Goldman Sachs Upgrades India in Market Weight

World's biggest private equity, hedge funds and investment firm The Goldman Sachs Group today upgraded India to "market weight" from "underweight". The decision comes after observing India’s macro cycle, lower oil prices, lower valuation, and policy reform.

In a statement Goldman said, "The latest move by the RBI to raise the repo rate by 50 basis points was a clear sign in our view that the central bank is vigilant in bringing down inflation expectations. Despite the near-term weakness, policy tightening was a necessary step to reigning in inflation expectations and will ultimately serve as a net positive for the Indian equity market on a medium to longer term horizon.”

The RBI recently raised the tax rates and eventually it had increased the rates for 11 times within one year in expectation to nearing the end of its tightening cycle.

HSBC To Cut Over 10,000 Jobs

As per some media reports HSBC Bank is planning to cut thousands of jobs as it embarks on a cost-cutting drive to push economic recovery. The plans have not yet been finalised, but could see more than 10,000 jobs being cut.

HSBC has about 330,000 staffs globally and they are looking forward to a sustainable cost savings of $2.5 billion to $3.5 billion in order to reach a cost efficiency ratio target of 48-52% by 2013.

The reports also said that HSBC would be considering a strategic review of its cards business in the United States, and would limit its retail banking operations in US. HSBC had already cut 700 jobs out of 55,000 in its UK retail banking arm in June this year.

Already Standard Chartered, Llyods, Goldman Sachs, Credit Suisse and UBS banks have announced their job cuts plans recently.