Financial tidbits

As the world economy continues to remain blunt, in the US the subprime mortgage lending crisis is still not over despite statements from the renowned in the field stating it to be over. From this news,

Standard & Poor’s Leveraged Commentary and Data reported this week that the default rate — the percentage of leveraged loans in default — rose to a five-year high of 3.3 percent in August. At the end of last year, the rate was a tiny 0.24 percent, or about one of 400 loans.

Back in India, this news (India’s external debt jumps 30.4% to $221 Bn in FY08), though it appears appalling prima facie, might not be that bad because the increase is on account of increased borrowings by the corporate from outside and weakening of the dollar. In fact, the government’s debt in total external debt has decreased from 28.4% to 25.6%. Increased borrowings by the corporate, also called External Commercial Borrowings (ECB) could indicate an increase in investments done by Indian corporate inside India and abroad, which is actually good for the Indian Business.

Related Articles
- US Sub-prime Crisis
- Sub-prime woes haunting the US
- Is India growing; really?