopholes to plug in. For example as opposed to 3000 plus old coaches sops were offered for mere 200 odd new coaches. Lies, damned lies and statistics! However, the silver lining was the promise of putting an end to the serpentine queues for tickets at railway stations. E-ticketing was a nice concept and getting tickets through mobile is even better a concept in the face of the impending telecom revolution.
Mr. Chidambaram has offered a better one. Though the finance minister has budgeted for a 2.5 per cent fiscal deficit for 2008-09, many believe he'll overshoot this, given the loan waiver, impending Sixth Pay Commission awards and off-Budget liabilities.
The 60000 crore loan waiver is not being currently accounted for. The farmers can also heave a sigh of relief with 2 plus crore loan waiver on cards. This might curb the suicide rate of the farmers. Then again the Income tax cuts can ensure a 4k-5k savings of any professional. To curb inconsistencies in the secondary market tax on on short term capital gains has been increased by 15%. FM has also promised retaining of 9% growth. More impetus has been given on increase in capital for education and healthcare sectors. The lack of it happened to be India's nemesis earlier. The plan to open more IITs and IIMs will solve a bit the problem of shortage of skilled manpower in India.
A lot has been done keeping the upcoming elections in mind. UPA can go for the Indo-US nuke deal in June and all efforts have been made to lure the middle class. The timing is just right. However, FMCG has been given a shorter shrift. The bourgeoise and the proletariat is more concerned with consumable items like sugar,soyaban oil,dal,rise,wheat etc. and there is no price decrease on these. Luxury items could have been targeted for price increase thereby slightly impacting only the rich blokes. The common man in India still prays daily, "To this day Lord give us our daily bread." There is another flaw in the loan waiver of farmers. Very few farmers approach the banks for loans. They procure it from moneylenders mostly. Now it can goad them to approach banks for loans and can be trapped further. It makes them vulnerable. Besides, NREG was planned to be implemented only in 593 districts. It has not kickstarted the way it was planned by our visionaries like Rahul Gandhi.
All said and done, it is a political budget crafted dexterously by a few good men- Mr. Chidambaram, Mr. Manmohan Singh, Mr. Montek Singh Ahluwahlia just to name a few.
All said and done, it is not such a bad budget either.