ICICI Launches an online iProtect plan – for a 35 year old, the premium is just 24,000 for a 30 year, 1 crore term insurance. This is bought entirely online (no agents). This is fairly cheap, but the only problem I have is that this is ICICI insu…

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Devangshu Datta gets it absolutely right: Ulips have been around for several years. The structures are known. Every financial newspaper and business magazine of repute has analysed Ulips and shown in detail why investors should avoid them. In th…

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I write at Yahoo – “Understanding Insurance”, an article featuring a conversation that will, hopefully, elevate understanding levels of the unnecessarily complex industry. "I need some more help," said Sharma. "I’m getting hounde…

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Suresh Sadagopan questions SEBI’s regulatory actions in his article. (HT: Srikanth Meenakshi) By focusing only on investor interests and making the business an unviable proposition for fund houses and distributors, Sebi is actually harming invest…

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So there was a lot of drama after the recent IRDA-SEBI fight, which went all the way to Finance Secretary Ashok Chawla, and the FM Pranab Mukherjee announced that “there will be status quo” until a court determines who has the right to regulate wha…

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On Friday, SEBI issued an order banning 14 companies from issuing any more ULIPs, with immediate effect. SEBI full time member Prashant Saran said in the order that ULIPs had an investment component similar to mutual funds, and therefore are securities…

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Why are annuity rates in India so crappy? (Annuity: Pay a lumpsum now and receive a fixed income for the rest of your life) This is the return for a 50-lakh rupee annuity, purchased at age 60. LIC provides an annuity that returns your entire pur…

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