Flat opinions in the round world

 No one is spared from the wrath of an emergency, they claim. You might prepare very well to buy a home, finance the education of children, etc., and you would have nailed all the right investment instruments to save for it. But if you were to face an unexpected situation such as a work loss, family death, etc., which you are not prepared to handle, all your hopes could crumble and funds could be drained. Being prepared is the only way to go about it. Without upsetting any of the long-term plans or throwing you into a debt trap, a liquid fund worth six to 12 months of your cost could save you from an emergency situation. Here are five emergencies for which you have to prepare: Health Emergency : Hospital and medical costs have been shooting up over time and all your savings could be exhausted if an emergency hits you. For that matter, a suitable health policy could financially support you during a health emergency or a chronic disease. If you already have health insurance, by p

 In Tuesday's International Monetary Fund outlook, the dissemination of COVID-19 vaccines will fuel a stronger global economic recovery in 2021. The global economy will rise 5.5 percent this year, the 190-country lending organisation projected, after slipping 3.5 percent in 2020, the worst year since World War II. The new figure for 2021 is an improvement from the IMF estimate of 5.2 percent growth in October and will mark the fastest year of global growth since the 2010 financial crisis snapback. Vaccines should contain the spread of the virus and promote lockdowns by governments around the world and enable a return to normal economic activity. But the IMF also says that economies around the world will need their governments' help to compensate for the damage caused by the pandemic and warns that coronavirus mutations could cloud global health and economic growth prospects. The IMF said in an update to its World Economic Outlook that it expects the U.S. economy, the worl

Over time, the gender gap in workplaces has narrowed. The disparity in pay has narrowed. Day-to-day duties are shared by both men and women in most urban households. Currently, in many cases, women are breadwinners. All these are welcome signs of the financial equality of women. Financial freedom, however, is not only limited to providing a stable source of income and sharing expenses with household citizens. It is also vital to safeguard one's future and develop resources to achieve aspirations. A lot of women still rely on their male counterparts to do it on their behalf when it comes to financial planning. Regardless of your marital status, whether single or married, widowed or divorced, you have to take care of your finances in any way. Let's look at a couple of main steps women need to take to improve their financial well-being. Set and save goals accordingly. You will not be able to earn an effective return in the optimal time frame if you are only hoarding money or

  Just a third in India regularly save for their retirement, although, according to a survey, a comparable 33 percent of working-age respondents worldwide set little aside for their later lives. According to HSBC's 'Future of Retirement: Bridging the Gap' study, the lack of savings is likely to be due to low awareness of how much capital is required in retirement, as well as those who prioritise their immediate financial condition over preparing for their older years. Thankfully, for us, retirement is no longer a brief time tackled at the end of our lives. It can be a lengthy and very satisfying part of the life of a human. But with that, our 65 needs can be very different from our 75 or 85 needs, with very different financial consequences," said Ramakrishnan S, head of retail banking and wealth management at HSBC India." Ipsos conducted online research for this study on behalf of HSBC among 16,000 adults in 16 markets, including Australia, Argentina, Cana

  What most of us lack as investors is the conviction, trust and expectation that our capital invested in equity will expand and deliver possibilities for wealth creation through stocks or equity mutual funds. This is a significant issue that contributes to the washing away of a great opportunity to make our hard-earned cash work for us. The only option possible to instil the conviction, trust and belief needed to invest in equity-related instruments, preferably by shared means, is to start investing in any household in the month and year in which a child is born. Will parents doubt that, over the next 25 years, their child will develop and not become a self-dependent person? Will they lack faith that in these years, their child will not become a capable person? Don't they make every effort to ensure the development and accomplishment of their child's goals and ambitions? If the response is that all of the said aspects will not be unclear, then one should certainly start inve

  A very good product for tax planning as well as retirement planning is the Public Provident Fund (PPF) account. Since this is supposed to be your savings income, before retirement, it is not recommended to be withdrawn. PPF rules, however, have certain provisions for you to use this cash before its maturity. Let us see how you can do this. Loan toward equilibrium in PPF account Only after your PPF account has completed one full financial year from the end of the year of its opening can you make use of the loan facility. Let us use an example to understand this. So you will only be able to take advantage of the loan from the financial year beginning April 1, 2018 if you have opened your PPF accounts at any time between April 1, 2016 and March 31, 2017. At the end of the financial year, the amount of loan you will take against the PPF account is limited to 25% of the accumulated balance previous to the year in which you made your loan application. So, as of March 31, 2017, you will