Investment: Insurance

Insurance is considered as investment as it is done to insure one's life. Term insurance gives us no return but the nominee gets the insured amount on the death of the insured.

Policies like endowment and money back are taken with the expectations of return in the forms of bonus and loyalty. The insured gets the insured amount with bonus and loyalty if any at maturity. 

Three generations have faced pandemic:

Three generations have faced pandemic:

Our parents during last part of their lives,

We during later part of our lives,

Our children during initial part of their lives.

Three generations have faced pandemic:

Some have fought till the last breath,

And the rest are fighting with the remaining breath.

Three generations have faced pandemic:

The world has never been the same before,

The world is never the same now,

The world will never be the same after

Three generations have faced pandemic.

Investment: Government securities

To raise funds to finance important projects and budget deficits, government issues government securities (G-SEC)  or treasury bills (T-Bills).

The return is fixed and secured and usually better than the fixed deposits.

Moreover government securities are reliable and investors get a good return when there is financial crisis and other investments are not doing well. 

Investment: Other fixed deposits

Investors can invest in companies, financial institution and non-banking institution for a certain period. These companies and institutions pay higher interest to the investors.

Investing in the fixed deposits by the companies and non-banking financial institutions is not easy as the minimum investment amount is higher than the fixed deposits by the banking institutions.

Investment: Gold

Investing in gold is a safe investment. Commonly, we invest in gold in the form of jewellery. Gold in jewellery form has the issue of storage. Banks provide storage facility which is chargeable. There is also making charge in case of jewellery.

We can start a Systematic Investment Plan (SIP)  in the gold funds from mutual funds. Mutual funds save us from storage and making charges.

Additionally, we can invest in ETFs. We must open a trading and demat account with a SEBI registered broker to invest in a gold ETF.

Government issues gold bonds for the investors who are looking for a long term investments. In sovereign gold bond,  investors get a declared interest in return per year till the maturity of the bond along with the maturity value. 

Investment: Shareholder and dividend, bonus and split of shares

When we invest in a company and buy a share from the share market, we become a shareholder for the company.

We are then entitled to a share of the profit or loss of the company. The management of company can declare dividend, bonus share or split of share to reward its shareholders.

Share price moves up and down during the trading session and varies according to the performance of the company. Price appreciation is also the return against the investment for the investors. The shareholders can book the profit against the investments anytime or continue to hold the share for a longer time. 

Investment: Shares & ETF

Investors have the option to invest in company shares or index exchange traded funds (ETFs).

We can invest in the shares of the companies listed on BSE and NSE. Index ETFs like Nifty ETF, Sensex ETF and Nifty bank ETF are also available for the investors who do not have knowledge about the share market. Other ETFs are also available for investors to diversify their portfolio.

Investment: Investing in Share Market

Before investing in share market, we must open Trading and Demat account.

Trading account is used to buy and sell the shares while Demat account is for storing the shares. Trading account is opened with a SEBI registered broker.

Once the trading and demat account is opened, we can place an order after transferring an amount in the trading account from a linked bank account. A buy order or a sell order is placed to buy or sell shares.

Day trading is buying the shares for a single day. The shares are sold before the close of the trading session of the day. And a delivery is buying the shares to hold them for a time period. The shares are sold when the shareholder places a sell order.

Investment: Share Market

After mutual fund, it is now the time to understand share market. This is the most risky investment. Investing in equity will give a good return in short and long period. We need to be careful in investing in share market or else we will lose our money.

Share market is a place where shares are bought and sold. The shares are traded in two major stock exchanges: Bombay stock exchange (BSE) and National stock exchange (NSE).

The shares of the listed companies are available for trading in the stock exchanges. The top 30 companies in BSE is Sensex. Similarly, the top 50 companies in NSE form the index named Nifty.

These exchanges are regulated by the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI).

Investment: Types of Mutual funds

There is a lot of mutual funds for the investors to choose from. Investors can choose from the lot ranging from low risk to high risk funds.

Investors have the option to select any of the funds or diversify their portfolio with more than one fund. Once invested, the fund manager takes the job of investing the money in the stocks alloted for the fund.

Large cap fund is the least risky fund while small cap fund is the most risky one. Mid cap fund is also available for investors who are not willing to take too much risk. Multi cap fund is the combination of large, mid and small cap stocks, in addition to the fund with combination of investing in shares and debt instruments.

Apart from the above funds,  index funds, sectorial and thematic funds, liquid and debt funds are also available for investors to invest their money.