The pluralism of experience that… financiers bring to bear in their decisions gives a wide range of entrepreneurial ideas a chance of insightful evaluation,” says Edmund S. Phelps, winner of the 2006 Nobel Prize in economics. In an article published the day after the Nobel award was announced, Phelps observes, “Instituting a high level of dynamism, so that the economy is fired by the new ideas...

Debashis Basu points out the lessons for a trader in Amaranth’s $6 billion blow up

In late September and early October, Amaranth Advisors, a US-based hedge fund went under. It had a large exposure in the natural gas futures market and was wrong-footed when gas prices tumbled. The total loss? A humungous $6 billion. The hedge fund lost that money in just one week. The trader who took the firm...

Dr Nita Mukherjee discovers how the commercial use of a traditional craft has made the girl child wanted in Kutch

Four years ago, a Trustee of the Sarwa Sewa Sangh a Bhuj NGO told me that embroidery had become the main activity of many rural Kutchhi women. Its social impact is very evident. “Today, a girl child is preferred to a male child. Because she will be trained in embroidery; they...