For years, Indian investors had 3 primary options: (1) the accessibility of Mutual Funds (MFs) for broad diversification, (2) the customised, high-ticket strategies of Portfolio Management Services (PMS) starting ₹50 Lacs investment, or (3) the highly-tailored set of Alternate Investment Funds (AIF) beginning ₹1 Cr of investment. But what if you seek the sophisticated strategy of a PMS/ AIF coupled with the regulated framework and structure of a mutual fund?
Enter theSpecialised Investment Fund (SIF).
Introduced by the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), SIFs are the financial market’s innovative answer to a growing demand. They are designed for investors who have outgrown conventional MFs but aren’t quite ready for the highly exclusive, high-minimum investment vehicles. SIFs are, quite simply, the future of strategy-driven investing in a robustly regulated environment.
What is a Specialised Investment Fund (SIF)?
Imagine SIFs as tailor-made suits in a world of ready-to-wear investments. They offer fund managers the flexibility to deploy advanced, cutting-edge strategies—like taking both ‘long’ and ‘short’ positions, known as Long-Short Equity—to potentially capture returns regardless of whether the market is rising, falling, or moving sideways.
This ability to be an “all-weather” investment vehicle is their most powerful differentiator.
SIFs at a Glance: Key Differentiators
The Power of Strategy: Why SIFs Are a Game-Changer
SIFs are gaining traction because they allow investors to access niche and sophisticated strategies that were previously unavailable or required a much higher capital commitment.
Here are the key strategies unlocked by SIFs:
Long-Short Strategies: This is the flagship feature. Fund managers can buy securities they expect to rise (Long) and simultaneously sell (or hedge against) securities they expect to fall (Short). This dual approach is designed to provide stable, risk-adjusted returns by minimizing the overall market volatility exposure.
Active Asset Allocation: SIFs can dynamically shift between equity, debt, commodities, and even instruments like REITs/InvITs based on proprietary market models, making them inherently adaptive to shifting economic cycles.
Special Situations Investing: Managers can focus on unique opportunities like mergers, acquisitions, buybacks, or distressed debt—areas that often require specialized research and quick execution.
📈 The Current SIF Landscape: Who’s Leading the Way?
Since the introduction of the SIF framework, India’s top fund houses have quickly launched innovative strategies. This is a dynamic space, and new schemes are frequently being approved by SEBI.
Your Next Financial Step: A Consultative Approach
The shift from traditional funds to sophisticated vehicles like SIFs is a natural progression for successful individuals whose wealth has grown. However, the complexity inherent in these specialized funds means that choosing the right SIF requires more than just looking at a fact sheet.
It requires a consultative approach to ensure the fund’s strategy (Equity Long-Short vs. Hybrid Long-Short, for instance) is perfectly aligned with your financial goals, risk tolerance, and investment horizon.
The BigRise Advantage
At BigRise Financial, we don’t just sell funds; we help successful individuals like you navigate the newest and most effective investment frameworks. As a registered advisor for SIFs (ARN-113150), we focus on:
✅ Profiling: Deeply understanding your current portfolio and wealth objectives.
✅ Analysis: Scrutinizing the complex SIF documents and strategies.
✅ Alignment: Mapping the right SIF strategy to your unique financial footprint.
If you believe your capital is ready for a more sophisticated, strategy-led investment vehicle, the first step is clarity.
We invite you to reach out for a private consultation. Let’s discuss how Specialized Investment Funds can form a resilient, high-potential pillar in your wealth creation journey.
Ready to Elevate Your Portfolio?
Connect with a BigRise Financial SIF Expert today.
(Disclaimer: Investments in securities markets are subject to market risks. Please read all scheme-related documents carefully. BigRise Financial is a registered advisor (ARN-113150).)
Know what works: 4 days before the 2022 INDIA budget! See opportunities in RED Indian Markets! “Spray & Pray” time? SIP in Mutual Funds may not work alone!
Market Update: 28-Jan-22 (10:16 Am)
First – we have to be mindful that we are sitting on 2 years of Equity gains!
1000 points correction in BSE, once a rarity, could be seen quite often now & could continue to be observed!
In stocks that you get stuck – you would be stuck for longer now!
Stay away from Penny stocks wherein the end Larger investor could end up buying the penny company in just 5% amount while the shareholders would lose 95%.
Don’t assume that all they will turn: Multi-baggers, as a bigger company is buying them hands-down! (Eg: Sintex in the news to be bought by RIL) No one makes money any further with: the “Spray and Pray” approach! Rather: Spread-well to Grow! The fiscal deficit is at about 6%.
US FEDs are pushed to the wall to do interest rate cycle changes. Interest rates would be more sharp & rapid. So, India’s equity markets would react! (accordingly to volatility). Both US and India are pegged to grow.
India is moving from growth to Value companies. Companies that are cash rich and have a value chain ahead of them to unlock. Pandemic Scare? Indian Markets are more or less out of the scare, and that we can STOP talking about “THE Pandemic” being an issue anymore for NSE & BSE!
Good eco-system in India for: Manufacturing, EV, etc. is shaping well.
What works for you? Select companies now that are good in PEG, rather than PE! Switch over to SEP Strategy (Direct equity) Select fundamentally good portfolios.
Small/ medium Investor: Up to 1 Cr Step-up SIP strategy (Mutual Funds) to: Higher-grade STP/ Boosts/ VIP, etc. to ride through high volatility that continues to stay in Indian markets!
Silver ETF would also be good to invest in, say 5% of your corpus. Also – Market Linked Debentures (MLD) could be explored to your advantage!
Larger Investors: > 1 Cr Pick up from the stable of high-grade AIFs, averse to direct market volatility. The Latest ‘Direct Indexing’ options now are available (investing in underlying stocks & not the stock/ ETF)!
Converting your loosing hand to winning (whether at Job or business) ………………. By switching up to Equity Investments, did pay in this LIVE case study of our own client, a 27-year old!
Smart Money decisions ……………. investing money at hand in Equity!
What beautiful is: “Money Maths” …………. Converting losses to gain altogether …Just needs that mental frame and decision making!
THE CASE: 2020 Covid-time Salary Cutby 12% ……….. ………… Salary last year was at just at 88% ……………..
Employer Salary-hike target for 2021 & 22 ….. slashed by 6% each year ……………….…. own expenses shot up by 7%
………………… Total earning hit was at about 25% each year, making it 25% + 25% = 50% losses in 2 years!
Then in 2020 …… a smart one, pulled down by circumstances but not broken, was guided first-time to venture into better alternative investments (away from Fixed Deposits, PPF, etc) and that too – directly into EQUITY to cover up for the lost earnings. This happened only because there was a clear desire to cover some lost ground, with which this individual came to us. ……. Invested 50% of his reduced salaries (i.e. 44% of their take-home earnings) ……………….
44% Invested amount……………….. grew by an average 77% each year, in 2 years, by this day of 2022 …….
Effectively …………. Loss of approximately 5 Lacs was converted to 12.1 Lacs of gain! Technically from a -25% setback on 2 years’ earnings to a +41% Gain at the end, today!
Overall – the situation actually mimics a salary-hike of a whopping99.26% each year on the original salary of 2020 (which was so-called pandemic affected or reduced)!
Actual Table below.
Note: Actual figures just rounded off to nearest decimals.
Whether INR or $$ ………….. careful thought and courage to solve an on-hand financial problem is all it takes to make your status better! Equities are a good option if done well with the right advisory. Never fear it!
Equities still look pretty good for the next 1-2 years in India, owing to the massive gain India sees from a variety of global factors. And taking that route – would pay you in the short or long run!
Moral of the Story: Consciously find ways to grow your earnings/ savings! Seek professional advice. Take calculated bets. Never fear Equity!
Real Case study & compilation by: Rishabh Aggarwal (Investment Expert) BigRise Financial™
Survey Results: How many of you knew about this low priced health cover top-up?
BigRise Financial™ conducted an extensive survey (courtesy: LinkedIn) between: Feb-21 & Mar-21, asking just ONE simple question to which respondents had to reply with a YES or a NO. We did this towards generating massive awareness across corporate to help families drive up their own medical coverages to be better prepared, before or after the Covid-19 vaccination.
We witnessed a huge turnout in responses with 1178 people (77% male, 23% female) in our own connected network (none of which were our existing clients) sending us their candid answer. Respondents belonged to various positions ranging from junior levels, all the way to up to C-Suites executive ranks. The lot chosen to respond to this survey was: 100% working professionals, selected randomly, belonging to established companies across India.
That ONE simple question asked, apt in the current Covid-19 scenario was: “Can your existing corporate group mediclaim or private health insurance cover be increased by 40 Lacs straight for a peanut price? Including your parents too?”
(The answer is given at the bottom of the article)
It was overwhelming to have responses from professionals belonging to eminent corporations, some of which included: Accenture, Amazon,American Express, Bank of America, Barclays, Boston Consulting Group, DHL, Dell, Deloitte, Ernst & Young, Genpact, Google, JP Morgan, KPMG, HCL, IBM, Microsoft, Moody’s, Nestle, Novartis, Oracle, PwC, Pepsico, Reliance, TCS, Unilever, United Health Group, Vedanta, Walmart, etc.
We thank all the ones who responded and their organizations to have cultivated a culture of ‘adding value’ to awareness drives in the larger interest of the ‘unaware’.
The shocking Survey Results?
Only 27 people (2%) out of 1178 knew about this mediclaim top-up or health insurance.
1151 people (98%) out of 1178 did not know they could easily enhance their health insurance at work or private capacity.
Medical emergencies take up a huge cost! For which medical top-up is a must!
Now, it’s time for the Answer to the question: YES. You could enhance any of your existing mediclaim or health insurance at just Rs 2000 per person per year additional premium only. This is all it takes to jack-up your mediclaim by a straight 40 Lacs. What better, you could enhance your coverage up to 2 Cr as well. This could include your parents as well, which in all probability carry a higher risk of hospitalizations in the near future, and hence the need of a higher medical cover at their disposal.
Note: Basis the age, the premiums would vary, but the difference is not as significant. In the Indian health industry, these added covers are referred to as ‘super top-ups’ and currently, are the least-priced across the board with the most comprehensive coverage.
Strategy: Take into consideration your existing health cover (at work or in private capacity), referred to as the ‘base cover’. Just top-it up with a comprehensive super top-up (mediclaim) cover. With this you enjoy a high coverage and at a price that is much lower than maintaining a high-base cover, year on year. A good medical coverage set for your family once could continue to run for a long time (or life time), without you having to worry to review it in case of a medical emergency.
As a matter of fact, 72%+ families in India/ abroad do not get a chance to enhance the health insurance cover of the affected member of their family – if the problem strikes, as insurers do not want to take medically ill cases! A lot of corporate employees continue to live in this myth: “I do not need any external private coverage as I’m well covered from my corporate”. This is completely a wrong thought! We advise you to build a private top-up cover to de-risk exigencies in your family related to mediclaim costs.
We offer flexibility to you to consult BigRise Financial™, a Financial Consulting organization that works in the space of: Investments, Insurances & Wealth for Indians & Indian-origin (PIO) across the world including: OCI, NRI & Expats to get them innovative insurance investment options in India. We bring world-class products and solutions from the world’s most renowned financial organizations and insurers to our clients.
Budget 2021 Highlights for Indian-origin Worldwide (Fy 21-22)
1st Feb 2021, India witnessed a roaring Budget 2021, completely in favor of the Indian-origin, amidst the near-end of the coronavirus-hit economy. The Finance Minister of India presented startling financial facts across various industries with key themes around: Banking, Infrastructure, Housing, etc. The Union Budget 2021 was presented ‘digitally’ (paperless) for the first time. The framework of the budget was clearly to give a massive ‘push’ to the Indian economy.
Below are select financial insights & strategies that we could bring forward for Indian-origin (PIO, OCI, NRI & Expats) worldwide. Whether employed internationally or in business, these recommendations would help scale your wealth up, along with the 5 Trillion-dollar India growth story. Exactly, what the budget brings to you from its top-drawer.
1. Earnings of elderly/ Senior Citizens in your family, aged 75 years or above, in pensions or interest incomes, would have limited tax-deduction at the bank only. There is no need for them to file ITR (Income Tax Returns) in India, anymore.
Strategy: Within the family, India does not attract any gift-tax on any sum of money given to a family member. So, you could gift any sums of your earnings to a senior citizen in your family (in approved relations), cross-country. The interest earnings that an elder member receives on these sums, will only be taxed at a minimal level. If they invested the amount in Fixed Deposits (FDs) or in Pensions (including Life Insurance pension products), they yet wouldn’t be paying higher tax as that of yours. Plus, there won’t be any headache of filing taxes for seniors as the bank will have to maintain all the tax deductions & report out self. For an Indian-origin (PIO, OCI. NRI & Expats) with senior family members in his/ her direct family in India, it makes sense to transfer your tax-paid monies to elders’/ parents’ bank accounts (whether even managed by you) to take advantage of growing your corpus significantly, with limited tax outgo.
2. Foreign Direct Investments (FDI) in Insurance sectors raised from 49% to 74%. This is to help an Indian-origin (salaried or business owner) have the best investments in India through the insurance savings route.
Strategy: In a bid to attract global Indian-origin outside (PIO, OCI, NRI & Expats) to invest into life insurance products, saving plans or market-linked products in India, taking benefits of higher returns from Indian-collaborated world insurers, the finance ministry drastically raised the limits of FDI in budget 2021. This opens the gates for world insurers to come into India, and we clearly see a series of high quality – Coverage Plans (like: term life covers or term plans), guaranteed return products (returning 4% to 9% fixed per year), or even the booming market products (10% & higher up) getting launched. It gives an advantage to an Indian-origin now to invest directly in India, sitting outside.
We encourage you to avail your investment options, as now you can even invest in global currencies in India (or your home country currency), in most safety-oriented products. You could pay through your local home country bank or your NRE/ NRO (Non-Resident External or Non-Resident Ordinary) bank accounts, with any bank, as well. All your maturities & redemptions come back swiftly in your NRE bank account, making it easily repatriable later to the country of your choice. Further, investing in currency would get you a currency hedge on these products as long as you keep paying, as well as, waive-off the entire Goods & Services Tax (GST), which you don’t have to pay anymore. All this put together can really work towards growing your wealth exponentially, and keeping your costs low!
Budget 2021 Update: Investment in India gets GST waived-off, plus invest in your local currency
The budget also made the ‘Income Tax Appellate’ faceless (all digital) completely for Indian-origin (PIO, OCI, NRI & Expats) to benefit from, in terms of, faster and error-free filing and resolution of tax issues, online itself. This only aims at encouraging global Indian-origin to invest online in India. Note: There are no changes to existing Indian tax slabs, since the last financial year. The time period of re-opening of tax matters by the Income Tax department in India has now been reduced from 6 years to 3 years, in normal cases. Even this points to the fact that the Indian tax system is being simplified and now favors the global Indian-origin to send back investments in India, effortlessly. Indian ministries are strategically working with UAE & Japanese governments in areas of skill development of the workforce in India, in many areas.
Indian-origin people definitely have the flexibility to consult BigRise Financial™, an Investment Consulting organization that works in the space of working with Indian-origin (PIO) across the world including: OCI, NRI & Expats to get them innovative investment options in India. They bring world-class products and solutions from the world’s most renowned financial organizations and insurers to their clients.
To get COMPLIMENTARY advice on this situation, write into: nitin@bigrisefinance.com Or Drop a WhatsApp on: +91 98182 46300
Tax Savings till 31-Mar-21 Up & Above 80C, 80-D for all Private & Govt Employees
Ever dreamed about a time in the Indian Tax system (IT) wherein you could save more tax on your earnings by investing for your own essential purchases? That too, by investing is some existing IT brackets that give you a bigger tax-break this financial year (FY 20-21), up and above the defined 80C (1.5 Lacs), 80D (25K for under 60 years of age), etc. section limits as laid out by the IT Department of India. It’s possible! It is Section-10 that now offers you a widened advantage.
Here’s your chance! Considering the pandemic hit economy & a bid to boost consumption and sentiments of the private employees (after the central government employees were given the benefit of this in Oct-20), the Finance Ministry has been able to income tax exemption benefits of Leave Travel Concession (LTC)/ Leave Travel Allowance (LTA) cash voucher scheme to all private employees in India.
What do you need to do? Get to know your total LTA allowance for the 4-year block (2018-2021) from your employer, spend in equivalent of minimum 3 times of that for insurance products (ONLY with the online purchase) and then just submit the digital copies to claim the exemption as the filing of ITR happens. Note: All purchases that have 12% or above GST (Goods & Services Tax) implied on them, qualify for the highest exemptions for all spends up till 31-Mar-2021. This means all insurance products including: Life Insurance covers, base Medical covers, Mediclaim Top-ups, Accidental Riders, Temporary Disability & Total Permanent Disability, Corona Covers, etc. for you or your family are all under this. Note: You could purchase single or multiple products as well.
Example: Generally, 40K is the LTA given to you in every 2 years which means that you have to be able to spend INR 1.2 Lacs ( (i.e. INR 40K multiplied by 3) in total to get tax exemptions under this section (inclusive of GST). Note: The upper limit for claiming tax exemptions for this year is fixed at a maximum of INR 1.08 Lacs (i.e. INR 36K upper cap of LTC/ LTA multiplied by 3 times). This includes the GST spends also. If you spend lesser than 1.08 Lacs, say INR 90K, you would then qualify for reduced tax exemptions pro-rata basis of INR 30K for this year (which is INR 90K divided by 3). This literally means that basis your tax slabs (even if you are at the least @5% or highest @30%), your tax savings could be directly between 5.5% to 9.5% – which definitely become pure savings!
Further, another important advantage is that you save your leave encashment (which otherwise you would’ve lost if you took leaves to do domestic travel with your immediate family to claim LTC/ LTA). Depending on how your employer would treat this, you could encash them also – as a bonus! And let’s not forget other sundry expenditure that would’ve happened while you would have been on travel.
More savings above 80C & 80D till 31-Mar-2021 only
Technically, you may consider these savings as a ‘direct discount’ on your purchase, a ‘vital purchase’ that may have been held up at the back of your mind till now, till when this gift from the finance ministry came in. This opportunity just serves the purpose to go for that purchase now within the next week itself!
You, however, have to be wary of the fact that any existing insurance premium payments (renewals) would NOT qualify for this exemption and continue to be tax-treated as normally in 80C & 80-D exemption of yours. Interestingly, this scheme was opened to private employees in Nov-20 only, but the employers kept it under wraps will when they got certain clarifications from the CBDT department (Central Bureau of Direct Taxation) on the LTC/ LTA cash voucher scheme, which finally, have been notified now.
If you were thinking to travel domestically and produce bills to claim exemptions internally with your employer, realistically does not seem possible in the current era of Coronavirus. Rather, you have a better alternative now to purchase the essential Life Insurance & Health Insurance (also known as ‘mediclaim’) covers and getting a much valid reason to claim exemption. You save tax of a maximum INR 36K for this year clearly!
If you wish to seek more clarity and know all the products that qualify in insurance under this tax extension scheme, please drop in a query to us at:
Remember the time of 80s or 90s staying back in your Indian city or just wherever you grew up? Purchasing things always appeared much cheaper, no matter what sources of income you or your guardians had then. Did you ever look back financially? There wasn’t any ‘real occasion’ per se wherein you would’ve felt the need to cut expenses to buy ‘a thing of choice’. Rather the easier option, back then, was to just give up the thought of buying ‘that thing’ all together & move on. Actually, the focus was always to save money, more than reducing expenses. Times were sweet and giving up a thing of choice – was still an option!
In 2020, living with the monstrous coronavirus now, it’ll be right to say that ‘expenses have gone way too expensive’. Be cautious to understand that this ‘expense track’ could devastate you in no time, especially when you know that you’re living with the monster until the end of 2021, or maybe even after that. Already, the virus must have taken a colossal blow on your existing earnings whether in: salary cuts, business earning downtimes, slashed NRE/ NRO bank interests, lost rental incomes, etc. On the top, add a plethora of expenses out of nowhere, related to: hygiene & sanitizers, lifestyle with superfoods, medicines or supplements intake, higher usage on electricity or other utility bills (while working from home), children’s online education costs, etc. – which in reality you can’t shy away from in today’s time, like how you could in yesteryears. Times are unprecedented! We need deep retrospection and quick practical actions to avoid being thrown off-balance in this problem-equation: ‘Lowered income & higher expenses’, leading to an eventual financial breakdown. Trust us, slashing expenses would be the de facto ahead for your survival, till when earnings start to increase next!
We analyzed the problem scenario in detail. We realized that besides saving money if we could help you put off some unnecessary or ‘unknown’ expenses, cycle per cycle, you would be much better off to sail through these hard times. Every penny saved would count for you in the coming 2 to 3 years. This is the kind of timeframe you need at hand to re-shape as per the economic business cycle.
Over the last 3 months, randomly talking to about 227+ ‘People’ being: Persons of Indian-origin (PIO), OCI (Overseas Citizens of India), NRI (Non-Resident Indians) & Expats, those were not our clients, we realized that for managing Insurances or Investments held in India; they were doing some common & grave mistakes, unknowingly. This was definitely resulting in their expenses being higher than what would’ve been straight savings otherwise.
2 Steps to directly cut costs on Indian Insurances & Investments
2 mistakes we could immediately note to help answer for all fellow Indian-origin living globally, are as below:
Paying of Goods & Services Tax (GST):
People are mistakenly paying a high 18% Indian taxes on existing or new premiums for their Term Plan or Term-Life cover purchased from India (online or offline). This is a significant outflow of money, going out without them realizing that they are not liable to pay for this being outside of India.
Regarding their existing life insurance backed investments in India, they’re continuing to pay premiums, including 2.25% Indian taxes, without referring to their policy document at all. This could also be waived-off. Undoubtedly, the interest or investment growth rates on Indian products are decently high compared to their home countries, but that surely does not mean that one throws away money!
This particularly seemed damaging for the new investments (like: Money backs, guaranteed investments, income solutions, etc.), wherein the Indian taxes are 4.5% at the inception. This straightaway could’ve been waived-off, less they had a capable & licensed advisory to guide them through it. NRE/ NRO Bankers, unfortunately, are not bankable for wealth advice that includes taxation. Working with a Wealth Advisory should absolutely help all along to add value in your current situation.
Paying in Indian Currency (INR):
There isn’t an iota of a doubt that global currencies like: Dollars, Pounds, Dirhams, etc. are much stronger in value as compared to Indian Rupees (INR). It’s a grim mistake for people paying for their Indian premiums in INR, even now, when they could’ve paid far lesser, paying in their local currency. Come, what may, they could have easily saved 1.75% to 4% (depending on the country they are earning in), just on the currency-conversion side. Insurers in India are globally reputed, mammoth organizations with the highest standard of money safety, and accept payments in any currency of your choice.
Now, this changes the ‘money game’ completely in one’s favor, as it directly cuts the expenses of an investor (by curbing Indian Taxes, GST) and further, gives one’s overall investment a spiraling currency-effect (as lesser absolute premium gets paid out effectively in foreign currency). One easily cuts expenses to the tune of 4% to 22% each year, without moving an inch. This also means that the investment literally gains in the same percentage proportion. Example: If a term plan, annually costs you @INR 1,00,000 plus 18% GST, making it a total of INR 1,18,000 that you were paying through your NRO account or credit card, etc., now it should cost you a modest INR 1,00,000 only (waiving-off 18% GST) and which further goes down to @INR 97K, considering that the currency conversion benefit was 3% at the time of payment. This clocks 21% of expenses controlled. Period!
Note: It’s the worst mistake of paying the Indian premiums through your international credit cards. Immediately stop it.
Note: Besides the above direct losses till when controlled, you could do a host of other strategies to improve your investments’ return. You could also pause your payment temporarily, without paying any penalties. Consult a Wealth Advisory to know all your options.
Indians and Indian-origin people have the flexibility to consult BigRise Financial ™, an Investment, Insurances & Wealth Consulting organization that works in the space of financial planning for: Indian-origin (PIO) across the world including: Indians, OCI, NRI & Expats to get them innovative financial solutions from India. They bring world-class products and solutions from the world’s most renowned financial organizations to their clients.
OCIs and NRIs should Take Guard of these Financial Matters (before relocating to India for long)
As the global lockdown is gearing up to open for the travel industry & international air spaces amidst the global havoc caused by Covid-19, there might be a teeming number of Persons of Indian-origin (PIOs), Overseas Citizens of India (OCIs), Non-Resident Indians (NRIs) and Expats staying outside India, who may be looking at this opportunity early-on to return to their homeland: India, forever. This could be on account of unfortunate events of losing their jobs, businesses, or other reasons caused since Jan ‘2020, as an after-effect or economic turmoil caused by the corona scare, worldwide.
We spoke to a few of our existing clients residing overseas who are working to move back (singly or as a family) and wanted to know all likely financial aspects to watch out for and settle. It is imperative to make their exit smooth and possibly avoid any legal disputes arising on their names when they’re gone from their current country or upon their arrival in India! With this, for the benefit of the larger Indian-origin community across the globe, we decided to write this for every affected person’s act accordingly.
Please share this with all the Indian-origin community in your circle to help them with awareness on “What all to Settle” before they left their overseas home countries. You never know if they also are sadly affected and be packing at this time to move to India, immediately as the global skies open for them to travel.
Prepare: ‘Transaction List’ (Current Country)
Breathe out and gather enough courage and patience to list out all financial matters to settle in your current country of stay (not India), besides any of your personal agendas that need to be reconciled as well. The financial transactions list may include:
Processing of all digital/ physical paperwork from your existing employer (if any) including appointment and relieving letters, salary certificates, full & final settlement notes, etc.
Closure and withdrawal of local bank accounts and withdrawal of money.
Settlement of outstanding mortgage payments on housing loans, or settling the rent or advances of your currently occupied dwelling.
Clearance of outstanding dues related to credit cards, personal or business loans, etc.
De-registering yourself from the local ‘Tax Office’ to avoid penalties and claim tax refunds (if any).
Cancellation of contracts related to Telephones/ Mobile connections, gas & electricity bills, vehicle parking dues, internet, TV & related paid subscriptions & licenses, domestic travel bills or outstanding, Fitness center subscriptions, etc.
Terminating contracts related to any other offline or online platform subscriptions including ones to transact Equity/ Stocks/ Derivatives, etc., Life, Disability & Critical Illness insurances, Health Insurances, etc.
Forfeiture, cancellation & returning of government-specific IDs and their closure as applicable to your case, not limited to: Individual IDs (like Social Security Number, etc.) Driving licenses, etc.
Processing to cash-out or transfer your pensions to India (eg: HRMS-UK pension funds could be moved to India through the process of QROPS with the help of a chosen financial advisory from India)
Disposing-off your car, other vehicles, or any of your existing belongings that need to be squared-off.
School passing/ migration certificates for your children’s admission (if any).
And most importantly, consult a trusted financial advisory in India to discuss the next steps to your financial success in India.
Words of Caution:
You cannot afford to omit listing any financial liability in this list, as not terminating or settling that may adversely trigger legal threats against you in your current country or in India as well.
If you have pets/ animals, you may look at donating them to locally available non-profit societies. If you wish to bring them to India along with, you must book order through an export agency or speak to the airline cargo to arrange for its delivery to India and pay the cost accordingly.
Move all accounts where you receive physical mail or posts, carrying your printed personal information, to the online mode. This is to discontinue physical mails and start receiving soft copies against those papers that maybe bills, promotional letters, etc. This serves the purpose of avoiding the illegal use of your credentials by anyone receiving those physical mails in your absence.
If you wish to move any of your belongings to India, you must also contact a shipping & packaging or courier/ logistics company that could help pack your stuff and eventually ship it to India. You must do your bookings ahead of time to avoid a last-minute rush. Note: Make sure you get all your cargo boxes labeled with at least 2 emergency contact numbers on them. In case they are lost in transit, they could possibly be traced and returned to you.
Lay special stress on closing your credit card outstanding as the credit card companies can charge you several thousand extras, year on year, only because of their high-interest rates. If you do not pay heed to close the credit card’s outstanding dues, even after returning to India, the respective credit card companies or banks, in an attempt to recover dues, may hunt you across the length and breadth of India (through their commissioned recovery agents) and be troublesome to your safe and pleasant stay in India. Furthermore, you may be blacklisted by the respective credit organizations/ banks and your entry to the local ports/ airports of your current home country also may be barred. All of this is generally reflected in a country’s airport immigration systems as well. So, take steps to amicably settle this financial matter, even if it is financially challenging.
In the context of your property mortgage, you can expect to negotiate with your lending bank to square off your loan, explaining your current financial condition and by negotiating with them to possibly acquire the property and pay you some amount instead (if the loan outstanding is quite high). If this case does not work, employ a professional property broking company (into sale and purchase) to sell your property on your behalf and settle the bank’s outstanding and dissipate the property matter. Make provision for the property broking company to transfer your balance amount to your NRE account.
Note: You can always add to this list as desired.
Prepare: ‘Transaction List’ (INDIA)
Take a sigh of relief as you go on to knocking-off items, one by one, on the list above. Here, it is equally important for you to prepare this transactional list to be successful in India, actually, even before you touch the Indian surface. You could start executing the first few steps sitting wherever you are currently, outside India. You are strongly advised to work with a ‘Financial Consulting’ company based out of India that works across geographies, to action this chronological list:
Updating popular Indian job sites or manpower consultants with your details and post your most recent & fitting CV/ Resume.
Booking flight tickets & travel insurance (covering corona) to India or knowing the revised procedures/ guidelines to get that done, as well as, quarantine guidelines on landing in India.
Planning your Term Life Insurances before your travel with the help of a licensed Financial Advisor from India.
Filing application for medical or Health Insurances for yourself & family (before the travel) with adequate cover through a Licensed Financial Advisor’s help in India.
Readying your rental or permanent accommodation in India. In case, you don’t have a permanent residence in India, the advice instead is to move to a pre-booked guesthouse/ hotel accommodation as you land in India and take a week or two to see, select and finalize your permanent-stay house location in India.
With children traveling along, writing to possible schools around the expected location, in the Indian city where you plan to reside and seek admission guidelines/ paperwork needed for children’s prompt admissions on landing.
Activating your NRE/ NRO bank accounts online (if non-functional) or open new ones.
Applying for a local SIM card (mobile) as soon as you land back.
Applying PAN Card (Permanent Account Number) if not already available in India and understand the new tax liabilities from your Financial Advisor.
Filing for your Indian taxes, in case you already had an Indian PAN card, for the previous financial year. Do this even if you had to file zero taxation, as this will help you secure a credit card or a quick personal loan, in case of a need or emergency.
Closing any of the active international credit cards that you have carried along from your home country to India, by paying all dues & balance.
Most importantly, when it comes to investing money, working with your Financial Advisor to create an investment pool that immediately starts income to take care of your daily needs. This could be planned with the funds that you carried back to India after the wrap-up.
Words of caution:
Keep a loaded travel kit that includes: First aids, masks/ gloves, hand sanitizers, clothes, etc.
You cannot afford to miss any paperwork back in your home country, as once in India, it would be very difficult for you to communicate long-distance with external parties.
Before flying off from your current home country, be sure to have some cash handy, along with an active credit card or more.
Banking accounts (NRE/ NRO) need to be activated and made online functional so that you are able to transact and pay money for any transaction done from your current country of stay or India.
If you have children traveling along to settle in India, engage them in getting contacts/ emails of their best buddies to stay in touch with, even if they are gone. This would help boost their spirits in India and shouldn’t make them feel suffocated with the large change.
Not closing as well as not paying dues of your international credit card may attract heavy penalties. Also, all global financial systems are nearly connected, unlike a few years ago, so escaping the liability is not an option.
You can even go on to applying for jobs directly with employers and top corporate of India, on their respective sites. Conduct a comprehensive search of best companies & employers in the city where you are landing.
Term Life Insurances would only be available to be taken from India whilst sitting in your home country, only if your country (outside India) is in the current list of approved ‘eligible’ countries, as per specific life insurers in India. This is amidst revised guidelines, currently prevalent for coronavirus conditions, which limits Indian-origin sitting in certain countries currently, to avail a life cover in India.
Your eligibility for medical or Health Insurance cover, whether to be purchased sitting in your home country or on landing back to India could be discussed with your Financial Advisor from India. With him, discuss in detail any existing medical ailments or allergies and medicines that you may be consuming currently. On touching the Indian base, you may have to follow the Indian government’s quarantine guidelines. So, ready your own supplies/ things of relevance envisaging the quarantine period.
Directly booking and paying for a finalized rental accommodation of stay in India, at a distance, is risky from the angle that you do not know whether that accommodation would fit your exact requirements or not. Hence, your money could get stuck. If you are thinking of purchasing accommodation immediately as you return, you are advised to defer your plan on it. The properties/ real estate market in India is pretty stressed right now and has skewed prices. Also, at this time it will be pertinent for you not to spend a larger sum of money from your reserves to invest in property. This could be reconsidered post you have settled comfortably, say in about 1 year.
Opening or maintaining of bank account (NRE), which is a Non-Resident External account would give you the flexibility to bring back any payout of your bank, property sale, full and final settlement amounts of your past employer, etc. to the NRE account. All interest contained in the NRE stays exempted from Income Tax and Wealth Tax, as well as, is free from any Inheritance Tax liability. To avoid Indian taxation issues, the same NRE has to be converted to a normal account within a stipulated timeframe if you are now deciding to stay in India or you get the option to change the account to a Resident Foreign Currency (RFC) account to keep receiving foreign funds. Discuss with your banker in detail on the same explaining your specific situation.
Note: You can always add to this list as desired.
The crux of the article is that you should work on populating 2 comprehensive lists of transactions, one to be made for your current home country and the second one for the India-specific transactions. You should consult a qualified Financial Advisor to discuss these matters and get a smooth execution, avoiding stress.
Indian-origin people definitely have the flexibility to consult BigRise Financial ™, an Investment & Insurance consulting organization that works in the space of working with Indian-origin across the world including: PIO, OCI, NRI & Expats to get them cutting-edge investment options in India which are into world-class financial organization products and solutions.
To get COMPLIMENTARY advice on this situation, write into: nitin@bigrisefinance.com
Or Drop a WhatsApp on: +91 98182 46300
Author: Nitin Attri BigRise Financial ™
Major Contributor: Koteeswaran Paulpandian (Engineer), UK
Come 01-Oct-2020, get ready to shell-out an estimated 10% to 25% additional premiums on all medical insurance products in India, popularly known as ‘mediclaims’.
Whether you are an Indian or an NRI (Non-Resident Indian), you pay a higher medical cover cost in lieu of a host of guidelines, now being incorporated finally by most insurers in favor of the end-consumers. These directions were given out by IRDAI (Insurance Regulatory Development Authority of India) to all Health Insurers to comply with. With the implementation of these features & changes to be mostly completed by all health insurers by 30-Sep-2020 and made available for the new users or enrollments in a ‘health plan’, this definitely is going to cost much higher. Low prices could be booked in the next 3 days only! The added premium costs are mostly on account of the inclusion of modern treatments such as: balloon sinuplasty, oral chemotherapy, robotic surgeries, etc. or simply because of the inclusion of mental or neurodegenerative disorders (listed & approved ones), in the insurance plans.
Having said the above, medical insurance pricing still remains quite competitive and cheaper in India than compared to the rest of the globe. More and more NRIs, currently, are also looking forward to getting enrolled in a comprehensive health insurance plan in India, whether for self or family, considering their eventual return and settlement in India, to be able to use it. In the light of the global pandemic, the numbers of health insurances being bought in India have gone up more than 5 folds in August-2020 itself (compared to August-2019), especially because of the fact that Indian/ International air space is set to open up, and hence people would travel to India. With the highest risks of coronavirus being caught during the travel or on entering Indian ground, people do not want to take chances and want to enroll ahead of time sitting in their home countries. Health insurers are even making coronavirus coverage ready to be availed now, in just 15 days versus 30 days waiting earlier. Secondly, for the ones who already have health coverage, this is the apt time to increase your cover by just adding a medical ‘top-up’, over the top on your existing policy, which comes at 1/6th of the price that you pay for the same ‘sum coverage’ in your current medical base policy in India. This way you get a much higher cover by keeping the pricing low!
We highly suggest NOT buying medical policies online, by yourself and rather strongly recommend buying offline through the help & guidance of a licensed advisor.
Indians and Indian-origin people have the flexibility to consult BigRise Financial ™, an Insurance & Investment Consulting organization that works in the space of financial planning of Indian-origin (PIO) across the world including: Indians, OCI, NRI & Expats to get them cutting-edge insurance and investment options in India. They bring world-class products and solutions from the world’s most renowned financial organizations and insurers to their clients.
Did you have a close look at the total losses in your equity portfolio this morning? The world’s economy has tumbled. The markets are seeing unexpected crashes to lower and lower levels in times of Covid-19. Indian-origin investors across the globe have lost a sizeable chunk of their hard-earned money staying invested in riskier bonds & stocks of all varieties. The market-linked products have eroded their wealth even before they could react to taking decisions themselves or, in turn, their hired & heftily paid wealth advisory doing the same for them. On a war footing, it becomes pertinent for this jolted investor to take ground defying financial steps and draw out a clear path on where to invest next. YES, ‘invest’ even in this bad time.
BigRise Financial™ thoughtfully suggests that you immediately recreate an apt ‘purpose’ with your new array of investments in debt. It appears obvious that your investment sentiments have been hard hit, but honestly, if you do not rake up enough courage to invest all the more now in high performing debt investments, that too overseas, you may not stand a chance to recover your losses even in a decade – forget the gains and high returns. The early set of Indian-origin investors till now including OCI, NRI and Expats who have thoroughly considered these strategic financial planning directions and acted fast enough to execute prompt advice, let’s say in India and have created a big cushion for themselves already against the future market falls, averaged their investment purchase costs, assured decent yield & returns, created a decade long flow of steady incomes and most importantly, bailed out of a loss-making investment portfolio to a quick-start profitable one.
Without an iota of a doubt, you instantly need execution on the 3 steps below that reengineers your existing financial portfolio and sets you up for a winning run, again. Read on:
The First Step: Strategize to cut your equity or market-linked exposure
Over the last 5-6 years, if all you’ve been doing is chasing returns, guess what, you’ve lost them all in less than 5-6 months! Equities, stocks, mutual funds, linked products, etc. have been severed on the streets considering their high-risk proposition. All the sadder if you’ve been locally investing (or rather betting) in equity markets of developed geographies including: US & Canada, UK, UAE, Australia, New Zealand, etc. The reality? Growth does not lie in any of these over-developed countries. You have to be able to ‘think global’ and explore high potential markets (like India) that will help you get past this financial mess happening across the globe, on a strategic front.
Indian-origin by design, across governments, have provision to consult Financial Advisors qualifying in ‘Debt’, cross-country, and get a 2nd opinion on equity assets held in their portfolio versus their square-off against debt. Even if you have to book losses at the cost of bringing down your overall equity portfolio, it is worth a decision. Equities and market-linked products aren’t going up on the growth ladder at all for several years ahead and you should knowingly restrict your exposure to them at max. 25%. The money scenarios in the world on linked products are over! Let us take you through a ‘mind and fact’ exercise which will help you get directions to bail out of this gloomy situation of having a large equity portfolio.
Categorize all your equity & market-linked products on our proprietary 4-point, ‘2-year Equity Non-Performance Scale‘ as per each under-mentioned ‘Equity non-performance category’:
Not-so Promising: Returns between: +3% to -1%
Poor: Returns between: -1.1% to 10%
Extremely Poor: Returns between -10.1% to -18%
Devastating: Returns between -18.1% & higher
Clearly Tabulate:
Equity Name (equity or market-linked products)
TotalInvestedCapital (net invested in each product over time)
NetCurrent Final Value (today, against each product)
Net Loss (which is the difference between the ‘Net Current Final Value’ minus ‘Total Invested’)
Net Loss Percentage (which is ‘Net Loss’ divided by ‘Total Invested’ multiplied by 100)
Equity Non-performance Category (finally define a category seeing ‘Net Loss Percentage’, out of 4 types above)
You can derive the Grand Total Loss of your portfolio by summing up all the categories. At this point, you can take a conscious call to still retain the ‘Not-so Promising’ equity assets, hold and watch them for a while (say the next 2 years) but it is a piece of strong advice to sell or square-off the ‘Poor’, ‘Extremely Poor’ and the ‘Devastating’ ones. In any case, it is advised that you do not keep more than 25% of your money invested in equity & equity-linked investments at this crisis time. By now you have a clear idea of what your product and overall equity portfolio loss is.
Calculating at certain points in time – matters!
The Second Step: Knock-off your equity management liabilities
Investors have realized clearly that investing by oneself, without a deep knowledge of ‘finance’ as a subject would cause them more harm than good. It is a debacle to be investing money randomly, forgetting about it, or not finding enough time to monitor its growth and then finally waking up to a financial nightmare one fine day losing most of your invested capital. Your ‘self’ equity management indeed has taken a big hit on your investment portfolio. Then there is the other section of investors who have hired fee-based wealth advisories who haven’t been better-off either. The advisories have extracted hefty fees out of an investor’s hard-earned money and gained commissions on the top only to be turning the corpus negative in all these years. It is not sustainable for an investor to manage investments himself as it faces the risk of loss by doing things incorrectly. At the same time, since global equity markets are going to be affected for a long time from here, it does not make viable for you to slip money out of your pocket-hole and pay chunks of fee each month or quarter, etc. to these wealth advisories. In reality, you may never be able to recover your ‘Total Invested Capital’.
It makes sense that you take the utmost cognizance of the total money that you’ve lost towards a wealth advisory’s fee/ management and switch to debt-based advisories that do not charge you a single penny. Further, a robust financial advisory specializing in growth or guaranteed debt advising ends up surpassing several benefits and saving you: taxation, currency conversions, insurance cover costs, etc.
Ok, let’s do this. Obtain the total fee statement paid to your hired wealth advisory (as ‘Total Advisory Fee’) over the past 2 years and perform as under:
Add Grand Total Loss amount (from Step -1) and Total Advisory Fee to get the ‘Overall Loss’ on your equity portfolio.
Arrive at an ‘Overall Loss Percentage’ (by dividing ‘Overall Loss’ upon ‘Total Invested Capital’ multiplied by 100).
This now shows your final losses (‘Overall Loss;) including the advisory fee paid all along. Indian-origin investors doing management of their equity portfolio all by themselves were still better off (in losses) as they did not pay any wealth advisory management fee on the top to add to their woes. With the final figures in hand, in the next step, you would have to work with a Financial Advisor from India on guaranteed return debt strategies. Look for a non-fee based wealth advisory only which has a solid track-record on debt advising for Indian-origin overseas.
Indian-origin sets up to sail through this tough time
The Third Step: “Purchase debt overseas to add steady returns”
Debt is going a long way in high performance in this time of coronavirus and beyond. Sooner than you could think, it would be able to build a steady corpus, lump-sum, incomes, or simple flow of monthly or yearly returns for you and your family. As an Indian-origin investor, anywhere in the world, you should take fast steps to explore: Paper-Guaranteed Return debt instruments available for you to invest in India through your Global or Local/ NRE/ NRO bank accounts, sitting comfortably on your laptop in a video session with a licensed advisor from India. The governments and regulators give you the flexibility to exercise your OCI/ NRI rights, technically and financially, only if you knew the power of it. Your Indian-origin status is your financial passport to a wealthier tomorrow.
As you get in touch with a financial advisor in India, you could discuss in detail the equity non-performance list that you prepared from ‘The First Step’ and the ‘Overall Loss Percentage’ that you calculated at the end of ‘The Second Step’. Explore advice around your new investments (against new goals) or ‘guaranteed equity replacements’ (mapping older goals against your existing equity sells or squaring-off). In confidence, get your life goals mapped with tenure, obtain strategic directions in ‘payment spreads’, etc. – all of that as complimentary. The India-based guaranteed return papers mostly invest in government securities and bonds of the highest credit ratings, like: AAA, AA+ which currently are premier global standards in the ‘safety & security’ of investment papers. Further, these papers are backed by the world’s best and most credible life insurance companies making them very popular and highly chosen since last year when the market investments began to sink.
Basis the tenure that you wish to be invested for on these papers, you get a guaranteed return percentage & guaranteed IRR, completely non-linked to any factors of the market conditions, company performances, fund managers, or your hired wealth advisory’s performances. Returns on these papers are completely unaffected from global crises or pandemics, etc. You will be startled to know that several hundreds of Indian-origin staying outside India, invest in these world-class papers each month to get a range starting minimum 4.5% up to as high as 9.5% returns per annum, fixed income, guaranteed. Any day, an IRR of a minimum 4 is easily achievable and guaranteed at the sign up itself by the issuing life insurer. Other high-quality investments guaranteeing greater IRR are also available and only depend on the time you wish to stay invested for (ideally mapped to your life goal).
Indian-origin investors are Ready to Go!
These papers additionally come along with decently high life insurance coverage, say 100K versus the first 10K paid, at a ZERO or adjusted cost. This attracts PIO (Persons of Indian origin) to purchase them especially understanding their home countries have a significantly high cost for life covers. Global large-sized insurers allow the purchase of these premium investments by Indian-origin investors, currently based anywhere, even if they were born in their home countries and not India. These investments can be done online through any bank and are strongly guarded by the regulatory bodies in India. It becomes imperative that you carefully rework your financial goals and take advantage of adding these investments online to your financial kitty.
Ok, let’s do this. Draw a financial charter for yourself using our proprietary ‘Goal Planner with Guarantees’, choosing a ‘Goal Category’ as below:
Short-Term Goal (including: Steady income flows, substantiating for a job or business income loss, lump-sum money needs, etc.)
Mid-Term Goal (including: Home mortgage pay-off, buying a property or car, planning a business investment or expansion, etc.)
Long-Term Goal (including: Children education funds, buying larger house cash down, investing in a business, retirement planning, legacy creation for family, etc.)
Clearly Tabulate:
Goal Category (being short, mid or long)
Goal Description (like: Building post-graduation funds for a 4-year old, start parallel passive incomes, etc.)
Lump-sum Input (to invest at the investment inception)
Yearly Investment Contribution (to add to this goal)
Total tenure (to stay invested or when the final money output has to come)
Total Output (desired corpus, whether in lump-sum or income format at the end).
Basis all discussions and hard facts, the magic advising is done by the expert on debt who should take into consideration your investment and sync along with your past losses. Note: The more structured your goals are; the better your eventual debt portfolio would be. Whether it comes to recovering losses fast or connecting on time with your defined goals with guaranteed gains, both could be easily planned. An example of a structured goal is: Post-graduation education funds of USD 2 Million for a 2-year old child who would need total lump-sum corpus when he turns 21. If you have such simple clarity on your financial goals, along with the frequencies on which you could invest, you are bound to win in a landscape called ‘India’!
The crux of the article is that as an Indian-origin you should work on populating and arriving at your total net loss on your equity or a market-linked portfolio, factoring direct losses, as well as, your wealth advisory fee. In these testing coronavirus times, look forward to cutting your collective equity losses fast by investing in India-based debt (classified under the world’s top life insurers) through a Financial Advisor in India. Stop paying heavy fees to wealth advisory as you would not be able to break even your losses. Put together, you would be able to recover your losses fast enough by buying new debt investments, saving on wealth advisory fees, and gaining high returns from debt. Compared to developed countries, India is much aggressive in debt investment returns and Indian-origin placed globally could invest with ease, sitting wherever they are.
Indian-origin investors have the flexibility to consult BigRise Financial ™, an Investment Consulting organization that works in the space of working with Indian-origin across the world including: PIO, OCI, NRI & Expats to get them cutting-edge investment options in India. They bring world-class products and solutions from the world’s most renowned financial organizations and insurers.
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