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Asia
The Hindu BusinessLine

Why gold should form 10% of investment portfolio

Most investors think of portfolio in terms of equity and fixed income. Gold is an afterthought. That approach misses the point. Gold deserves a deliberate, planned allocation of about 10% of every portfolio and here is why. Long-term data shows gold behaves differently from equity and fixed income in most situations. When equity markets are under stress, gold tends to hold up or even gain. When bond yields rise sharply on inflation worries, gold does well since it is seen as a hedge against currency depreciation. This is the essence of diversification - you don’t want all assets moving in the same direction at the same time. If you run a portfolio with equity and fixed income and allocate 10 per cent to gold, the math works out in your favour as the overall portfolio volatility drops as gold price movements are not synchronised with the other two asset classes. Risk-adjusted or volatility-adjusted return improves. This is how portfolio construction works when you combine assets that do not move in lockstep. You are adding gold as it smoothens the ride. Sanctions, trade tensions and a more fragmented world order have made many central banks wary of holding all reserves in US Treasuries. Gold held within a country’s own vaults does not carry counterparty risk the way a government bond does. This shift by central banks has been one of the steadiest sources of demand for gold over the past four years. Gold has corrected meaningfully from a peak earlier this year. Prices had run up too far too quickly, and some of that froth had to come off. What matters more is if the long-term uptrend is intact. Chartists tracking gold have a technical support line and even after this correction, that line has not been broken. A correction within an intact uptrend is very different from a trend reversal. Gold price is quoted in US dollars and set daily by the London Bullion Market Association. The price in India is that global dollar price converted into rupees. Over the long run, the rupee had depreciated against the dollar and is likely to continue so. Every time the rupee weakens, it adds to rupee-denominated return from gold over and above whatever the dollar price of gold itself does. This is a tailwind that many investors overlook. Gold has an inverse relationship with the US dollar (USD). When the USD strengthens, gold in dollar terms tends to soften and vice versa. The US Federal Reserve is likely to raise interest rates which will act as a headwind for gold. However, there is a limit to how much the Fed can hike as the US is sitting on a huge pile of debt and higher rates mean higher cost of servicing it. At some point, the arithmetic of debt servicing and growth of economy forces a pause/reversal, in the rate cycle. Investors should see dollar-gold relationship as cyclical on gold’s prospects. There are several routes to gold. Sovereign Gold Bonds, offering 2.5 per cent annual interest on top of gold’s price appreciation are no longer issued afresh but existing bonds can be bought and sold in the secondary market. Gold Exchange Traded Funds are an evergreen option — you need a demat and trading account with a broker and can buy/sell units. If you do not have a demat account, Gold Funds from mutual funds (MFs) serve the same purpose and you can invest via regular MF folio, including SIP. More recently, a new avenue has opened up: Electronic Gold Receipts or EGRs. These are SEBI-regulated securities representing direct ownership of physical gold held in accredited vaults. You buy/sell EGRs on the stock exchange, just like a share and they sit in demat account. Each EGR is a receipt against a specific quantity of physical gold with the option to convert holdings into gold bars/coins via withdrawal request subject to charges/taxes. EGRs are available in small denominations making them accessible even to small investors. For those who want transparency of exchange-based pricing along with the comfort of an actual claim on physical gold, EGRs are worth considering as part of the 10 per cent allocation. Whichever route, the underlying point is: gold is not a speculative add-on, it is a structural building block of a well-constructed portfolio. Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

Why gold should form 10% of investment portfolio
North America
CNBC Finance

Where commercial real estate demand is the highest, according to new data

South Carolina ranks highest among all U.S. states in future potential demand for commercial real estate. That is the finding of a new index from the National Association of Realtors, which aims to be a crystal ball for commercial real estate investors. It uses factors in local economies to indicate future demand. The index looks at more than 300 metropolitan markets, with separate measures for the office, industrial, retail and multifamily sectors, and measures the economic conditions of each region. The Realtors use government data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Census Bureau for population and migration, which it says informs the rankings. For the office sector, specifically, the index looks at growth in professional and business services employment. For industrial, it's manufacturing, transportation and warehousing employment growth. For retail, the NAR measures growth in retail trade as well as leisure and hospitality employment. In the multifamily sector, it incorporates population growth and net migration, both domestic and international. All of that gets combined into a single index. "It doesn't say, 'OK, go there and just buy property,' but it says … where the data shows that the momentum is building, the demand is building," said Nadia Evangelou, principal economist and director of real estate research at NAR. It also compares these markets to 2022, the peak of the pandemic migration boom. Raleigh, North Carolina, is the only major U.S. market that is stronger today than it was then, according to the index. Formerly superhot markets like Austin, Texas, Miami and Naples, Florida, have all declined markedly since 2022. The strongest metropolitan market in the index is St. George, Utah, with the most significant office employment growth in the nation. CNBC's Property Play with Diana Olick covers new and evolving opportunities for the real estate investor, delivered weekly to your inbox. "It also has very strong population growth and in-migration, and its industrial demand is above average," Evangelou said. "So St. George, for example, is the No. 1, because one industry happened to have a good year, so there is a broader momentum over there." While other indexes focus on the largest metropolitan markets, Evangelou said small and midsized markets could provide some of the best opportunities for investors. She cited Fayetteville, Arkansas; Huntsville, Alabama; and Spartanburg, South Carolina. Fayetteville is seeing broad-based growth, while Huntsville has one of the strongest multifamily scores in the nation, she said. The index also breaks down where each of the four sectors is seeing the strongest demand. For example, Salem, Oregon, and Fairbanks, Alaska, are ranked highest for industrial. "When we take a look at New York, San Francisco and the big coastal markets, we see that the large markets are still generally weaker than the fast-growing Sunbelt and smaller markets in this index," said Evangelou. Get this delivered to your inbox, and more info about our products and services.

Where commercial real estate demand is the highest, according to new data
North America
CNBC Finance

How wealthy families can prepare for aging parents and avoid a succession crisis

Battles over aging parents and their fortunes are becoming increasingly common in wealthy families, with some requiring cognitive assessments for those leading family businesses. While many families focus on the tax or financial components of wealth transfers, fewer are addressing the question of when an aging parent should give up control, wealth advisors and lawyers told CNBC. Waiting until a parent's cognitive decline is apparent can leave families scrambling over who controls their fortune. "Look, most of the matriarchs and patriarchs who create family wealth are strong personalities, right?" said trust and probate attorney Scott Rahn. "They've done great things, they've created this wealth, they've created dynasties. Now you're coming face to face with the reality that despite all of their accomplishments, they're human. That can just be emotionally difficult for families." Rahn said delaying a transition process can come at a steep cost. His law firm, RMO LLP, specializes in inheritance disputes among ultrawealthy families. He said these types of conflicts have become more common as families grow richer and people live longer, which comes with higher chances of a family member developing conditions like Alzheimer's disease. Family businesses can build in legal safeguards, such as mandatory retirement ages or mental capacity evaluations, according to Rahn. But how families talk about succession can matter as much as the legal language, he said. "Whatever that mandatory retirement clause may be, it has to be part of a fulsome discussion around family wealth — what it means culturally to the family," he said. The biggest mistake that families make is waiting for a crisis like a stroke or a disagreement to discuss succession, according to Mallory Findley of Rockefeller Capital Management. By then, emotions are running high and sometimes trust is already broken, she said. "The better approach is to begin while everyone is capable of participating really thoughtfully — as we like to say — while they're happy and healthy and here," said Findley, the firm's head of family dynamics and financial education. She said meaningful life events, like selling the family business or a birth in the family, make for natural points to evaluate future plans. It's easier to have these weighty conversations if the family talks regularly, said BJ Goergen Maloney, global head of J.P. Morgan Private Advisory. "If you don't have a cadence of talking about things, even if it's a couple of times a year, it's really hard to have those conversations," she said. Families can build their muscle memory, as she puts it, with casual gatherings, Maloney added.

How wealthy families can prepare for aging parents and avoid a succession crisis
Asia
The Hindu BusinessLine

India’s first single-cask scotch curator launches amid FTA-driven tariff relief

Isthmus 44, a Gurugram-based venture, launched its debut release on 25 August 2026, positioning itself as India’s first curatorial house dedicated to sourcing and presenting single-cask Scotch whisky to Indian collectors. The company’s inaugural release, Chapter I, is a nine-year-old single malt from The GlenAllachie Distillery in Speyside, distilled in October 2016 and bottled in January 2026 at 46.2 per cent ABV. Matured in an ex-Oloroso sherry hogshead, the release comprises 343 numbered bottles priced at ₹12,000 MRP. It is presented without chill filtration or added colour. The launch coincides with a significant shift in India’s Scotch import regime. The India-UK Free Trade Agreement has halved the existing 150 per cent tariff on Scotch whisky to 75 per cent, with further reductions scheduled over coming years. The change is expected to improve market access for premium and independent Scotch producers targeting Indian buyers. Isthmus 44’s model mirrors the independent bottler tradition established in the UK, where individual casks are selected based on provenance, maturation character and sensory evaluation rather than being blended into standard commercial releases. Each cask yields a finite quantity of bottles that cannot be replicated once sold out. Founder Sachin Uppal introduced the release at Oak & Cru, The Quorum, Gurugram, before an audience of collectors, trade professionals and industry veterans. Casks sourced by the company are evaluated by an expert panel and bottled in Scotland under Scotch Whisky Association regulations before being imported to India as numbered releases. Bottle holders of Chapter I are enrolled in The Circle, a register granting early access to future release information and panel notes. The company said retail and on-trade distribution would remain selective, prioritising informed presentation over broad market penetration. Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments. We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of TheHindu Businessline and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.

India’s first single-cask scotch curator launches amid FTA-driven tariff relief
Europe
BBC Business

Struggling households need more help with bills, energy industry says

Image source, Getty ImagesByLucy Hooker Business reporterPublished23 August 2026, 00:00 BSTUpdated 1 hour agoHigher energy bills this winter mean the government should step in to provide more help for households most in need, the body representing energy firms in the UK has said. Stubbornly high prices over the last few years have left some people needing "emergency support" over and above the existing £150 Warm Home Discount, Energy UK said. A "better targeted" support scheme that takes into account someone's income, health and energy consumption was needed, it added. On Wednesday, the energy price cap for October onwards will be announced by regulator Ofgem and is expected to hit a three-year high. A government spokesperson said that in addition to the Warm Homes Discount it was cutting VAT on electricity bills and would do "everything we can" to shield consumers from global energy shocks. Energy UK chief executive Dhara Vyas said: "Suppliers continue to do all they can to help their customers but as well as persistently high bills, record levels of debt show how the current system is failing to provide the right support to those in need." A new "social discount" scheme would result in "a system that works better for everyone", she added. Energy UK says suppliers have a range of support measures for customers, external that includes debt write-off schemes and hardship funds, as well as enhanced funding to charity partners. However, Adam Scorer, chief executive at National Energy Action (NEA) said: "Heading toward winter with prices spiking again we expect suppliers to do more - listen and respond to their customer who are really struggling. "More than anything else people need a responsible and empathetic approach to debt," he added. Ofgem reported at the end of last winter that customers who had fallen behind on their energy bills owed suppliers a record £4.7bn. Since then wholesale energy prices have risen, following the start of the Iran war in February. Energy consultancy Cornwall Insight predicts Ofgem's cap on household price rises, which is set every three months, will go up by 4% when it is announced on Wednesday.

Struggling households need more help with bills, energy industry says
North America
CNBC Economy

U.S. government debt passes $40 trillion, more than doubling in a decade

Government debt has eclipsed $40 trillion, passing yet another staggering benchmark for red ink, according to the Treasury Department. The total U.S. IOU hit $40.05 trillion as of Tuesday, some four and a half years after topping $30 trillion. Years of escalating budget deficits, pushed higher by stimulus funding during the Covid pandemic, have seen the public share of the debt near 100%. In the most recent monthly accounting of U.S. finances, Treasury reported a $432.3 billion deficit in July, the highest monthly total since March 2021. The year-to-date shortfall is nearing $1.8 trillion, higher than the same period a year ago. The U.S. fiscal situation has had market ramifications, which have played out recently and likely pushed the Treasury Department into announcing Wednesday that it is upping the size of its repurchases at the long end of the yield curve. Treasury yields have surged since late June, hitting levels not seen since before the global financial crisis that ultimately saw the Federal Reserve take benchmark rates to near zero. The Fed also instituted an aggressive bond repurchasing program in late 2008 that helped suppress rates. However, concerns over the debt-and-deficit situation, along with surging corporate bond issuance associated with artificial intelligence investments, rising term premia and worries over the Fed's commitment to inflation fighting, have been a tail wind for yields. With the Fed hesitant to move on rates absent more information on inflation and the labor market, the government has seen its borrowing costs soar. Interest on the debt has totaled nearly $1.2 trillion this year and is the largest budget expenditure outside of Social Security and Medicare. Correction: The debt total passed $40 trillion on Tuesday. An earlier version misstated the day. Get this delivered to your inbox, and more info about our products and services. Data is a real-time snapshot *Data is delayed at least 15 minutes. Global Business and Financial News, Stock Quotes, and Market Data and Analysis.

U.S. government debt passes $40 trillion, more than doubling in a decade
Europe
BBC Business

'I didn't speak the Queen's English': Why people worry about their accents

Growing up in Manchester, Mia Tanswell didn't give her accent much thought - until her first week at university in Loughborough. "I knew people were going to notice that I was northern and that I didn't speak the 'Queen's English'," the 22-year-old says. "Definitely in seminars I would sometimes feel like my accent would sound a bit less intellectual than other people, especially if I was the only northern student in the classroom." She's not alone. Fresh polling seen by the BBC suggests many workers still see so-called "accent bias" as a problem. The survey found one in 10 people in Britain feel anxious or self-conscious about their accent in high stakes professional settings such as speaking up in a business meeting. The research, conducted by the organisation More in Common of more than 3,300 adults across England, Scotland and Wales, found accent-related anxiety in work settings like these was highest among Geordies - from the region around Newcastle - and those with an east London - or Cockney - accent (at 19%), followed by people with a Welsh accent (at 18%). Around 5% of respondents believed their accent had cost them a promotion, pay rise or senior role. "Brummies" - people from Birmingham - were the most likely to feel this, at 13%. Respondents with a West Country accent reported the highest rate of having their accent mocked or criticised by colleagues, at 15%, followed by 13% of those with a Geordie accent. The poll was commissioned by Common Ground, an organisation which aims to promote social cohesion. Its founder, Lara Newman, has worked in construction, property and the built environment industry for more than 30 years, and says she changed her own accent to get ahead in the workplace. "I am incredibly realistic about what would have happened had I gone to university or gone into the workplace with a strong west country accent," she says. "I felt like that was going to be an issue for me." Common Ground aims to support people from disadvantaged backgrounds into work but she says one of the layers creating a barrier to them is accent. "I think there is a problem in the sense that [an accent] implies a level of education or otherwise. It implies class," she says.

'I didn't speak the Queen's English': Why people worry about their accents
Europe
BBC Business

Why students are being paid £2,000 to play computer games

As parents across the country prepare to wave their children off to university, conversations about family finances and the cost of living are growing ever more frequent - and fervent. Yet every year, millions of pounds worth of scholarships and bursary funding goes unclaimed by students - with many unaware the extra help exists. So roll up the next generation of gamers, who this year can apply for as esports scholarship from the University of Roehampton - with more than 100 handed out so far. But can the students balance their studies and their esports? And is the scholarship set to catch on? It is different from standard video gaming as esports includes spectators, much like traditional sports. Gamers compete against one another in high-stakes tournaments for cash prizes and trophies. Roehampton is offering esports scholarships to undergraduate and postgraduate students who show that they can balance academic progress and video-gaming excellence. "This scholarship is about recognising talent in a field that has a growing popularity both around the world and among our students," University of Roehampton registrar Mark Ellul said. Scholars are expected to compete in weekly university tournaments as well as representing the university at in-person events. Roehampton requires minimum rankings in major games for the scholarship, but will consider applications from those close to the threshold who meet other criteria, such as having large followings on streaming platforms like Twitch. Former esports scholar Cameron Dray found out about Roehampton through the esports scholarship. Inspired by similar initiatives at American universities, he looked into whether anything similar was on offer in the UK. Initially, the university was offering just £1,500, but due to the team's performance and rise in popularity, the amount was raised to £2,000.

Why students are being paid £2,000 to play computer games
Asia
The Hindu BusinessLine

Billion-dollar baskets, half-capacity lives: The blind spot in Indian agricultural policies

As India aggressively structures its next-generation trade frameworks to scale global markets, the nation’s agricultural export identity is undergoing a profound transformation. The state is rapidly shifting away from a traditional reliance on raw bulk staples toward an agile, high-value basket of processed foods and fresh horticulture. Recent official data marks a historic milestone in this trajectory: India’s total agricultural trade has consolidated at $97.92 billion, with outward shipments scaling $52.26 billion. Within this expanding matrix, mass-market commodities have provided powerful volumetric momentum, with non-Basmati rice peaking at 17.79 million tonnes (mt) and buffalo meat stabilising at 4.34 mt. Yet, as the state pivots toward delicate, high-value horticultural items—such as mango pulp, table grapes, pomegranates, and processed gherkins—the overarching trade strategy faces a glaring microeconomic paradox. Current agricultural policies remain heavily focused on post-harvest cold-chain logistics, while largely ignoring the most fragile element of this changing basket: depreciating Farmers’ Health Capital (FHC). Moving up the global agricultural value chain fundamentally changes the rules of production. While raw grain staples can be managed under highly mechanised, macro-level trade frameworks, an export basket focused on premium fresh produce is intensely time-sensitive and labour-dependent. Meeting strict international sanitary and phytosanitary barriers requires precise, hyper-focused manual intervention at the field level. Cultivators must execute meticulous residue monitoring programs, harvest delicate fruits at exact maturity hours, and oversee rapid sorting to prevent rapid post-harvest deterioration. A technical audit of India’s current export competitiveness reveals a sharp divide between international price benchmarks and domestic field realities. Standard trade metrics show that key commodities maintain a Nominal Protection Coefficient (NPC) below unity, indicating that domestic farm-gate prices remain highly competitive against world reference prices. Correspondingly, metrics tracking India’s Revealed Comparative Advantage (RCA) reflect robust structural pricing power across mass commodities. Yet, this advantage fails to translate efficiently into optimal global value. International benchmarking indicates that India’s export unit value realisation remains severely bottlenecked compared to rival exporting nations; for instance, India realises an average mango unit value of just $1.44 per kg, lagging significantly behind competitors like Thailand at $1.59 and Egypt at $2.65. This pricing gap stems directly from deep productivity deficits on the ground. India’s average mango productivity languishes at 6.50 tonnes per hectare, far below the global benchmark of 15.83 tonnes. While traditional diagnostics blame this gap on a 99.6% national deficit in modern pack-houses and an 85 per cent gap in refrigerated transport, the true systemic ceiling is not physical infrastructure, but human exhaustion. A groundbreaking bioeconomic framework submitted to the Nehru Memorial Museum & Library brings this invisible structural variable to light. By evaluating physical pain scores, work-to-sleep dynamics, systemic debt anxiety, and institutional healthcare access, researchers constructed a multi-dimensional FHC Index. The diagnostic outcome introduces a sobering dimension to India’s trade ambitions: the average commercial cultivator operates at an FHC score of just 0.479 out of 1. This human capital deficit acts as a direct, hidden tax on farmer income and global market competitiveness. Chronic musculoskeletal pain from gruelling harvest labour destroys field efficiency, while systemic debt anxiety over volatile global markets degrades operational focus. When human biological capacity operates at less than half its optimal endowment, farm-level labour efficiency plummets. This productivity loss drives up marginal production costs, directly eroding the razor-thin border price advantages that Indian produce relies on to compete with rival exporting nations. Furthermore, the policy framework historically treats rural healthcare as a post-harvest afterthought. Micro-level survey data from sugarcane-cultivating households in Maharashtra reveals that a single family health crisis forces an average out-of-pocket medical expenditure of ₹23,233. This shock drains vital working capital from high-quality agronomic inputs, while creating a recurring ₹12,000 downstream crisis-management liability per household that the public treasury must cover through state subsidies. Bioeconomic simulation models demonstrate that a proactive policy shift yields superior macroeconomic returns. Allocating a targeted, preventative farm-gate wellness investment of ₹5,000 per cultivator per season—a modest 1.88% asset-maintenance allocation derived from average seasonal revenues—systematically lowers marginal costs by stabilising yield efficiency. By institutionalising healthcare as a direct agricultural production input, the state can simultaneously expand farm incomes, secure crop quality, and clear the public exchequer of emergency hospital liabilities. If India wants to scale its changing export basket toward the US$ 100 billion threshold, it must move away from a purely volumetric, production-centric model. District-level export clusters and Transport and Marketing Assistance (TMA) schemes are highly useful mechanisms, but they only preserve a product after it leaves the field. True global trade dominance cannot be built on the backs of an exhausted, unprotected labor force. Integrating proactive rural welfare and health metrics into the state’s new trade framework is no longer a social welfare option; it is a microeconomic necessity to protect farmer income and secure India’s export future. Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments. We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of TheHindu Businessline and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.

Billion-dollar baskets, half-capacity lives: The blind spot in Indian agricultural policies