India’s digital payment ecosystem has grown exponentially. Such massive scale inevitably invites fraudsters, and many gullible customers have fallen victim to their tricks. The Reserve Bank of India has earlier issued master directions specifying customer liability in the event of a digital/online fraud. The RBI has gone further and proposed amendments to the Master Directions… Continue Reading
Your employer offers you a loan at 4% per annum. The bank would charge you 12%. Sounds like a great deal. But is the entire benefit tax-free? Not necessarily. The rules around this have changed significantly with the Income Tax Act, 2025, applicable from financial year 2026-27 (April 1, 2026 onwards). In this post, let… Continue Reading
From April 1, 2026, two sets of rules have changed that will directly affect your salary slip and your tax outgo. One is about how your CTC (cost-to-company) is structured. The other is about how much HRA exemption you can claim. In this post, let us look at both. The 50% Basic Salary Rule Under… Continue Reading
What would you prefer? Paying tax on Rs 25 lacs or paying tax on Rs 21.4 lacs? Silly question, right? You would obviously prefer the lower taxable income. That’s exactly what a car lease through your employer can do for you. And no, this is not some aggressive tax avoidance trick. This is a legitimate… Continue Reading
Unfortunately, there is no magic number. As with most things with personal finance, the answer will vary across borrower families. Yes, the banks cap fixed obligations to income ratio (FOIR) at 40-50% as a safe bet and to ensure that you don’t overborrow. Fixed obligation to income ratio (FOIR) = Total EMI outgo including the… Continue Reading
RBI allows gold loans against gold jewellery, ornaments and even gold coins (up to 50 grams). However, RBI does NOT allow loans against gold ETFs, gold mutual funds, digital gold, or any other form of financial assets backed by primary gold. And this is very crisply mentioned in the RBI Master Circular on gold loans.… Continue Reading
Mis-selling by banks is a well-known problem. There are umpteen examples of customers visiting bank branches for one-time bank fixed deposits and walking out with ill-suited insurance policies. Insurance policies that many of them could hardly afford. They went to the bank to grow their wealth or save for their retirement but only ended up… Continue Reading
Have you ever bought one nice thing, and then felt like everything else you own needs an upgrade too? You bought a new phone. Suddenly your old earphones seem bad. Then you buy better ones. Then a new case. Then a smartwatch and a new laptop. One purchase turns into five. This is called the… Continue Reading
Can you borrow from banks to subscribe to an Initial Public Offering (IPOs), Follow-on public offering (FPO), and even for exercising ESOPs? Yes, you can and the regulations permit such loans. Further, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), through its two recent circulars, has provided clarity and consolidated applicable rules at one place. Master Directions… Continue Reading
The finance minister presented the Union Budget 2026 today. While this year’s budget did not tinker with the tax slabs under the old or the new tax regime, it did have a bit of good and bad news depending on your investments and expenses. Let’s look at some of the key announcements in Budget 2026.… Continue Reading