What to do in this painful market ?

I am writing this note amidst the turmoil in the US Market and its consequent effect on Global Markets. Amazing is the global integration which is existing in the current operation of financial market. Few of the veterans had experienced it during Asian Crisis where Long Term Capital Management got busted but the impact was seen less in the Indian Market because of the fact that India was still going through some transformational changes in terms of investment cycles.

Everything started with Sub Prime Mortgages. You would think why there are repercussions of the same in financial market. Financial instruments created in last one decade allow you to leverage a financial institution to a large extent. It’s like me lending you money backed by Assets. I, in turn, go with an instrument called mortgaged security to the market and ask for money so that I can run my business by lending more. This was leveraged to such an extend that the ripple effect of the same is found in Timbaktu too.

Where do we go from here?

Last week, there was fear that large financial institutions would be impacted to a large extent. But it was not believable. There was good analysis provided by a writer in Yahoo Finance who mentioned that the mortgage market is miniscule to impact the financial market. And I guess he was right to a large extent. There are mortgages of the nature of Jumbo, Sub Prime etc. The impact was from the Sub Prime Mortgages where housing loans were provided to a category of Ninja Borrowers. NINJA here means NO INCOME, NO JOB and NO ASSET. If you try to logical think over it, it would be really a small market out of the large pool of asset based mortgages.

Well, I would think that this should settle down soon, now that the biggest Mortgage Lender – Countrywide Financials looks as troubled and there would be someone to bail them out or it would get busted.

Where do we go from here as far as Emerging Markets, especially India, are concerned?

There would a bounce back early next week but there would be one more pain day in the market globally. The Indian Market should settle somewhere between 13500 – 14000. I am not God to accurately predict that but this is my gut feeling based on the emotional play in the market. Moreover, India is fundamentally going through an investment phase where the money has been borrowed a@ LIBOR + 1 % in case of most of the big corporate. So, there is no dearth of money for the Corporate. Fundamentally, the profit growth can be somewhere between 15 % -18 % for the next 5 years and if it holds true, it can really a good steady market growth for the next 5 years where market can go to 25000 too.

So, hold on to your investments and let this emotional play settle down and enjoy the Bull Run in the market.