Sachidanand (Sacha) Singh's Page

Mulla Nasreddin, a 13th century legend lived somewhere between Turkey and Afghanistan (both countries included). I am sure he must have been a kid and a young man in his time but he is remembered as an old man, old and outrageously wise. One evening he was seen looking for some lost article under a street lamp. A passerby inquired what was the Mulla looking for. “My ring”, came the reply . “Now, where exactly did you lose it” the stranger persisted. “Oh, yonder on the commons while grazing my do… Continue

I am revising my lecture notes on euro as I have been assigned to take International Financial Management. I had last revised it in 2005 when euro was just six years old. It had stabilized and it also had the backing of enormous political commitment of leaders and citizens alike. I expected, as many others did, that euro would sail through any storms that may come its way. I had also, somewhat boldly, shared my view that in coming decades euro would offer stiff competition to dollar as the inter… Continue

In 2007 China recorded trade surplus at a whopping 11% of its GDP. In December 2007 People’s Bank of China (PBC) held foreign exchange reserves of 1.5 trillion USD in addition to over six hundred tonnes of gold. In December 2009 PBC held foreign exchange reserve of 2.4 trillion and about 1100 tonnes of gold. PBC had been keeping most of its foreign exchange reserves in US treasuries. Its purchases helped keep USD high and US rates low. US on the other hand have been running huge trade deficits.… Continue

Who should pay for rating – investors or issuers? In the aftermath of the GFC this has become a point of serious debate. Credit Rating Agencies (CRAs) maintain that their internal systems and procedures are adequate to take care of any conflict of interest between their marketing (get more business) and rating functions. Others are not so sure. Many seem to be thinking that an investor-pays-model will be better. CRAs are quick to point out that an investor-pays-model too will give rise to pressu… Continue

Double entry book keeping is, perhaps, our first attempt at

understanding the value of a business. A Franciscan monk Lucca Pacioli

is generally credited with inventing this system. Some maintain that

the monk merely documented the practices of Venetian merchants and that

double entry book keeping was first thought of by Fibonacci; in any

case the system was, without any doubts, invented by Italians. Pacioli

published his book containing, among other things, this fou… Continue