India Economics Update What to look for in the upcoming budget Investors are likely to focus on plans for fiscal consolidation when the FY15/16 budget is unveiled on Saturday, but progress on economic reform also warrants close attention. The crucial things to... 25th February 2015 · 1 min read
India Economics Focus Improvement in balance of payments position here to stay Eighteen months ago the rupee plunged to a record low against the US dollar as concerns over India’s external vulnerabilities made it one of the hardest-hit economies during the “taper tantrum”. Since... 24th February 2015 · 1 min read
India Chart Pack Economy is not out of the woods yet India’s revised GDP data paint a far healthier picture of the economy over the past couple of years than had previously appeared the case. GDP growth for FY13/14 was revised up from 4.7% to 6.9%. In... 19th February 2015 · 1 min read
India Economics Update Rupee continues to outperform The rupee has been the best performing major EM currency so far this year. This is in part due to falling commodity prices which have helped to lower India’s import bill, but it is also the result of... 18th February 2015 · 1 min read
Energy Update Rally in coal prices likely to be short-lived The rally in coal prices this year is unlikely to be the start of a sustained turnaround in fortunes for the beleaguered market. Stronger demand from India may continue to support prices over the next... 17th February 2015 · 1 min read
India Data Response Wholesale Prices (Jan.) Wholesale price inflation dropped into negative territory in January to its lowest rate since June 2009. In particular, the sharp fall in core inflation adds to evidence elsewhere of increasing... 16th February 2015 · 1 min read
India Data Response Trade (Jan.) India’s trade deficit narrowed in January as the sharp fall in global oil prices continued to feed through to the import bill. The smaller deficit provides the central bank with further scope to... 13th February 2015 · 1 min read
India Data Response Consumer Prices (Jan.) & Industrial Production (Dec.) Unlike the recently revised GDP data, the rebasing of India’s consumer price data appears to have done little to alter the headline numbers. The big picture is that inflation is still comfortably... 12th February 2015 · 1 min read
India Economics Update Rebased CPI data won’t change the big picture Forthcoming consumer price inflation data for January will be the first in the rebased series but, unlike the recently revised GDP data, we doubt that this will have a spectacular impact on headline... 10th February 2015 · 1 min read
India Data Response GDP (Q4) At face value, today’s GDP data for Q4 suggest that India’s economy slowed at the end of 2014, but that it is still growing faster than China’s. However, the GDP calculations under the new methodology... 9th February 2015 · 1 min read
India Economics Update A health-check of the banking sector Recent moves from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to encourage more lending have brought the health of the domestic banking sector under scrutiny. But while the level of bad loans in the system have... 6th February 2015 · 1 min read
India Economics Update RBI’s rate pause likely to prove short-lived Governor Rajan opted not to follow up on January’s unscheduled rate cut with further loosening in today’s policy review, with the repo and the reverse repo rates kept on hold at 7.75% and 6.75%... 3rd February 2015 · 1 min read
India Economics Update Taking stock of the GDP revisions Revisions to India’s historic GDP data have been greeted with both cheers and bemusement. One of the more puzzling aspects is that nominal GDP in the last fiscal year was left all but unchanged by the... 2nd February 2015 · 1 min read
India Economics Update GDP revisions raise more questions than answers At face value, today’s revisions to India’s historic GDP data suggest that the economy has been performing far better than had previously appeared. If true, this implies there is much less room for a... 30th January 2015 · 1 min read
India Economics Update All eyes on the union budget The government’s next budget, due to beannounced on 28th February, has taken on even more importance than normal, with the ReserveBank of India (RBI) looking for fiscal consolidation and investors... 30th January 2015 · 1 min read
Asia Chart Pack Interest rate cuts to be exception rather than rule Expectations that the fall in oil prices will trigger a wave of interest rate cuts across Asia are probably wide of the mark. Admittedly, Pakistan, India and Singapore have each loosened monetary... 29th January 2015 · 1 min read
