Indian Economy

[Whensthepaintdry?]

Has anyone ever looked into Genpact or WNS holdings? Both have a decent amount of revenue coming from India. I have barely scratched the surface on these companies, but was wondering if anyone thought these could be good holdings to try and capitalize on the growth of the Indian economy. 

[Haryana]

https://www.gemconsortium.org/reports/latest-global-report  (pages 84-86)

GEM introduced the National Entrepreneurial Context Index (NECI) in 2018, providing a single figure that summarises the overall state of a country’s entrepreneurial environment.

 

India has the best entrepreneurial environment among all Group C (low income) countries.

[Kupotea]

I’ve read that roughly 10% of India’s GDP is outsourced knowledge work/customer support. Anyone else think the rise in LLM capabilities are the kiss of death for outsourced IT labour? It seems like LLMs are custom built to replace the boiler plate code that most of these shops are specialized in providing to western firms.

[gfp]

I didn't watch that whole video but I always get a kick out of a huge dollar shortage in Asia being reported by the press as some kind of voluntary move by governments to "ditch the dollar."

 

Does this chart make you think India is making a decision to ditch the USD?  Or that there is a massive squeeze in dollar liquidity across Asia?

 

 

And lets throw in some other free floating Asian currencies 

[gfp]

8 hours ago, Haryana said:

 

watch that whole video

 

 

I watched it.  A waste of time as I expected initially by the intro.  These videos are all the same.  A country is forced to sell treasury securities because their country is short of dollars locally (and since we are talking about $50 billion over an entire year it will also include periods where RBI tried several times to intervene in the currency market by selling dollars to unsuccessfully pause a decline in INR-USD).  When a central bank intervenes in the open market to try to defend a level on their currency where do you think the dollars they are "selling" are coming from?

 

The main point that actually sticks is that weaponizing SWIFT / USD networks against Russia highlighted a key risk for central banks.  This was a blow to the USD's standing as a global standard.  But the USD is still on one side of essentially every currency transformation and deeply ingrained in overseas funding markets.  If I want to trade between JPY and INR the reality is that the JPY becomes USD and then the USD becomes INR.  Because it is far cheaper with deeper liquidity to transform the asset that way.

 

The value of a US dollar locally in India, or really anywhere in Asia, despite booming several economies, has gone straight up.  Of course they would love to settle international trade with BRICS outside of the dollar.  Their structural dollar short is killing them currently.  But what they want is for trade partners to accept INR and that isn't going to happen any time soon.  Because INR is not useful or demanded outside of India.  Some day India will have sufficient exports that trading partners will be willing to accept INR to re-spend on Indian manufactured goods.  But knock off generic drugs and basmati rice aren't yet a big enough factor.

 

If you take just the RBI's currency holdings - what other options do they even have if they wanted to make a conscious decision to "diversify away from the USD" ?  A German government bond?  A French one?  There aren't very many actual practical options.

 

If anything, if I'm at the RBI, I am extremely concerned that my central bank only holds $325 Billion of USD.  As we saw in the video - that can deplete awfully quickly when the country needs dollars.

 

[Haryana]

Another random video for fun. 

Feel free to get lost in your own strong bias and waste time putting your words in the mouth of this video as well. 

 

[gfp]

“My own strong bias”. LOL…. 
 

good luck fella!

[Txvestor]

16 hours ago, gfp said:

 

I watched it.  A waste of time as I expected initially by the intro.  These videos are all the same.  A country is forced to sell treasury securities because their country is short of dollars locally (and since we are talking about $50 billion over an entire year it will also include periods where RBI tried several times to intervene in the currency market by selling dollars to unsuccessfully pause a decline in INR-USD).  When a central bank intervenes in the open market to try to defend a level on their currency where do you think the dollars they are "selling" are coming from?

 

The main point that actually sticks is that weaponizing SWIFT / USD networks against Russia highlighted a key risk for central banks.  This was a blow to the USD's standing as a global standard.  But the USD is still on one side of essentially every currency transformation and deeply ingrained in overseas funding markets.  If I want to trade between JPY and INR the reality is that the JPY becomes USD and then the USD becomes INR.  Because it is far cheaper with deeper liquidity to transform the asset that way.

 

The value of a US dollar locally in India, or really anywhere in Asia, despite booming several economies, has gone straight up.  Of course they would love to settle international trade with BRICS outside of the dollar.  Their structural dollar short is killing them currently.  But what they want is for trade partners to accept INR and that isn't going to happen any time soon.  Because INR is not useful or demanded outside of India.  Some day India will have sufficient exports that trading partners will be willing to accept INR to re-spend on Indian manufactured goods.  But knock off generic drugs and basmati rice aren't yet a big enough factor.

 

If you take just the RBI's currency holdings - what other options do they even have if they wanted to make a conscious decision to "diversify away from the USD" ?  A German government bond?  A French one?  There aren't very many actual practical options.

 

If anything, if I'm at the RBI, I am extremely concerned that my central bank only holds $325 Billion of USD.  As we saw in the video - that can deplete awfully quickly when the country needs dollars.

 

While your point is taken. I think there is an underlying gradual but consistent shift. I think many Central banks are now keeping what they think is just enough US dollar reserves and additional increases in reserves are all going into assets such as precious metals.
 

India already has UPI. Its digital infrastructure is quite solid and widespread. It processes vastly more transactions than the Visa Mastercard systems globally already. 
And the collective block of countries that are not in favor US dollar trade is increasing. As they all build their gold reserves, they could quite easily rearrange the system. With one in which these digital transactions are in stable coins backed by gold. Such a trading require would require more value of precious metal reserves than exist currently. But as the price of those assets as well as volumes goes up and the desire to ditch the US dollar goes higher, the tipping point could easily come. I'm not saying in the next few years but it wouldn't surprise me if in 10-15 years it happens by chipping away a couple percentage points every year.
We may then start seeing a significant shift and only 25-30 percent global trade getting settled in USD.
I think the current share is around 65%.
That would be a tremendous blow to US soft power

Edited March 26 by Txvestor

[rogermunibond]

How does Indian solar power contribute to overall Indian grid production?

 

[This2ShallPass]

On 3/25/2026 at 7:52 PM, Txvestor said:

While your point is taken. I think there is an underlying gradual but consistent shift. I think many Central banks are now keeping what they think is just enough US dollar reserves and additional increases in reserves are all going into assets such as precious metals.
 

India already has UPI. Its digital infrastructure is quite solid and widespread. It processes vastly more transactions than the Visa Mastercard systems globally already. 
And the collective block of countries that are not in favor US dollar trade is increasing. As they all build their gold reserves, they could quite easily rearrange the system. With one in which these digital transactions are in stable coins backed by gold. Such a trading require would require more value of precious metal reserves than exist currently. But as the price of those assets as well as volumes goes up and the desire to ditch the US dollar goes higher, the tipping point could easily come. I'm not saying in the next few years but it wouldn't surprise me if in 10-15 years it happens by chipping away a couple percentage points every year.
We may then start seeing a significant shift and only 25-30 percent global trade getting settled in USD.
I think the current share is around 65%.
That would be a tremendous blow to US soft power

Moving your reserves to volatile precious metals is extremely risky, no?

What is the objective to move away from USD? I thought long term India's currency depreciation has more to do with the difference in inflation between the two countries..

[Parsad]

https://www.cnn.com/2026/03/30/travel/noida-airport-new-delhi-india-intl-hnk

 

Cheers!

[This2ShallPass]

12 hours ago, Parsad said:

https://www.cnn.com/2026/03/30/travel/noida-airport-new-delhi-india-intl-hnk

 

Cheers!

Nothing to do with the airport news but I have long been fascinated on how western news reports India related stuff. Especially the images and headlines used. They could be reporting on the greatest thing happening but the subtext reinforced from images is India is a poor country with poor people Some day when I have time, it'll be one of my pet projects (with no real use), use large amounts of images to show the trend.

I asked Gemini to create the attached image - "Can you create an image of Noida international airport (looking at the entrance from the outside) with a bunch of typical passengers standing outside". Now compare it to the headline image CNN uses in the article.

This is just for fun, doesn't affect my investment rationale.
 

[Parsad]

1 hour ago, This2ShallPass said:

Nothing to do with the airport news but I have long been fascinated on how western news reports India related stuff. Especially the images and headlines used. They could be reporting on the greatest thing happening but the subtext reinforced from images is India is a poor country with poor people Some day when I have time, it'll be one of my pet projects (with no real use), use large amounts of images to show the trend.

I asked Gemini to create the attached image - "Can you create an image of Noida international airport (looking at the entrance from the outside) with a bunch of typical passengers standing outside". Now compare it to the headline image CNN uses in the article.

This is just for fun, doesn't affect my investment rationale.
 

 

Ah, it's the media...don't worry about it.  Your photograph is what Indira Gandhi, CSM and BIAL looked like to me when I was at each airport. 

 

BIAL makes almost every North American airport look like they were built 50 years ago...oh, they were!    Cheers!

[This2ShallPass]

3 hours ago, Parsad said:

 

Ah, it's the media...don't worry about it.  Your photograph is what Indira Gandhi, CSM and BIAL looked like to me when I was at each airport. 

 

BIAL makes almost every North American airport look like they were built 50 years ago...oh, they were!    Cheers!

 

Yeah not worried about it all. It's one of those things when you first spot a pattern your brain looks for it every time and this one has never failed me:)

 

 

[Hektor]

13 hours ago, This2ShallPass said:

India is a poor country with poor people

It is, in my opinion. Definitely less poor than before.

[Haryana]

Aside from the debate whether India with the highest amount of gold is poor and that USA with the highest amount of debt is rich, what message does the following headline convey

CNN: "India’s latest mega airport has opened. Now it just needs some flights"

[SafetyinNumbers]

6 hours ago, Haryana said:

Aside from the debate whether India with the highest amount of gold is poor and that USA with the highest amount of debt is rich, what message does the following headline convey

CNN: "India’s latest mega airport has opened. Now it just needs some flights"

It takes time to fill an airport?

[Haryana]

The headline makes it sound like that infrastructor / airports development in India is being overdone with easy money without enough demand as it has been built without flights. 

 

This builds on the common narrative of over the top too much development in China with its empty ghost cities etc. 

 

Regardless of the fact that the  current Delhi airport is among the top 10 busiest airports in the whole wide world and has multiple runways / terminals that operate at full capacity. 

 

Major airlines are already lined up to operate from this second new airport just inaugurated. 

 

CNN: "India’s latest mega airport has opened. Now it just needs some flights" 

 

This latest airport doesn't need those flights, rather it is those flights that need this airport. 

[Txvestor]

On 3/27/2026 at 10:59 PM, This2ShallPass said:

Moving your reserves to volatile precious metals is extremely risky, no?

What is the objective to move away from USD? I thought long term India's currency depreciation has more to do with the difference in inflation between the two countries..

Unless of course you've concluded that the Dollar has outlived its global usefulness as a reserve currency and it's in its way down. Then you would want to move to something more universally acceptable. 
The us is not inspiring global confidence with its $40T debt load and $2T annual deficits. I think it's quite likely that we will see yield suppression in some form, and if you're a sovereign at that point gold is a better long term alternative, that's I think where we are. I don't think gold is more risky than the $US in the long term if you are considering it as a store of value. 

Edited May 8 by Txvestor

[Spekulatius]

On 4/4/2026 at 2:40 AM, Txvestor said:

Unless of course you've concluded that the Dollar has outlived its global usefulness as a reserve currency and it's in its way down. Then you would want to move to something more universally acceptable. 
The us is not inspiring global confidence with its $40T debt load and $2T annual deficits. I think it's quite likely that we will see yield suppression in some form, and if you're a sovereign at that point gold is a better long term alternative, that's o think where we are. I don't think gold is more risky than the $US in the long term if you are considering it as a store of value. 

You can’t get sanctioned owning gold. USD holdings can get sanctioned or nerfed in many ways, Gold can’t. That’s why gold is become more and more like a reserve currency of choice.