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  Flipkart  announced the launch of ‘ Flipkart  Leap’: the e-commerce giant’s first startup accelerator programme to help new and upcoming firms. The Walmart-owned firm said this would, in turn, contribute to India’s growing entrepreneurial ecosystem and boosting ‘Start-Up India’. Flipkart  Leap will identify business-to-consumer and business-to-business  startups  and help them scale through an intensive 16-week virtual programme. Shortlisted firms will win an equity-free grant of $25,000. Flipkart’s leadership from business, operations, product, and technology will mentor the selected  companies.  It would share best practices, in addition to master class sessions hosted by industry experts. “With innovations and disruptions in the field of technology coming about each day, we want to be at the forefront of driving scalability and helping these  startups  bring value to the industry as well as Indian consumers,” said Kalyan Kri...

Many times the worst investment decisions you took were quick reactions to news that looked important. It is usually said that for investing in stocks one needs to be vigilant & hyper active i.e. to keep an eye on all news. But the real job is to ignore information and focus on the goal. Excessive information hides knowledge and prevents understanding. As an investor, one should focus on identifying business that are likely to post huge earnings surprises ahead instead of envisaging solutions for the political arena and world economy. Because world is way too big & complicated to figure out anyway. To Be a Great Investor You Need the Right Temperament: If you strive to achieve good investment returns, you need the right temperament. It is important that you realize temperament is different from knowledge, intelligence, wisdom, and discernment. This includes: • Patience • The ability & willingness to stick to plan while ignoring the crowd • The emotion...

Changes to portfolio holding suggest fund managers have been following bottom-up approach for stock picking amid spike volatility in May While Mutual Fund Managers pumped Rs 136 billion into stocks in May the buying wasn’t across the board. Changes to portfolio holding suggest fund managers have been following bottom-up approach for stock picking amid spike volatility in May. For instance, they were seen favouring technology, finance and pharma stocks but didn’t go all-out buying companies such as Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Kotak Mahindra Bank and Dr Lal Path Labs were among the sellers even as they bought HDFC, Infosys and State Bank of India. Among the most-sold stocks in value terms in May include Power ... Click here

Pradipta Sarkar, 37, is saving Rs 10,000 every month, one-fifth of his take-home salary, in a fixed income-linked systematic investment fund (SIP) to build his retirement corpus. But being a soccer fan, his dream is to cheer for his favourite team, Germany, from stadia in the World Cup matches some day. Would Sarkar, an information technology sector employee, set aside Rs 3,000 in high-return investment schemes, and reduce his monthly retirement savings to Rs 7,000, to materialise his soccer dream? Banks now have a powerful tool — behavioural science — to figure that out. Lenders are of the opinion that by knowing short-term private dreams of their customers and giving personalised attention to achieve them, the stickiness of customers will improve. Psychologists say there is a science behind it. “Most people tend to choose short-term goals over long-term objectives, and the propensity for immediate gratification is very powerful in human psyche,” said Dr Jawaharlal Me...

Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (Irdai) on Monday said though Aadhar is not a mandatory requirement for Know Your Customer (KYC) in the insurance sector, it is the most simple form of KYC document. "Aadhar is not mandatory for the (insurance) sector but is the most simple one. On the government level they are creating a platform for all the KYC. "We are also working with the government for very simple KYC. But what can be simpler than a Aadhar," IRDAI Chairman T S Vijayan told reporters on the sidelines of CII's 19th Insurance Summit here. Talking about Life Insurance Corporation's (LIC) shareholdings in listed companies, Vijayan said regulation for investment is 15 per cent, in exceptional circumstances sometimes exemptions are given to invest more. "All the investment should be for the benefit of policy holders and investors and the companies should not be locking the money in and they should use the funds for the polic...

E-commerce firm  Snapdeal  founders Kunal Bahl, Rohit Bansal and existing investor Nexus Venture Partners have together infused Rs 113 crore into the company ahead of its potential sale to larger rival Flipkart. Both Bansal and Bahl have invested Rs 8.45 crore each, while Nexus Venture Partners has invested Rs 96.2 crore into Snapdeal, company said in its filings with the Registrar of Companies on Monday. It isn't clear why the investment was made or what it could mean, but was approved at an Extraordinary General Meeting of the company held on March 10. The founders, along with Nexus, were offered 17,410 Series J1 preference shares for their investments, said the disclosure which comes at a time when Flipkart has begun doing due diligence to acquire the firm. Softbank, the largest investor in Snapdeal, has pushed for the company's sale to Flipkart for which the latter signed a term sheet last week. The Japanese investor had written off a $1 billion in losses from Sn...

Alibaba buys back less than 1% stake held by Reliance Cap in the e-commerce company for $41 million China’s top e-commerce player and lead investor in  Paytm , Alibaba, has bought a marginal stake held by Reliance Capital for $41 million. While the deal has meant a 27-fold return for the Anil Ambani-led firm, it has lifted the valuation of One97 Communications, the parent company of Paytm, to an estimated $5 billion at a time when the e-commerce universe is facing severe markdowns.     Reliance Capital had acquired less than one per cent stake in One97 Communications for $1.51 million in 2009.   With this, the Paytm group has risen to the second position in the e-commerce valuation pecking order, if only companies with Indian founders are counted. Flipkart, whose valuation had risen to more than $15 billion a year ago, has gone through several markdowns. The latest markdown by Morgan Stanl...