Markets with Bertie: A tale of paneer manchurian, taxes and bankers

By the third week of the earnings season, Bertie has given up. Like the rain lashing on his office panes, his inbox is being pounded by first cuts, presentations, call transcripts and result notes. Somewhere around this point, he abandons the pursuit of insight and starts seeking entertainment. Bertie cannot stop being amused by some of the uniquely Indian contributions to the English language like ‘degrowth’, ‘prepone’ and ‘long cut’; many of them fathered by financial analysts.

They remind him of our unique contribution to global cuisine - paneer manchurian, except that Bertie loves this dish. His favourite though is ‘earnings missed estimates’. To be honest it is not a surprising phrase given the ‘I am the centre of the universe’ delusion that most market folks suffer from. When Bertie tried to wisecrack that actually it was his estimates that missed earnings, the analyst he was speaking to did not get the joke. He is now wondering if weathermen will take a cue from market people and announce that the weather today missed forecasts.

Tax status

At a post-budget event in the city, Bertie was quietly chomping samosas in the back row when a moment of sparkling candidness from a ministry of finance mandarin made him spill some mint chutney. “We have noticed that assets owned by professionals like doctors, lawyers, chartered accountants are often disproportionate to the income that they offer to tax. Measures like TCS (tax collected at source) on high-end cars will seek to address this.”

Also Read: Markets with Bertie: From onion shampoos to unicorns

Bertie smiled a broad smile because it was his long-held peeve that doctors get away with murder, even with their taxes. The warm glow of schadenfreude was short-lived though. The following day, newspapers reported that the gap between personal income tax collection and corporate taxes was set to widen further. “25% for their billions and 40% for my paltry five crores” he thought. Bertie is considering if the Gen-Z trend of “I identify as a cat” can be applied to his tax status. He would love to identify as a corporate.

Unhappy in its own way

On a wet Friday afternoon, Bertie was gripped by an unusual urge to socialise and so he decided to attend a book launch at his Fat Cats Club. After putting up with an hour of drab macroeconomics, he made a beeline for the bar hoping to bump into some old mates. The CEO of a mid-sized private bank greeted him and Bertie responded with his usual opening gambit - “Rocking markets, no?”. That seemed to touch a nerve. “What rocking? Seen our stock?” he snapped. “My options are under water” he lowered his voice “and what’s worse, Big Brother is always watching our salaries”. Bertie made some commiserative noises. “It’s rocking for them” the CEO went on, tilting his head towards the boss of a NBFC who was standing close by.

Always keen to hear both sides of the story, Bertie bid a polite goodbye to Mr Bank and manoeuvred himself towards Mr NBFC. “Rocking markets, no?” he began. “Yeah Bert. So far so good”. After some polite conversation about banks losing personnel to shadow banks, Mr NBFC asked the question that was troubling him. “Tell me Bert. Is the Big Brother going to regulate our compensation too?” This time Bertie made some non-committal noises. “I am worried sick, man. If that happens, it will be terrible. Where will we go?” he worried aloud. Bertie’s thoughts drifted to the opening lines of Anna Karenina, "Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way."

(Bertie is a Mumbai-based fund manager whose compliance department wishes him to cough twice before speaking and then decide not to say it after all.)

Also Read: Markets with Bertie: The grand wedding, manufacturing fund and Sam Altman