Numbers in Perspective - I: Capital Markets

The stock market in USA tanked a few days ago after Elon Musk finally decided to take over Twitter. 

While it is the dharma of markets to swing and sway wildly to various sentiments, one data-point stood out - the loss of market-cap suffered by seven top companies of USA was bigger than the entire capitalisation of the Indian market!

Only a few months ago the newspaper headlines had announced that India's equity market had broken into the Top Five Club in terms of capitalisation for the first time. At  $3.21 trillion, India was now UK ($3.19 trillion), Saudi Arabia ($3.18 trillion), and Canada ($3.18 trillion). 

All is is small change compared to the total market-cap of USA which is over $47 trillion...We have a long, long way to go!

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REFERENCES & LINKS

* (12 March 2022) - India breaks into world's top five club in terms of market capitalisation - https://www.business-standard.com/article/markets/india-breaks-into-world-s-top-five-club-in-terms-of-market-capitalisation-122031200004_1.html

* Visualising market capitalisation - https://howmuch.net/articles/all-stocks-capitalization-around-the-world

* Pearls of wisdom on investing in India - mostly from Mohandas Pai at a @TheRepublic event - https://youtu.be/Vtitg-o-8FI 

Dutch Doors, English Windows

Is there anything in common between Dutch doors and English windows?

One interesting thing I learnt last week was the way in which taxation has a lasting impact on the way in which societies behave and evolve. 

Apparently in the Netherlands property taxes were linked to the size of the main-doors facing the streets or or waterfronts. So, in order to minimise their tax liability, houses began to be built with narrow doors and large windows. So large pieces of furniture would either be lifted into the house through the windows, or custom-made inside the house!

If the taxman overlooked the windows in the Netherlands, the situation was quite the opposite in England where, at one time, property taxes were levied on the basis of the size and number of windows that a house had. Here too the response of the aggrieved taxpayers was rather predictable - houses began to be built with fewer, smaller windows. It seems this had an unhappy ending for the families living inside because the lack of ventilation and sunlight led to a sharp increase in the medical cases relate to smoke inhalation and deaths due to lung infections. 

It took more than 150 years (1696-1851) for the government to realise that the 'window tax' was not a very bright idea. This of course did not stop the government from trying out to squeeze revenue for the state from a wide range of other option - beards, hearths, wallpaper, or even playing cards!

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REFERENCES & LINKS

* Hirsute Pursuit - https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-35997919

* Window Tax - England, Scotland and France - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Window_tax 

* Window tax in the Hague - https://ikgidsudoordenhaag.nl/en/window-tax-the-hague/

DW News: Cynical Green

I was listening to this news-video on my way to work, and it had me laughing out loud. Here was a fine sample of the Western media being exposed for its slant, bias and bare-faced hypocrisy.

The title is, of course, misleading - "Does the World Want a Greener India? - International investors view India as both risky and vulnerable". At a time when the words 'risky' and 'vulnerable' would best describe the condition of the West which is confronting a multi-layered crisis emerging from the Ukraine-Russia conflict, Germany's official news agency, DW News, turns its focus on solar energy initiatives in India.

DW Asia Today has a byte from Kartik Sachdeva of Energific Solar,  company that is unable to keep up with the demand for rooftop solar systems in Delhi; it talks of government subsidies to get rural areas to adopt solar energy, and then, and interview with Chandra Bhushan, CEO of iForest. It is this interview that takes the cake :)

The interviewer wants to know - "Does India have the financial responsibility, the transparency and viability...to convince international investors that it is the place to invest?"

Do listen.

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LINKS & REFERENCES

* Solar Park, Gujarat - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gujarat_Solar_Park-1

* Charanka Solar Park - 700MW - https://www.dnaindia.com/ahmedabad/report-solar-power-capacity-at-charanka-solar-park-to-touch-790-mw-2607133

* Chandra Bhushan, iFOREST - https://iforest.global/people/governing-council/chandra-bhushan/