Through the Looking Glass

The evolution of India’s tax-to-GDP ratio will require significant political and social consensus—a strategic modelling and planning of tax POLICIES is required Financial Express India’s tax-to-GDP ratio at the government level has hovered around 18-19% of GDP over the last few years (between FY17 and FY20E). Coupled with disinvestments, dividends, and other receipts, the central government mops up another 5-6% of GDP, taking the total revenues of the government to about a quarter of GDP. The government is committed to spend, on account of both revenue and capital expenditure, 29-30% of the country’s GDP, leaving it with a fiscal deficit in the 4-6% range. The revenue percentages for the government have remained reasonably sticky, and the expenditure items are also committed. As India works its way towards a $5 trillion economy, or double its current size, in the next few years, it is worth considering what the fiscal landscape could look like. As Esteban Ortiz-Ospina and Max R...

Financial Express The product design strategy of a financial service firm revolves around ‘maturity transformation’, ‘liquidity transformation’ or ‘risk transformation’. There is excitement about fintech eating traditional finance. The incumbents are institutions with legacy systems and older-generation leadership while the new-age challengers are building models on open APIs and have modular, scalable platforms. In the new world, customer engagement is expected to hold the audience captive—this is expected to create a strong distribution pipeline via which products of increasing complexity can be sold. A publication by the Boston Consulting Group earlier this July, “Banks Brace for a New Wave of Digital Disruption” talks about the need for the banks “to redefine themselves and change how they operate”. However, it adds an important caveat: “given the fundamental strength of many leading multinational banks, banking’s inherently high barriers to entry, and the extent of the indu...