Indian intelligence agencies, rarely the epitome of self-assured success, have rarely been caught as flat-footed as they were over the weekend when Bangladesh’s Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina hurriedly evacuated her palatial residences for a rather modest government guest house on the outskirts of Delhi. In a matter of a few hours, the former “Iron Lady” […]

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The post Lifting the hood on the car industry appeared first on Asia Times.

At the conclusion of the Indian elections in which the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) romped home with margins that proved better than market expectations had been, one takes the time to examine two major components emanating from the elections: 1)  What were the vectors that played out in the election? 2) What is the likely […]

The post Of megalomaniacs and useful idiots appeared first on Asia Times.

How do Indians and the rest of the world deal with the rejuvenated Narendra Modi? To answer that, we must first consider what we learned about the prime minister in the past five years: • He is a man of action. • He is highly sensitive to criticism. • He is highly organized and focused. […]

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The potential economic impact of India’s demonetization policy must be considered over both the short and medium terms. In the short term, it is more than likely that the economy will hit a brick wall due to the following reasons: The cancellation of notes not banked by December 30 represents lost wealth – up to US$30-50bn based on current […]

The post Medium-term, Modi’s gamble could prove to be a masterstroke appeared first on Asia Times.

It is something of an article of faith amongst investors in Emerging Markets that economic crises in those markets are at once inevitable and unpredictable: they frequently occur in places where you wouldn’t normally bother to look too closely. Imagine for a moment that you are the CEO of a company making chocolates. It’s the […]

The post India’s object lesson in how not to demonetize appeared first on Asia Times.

Surging support for UK’s Leave campaign sits in the same end of the political spectrum as support for protest movements such as the Five Star in Italy and gains for the far right in France, Germany and Austria. As against nationalism or populism, the primary economic driving force is deflation in wages and higher competition […]

The post G7’s political battle is all about deflation appeared first on Asia Times.

A month ahead of the so-called Brexit (Britain to Exit the EU) referendum, pretty much every reasonable opinion poll appears to find in favor of Remain over Leave; so much so that if this were any reasonable gambling endeavor, the results would have been called already. The risks of the Leave camp winning though may […]

The post Brexit: Why the UK could vote Leave, but shouldn’t appeared first on Asia Times.

In an interview with the Financial Times, Raghuram Rajan, governor of the Reserve Bank of India, warns governments not to rely too much on fiscal stimulus through cutting taxes or increasing public spending. Before taking such steps, they should first consider the likely returns. While any cost is acceptable to ensure potable water to people, […]

The post Rate of Return is all that matters appeared first on Asia Times.

If there is no meaningful way to boost one’s quality of life through strong investment returns through retirement, it makes more sense to reconsider the benefits of longevity in the first place “There’s no time for us, there’s no place for us …. What is this thing that builds our dreams, yet slips away from […]

The post Black Label beats retirement planning appeared first on Asia Times.

The fairytale elevation of Leicester City to championship of Premier League will hopefully ring implications far and wide; from FIFA to financial sponsors and of course people gambling on unknowable outcomes. Europe’s UEFA has long backed a system of tiers in national football (soccer) across the continent; allowing the best teams in each tier to […]

The post Leicester City in the financial world appeared first on Asia Times.

“..they’d swallow a big lie and choke on a little fib” from the Terry Pratchett novel ‘Maskerade’ *All references to “Asia” in this article pertain to the geographic mass viz. Far East Asian countries, South East Asian nations, South Asia and the Middle East A spelling mistake on the word “foundation” helped to prevent the […]

The post Bangladesh hacker heist vs. the perfect crimes of Asian central banks appeared first on Asia Times.

“If you’re not a liberal when you’re 25, you have no heart. If you’re not conservative by the time you’re 35, you have no brain” … a popular quote usually misattributed to Winston Churchill Something is breaking across Western and specifically Anglo-Saxon democracies, and it isn’t the china or the glass ceiling. Quite to the […]

The post A Millennial conundrum: Communism and youth appeared first on Asia Times.

“To prove that Wall Street is an early omen of movements still to come in GNP, commentators quote economic studies alleging that market downturns predicted four out of the last five recessions. That is an understatement. Wall Street indexes predicted nine out of the last five recessions! And its mistakes were beauties.” –Paul Samuelson It […]

The post Fear, loathing and liquidity in the financial markets: Akya appeared first on Asia Times.

“Insanity is … doing the same thing over and over again, and expecting different results” A quote usually attributed to Albert Einstein, but likely much older There comes a point when someone acts so supercilious despite being so obviously wrong that you really have to control what Last week there was a sharp and nasty […]

The post Groundhog day for Quantitative Easing appeared first on Asia Times.

Coming out of an extremely busy summer due to market volatility – more on that later – I have been generally tracking world events on these pages; with my fellow contributors and columnists doing a great job summarizing, analyzing and commenting on key events ranging from volatility in Emerging Markets, the European refugee crisis and […]

The post Shooting at falling objects — Chan Akya appeared first on Asia Times.

There is an awful irony when one evaluates the consequences of all the Keynesian[1] actions since 2001; unfortunately matters of good taste and this publication’s writing standards disallow the use of many of the more colourful phrases that are entirely more appropriate to describe them. For now, let’s just call them the illegitimate children of […]

The post Keynes’ unwanted children: Chan Akya appeared first on Asia Times.

“That’s where the light is …” The oft repeated joke about the drunkard looking for his car keys under the street light rather than in the bushes where he lost them because “this is where the light is” is useful when looking at the actions of governments and more pertinently, central banks in the face […]

The post Central bank interventions: Drunks searching by the light … appeared first on Asia Times.

Today’s 2% devaluation of the Chinese yuan is bound to cause multiple conniptions around the world, not the least across the political establishments in Europe and the US where the subject of China’s “unfair” advantages never cease to find willing commentators and gullible audiences. To recap the news, the People’s Bank of China which administers […]

The post China yuan devaluation: Let he who hasn’t sinned … appeared first on Asia Times.

“The Holy Roman Empire is neither holy nor Roman nor an empire” — Voltaire If you were a politician attempting to make sense of the following: A rise in horrific attacks on unsuspecting people around the world Significant deterioration in ground conditions across a particular region Worsening rhetoric from various talking heads in that region […]

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