StatsGuru-03-February-2014

India resilient to US Fed taper impact this time around

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The United States Federal Reserve has begun to taper its bond-buying programme in earnest, causing the expected turmoil in world markets. In the middle of 2013, when the taper was first discussed, India was among the worst-affected emerging markets. This time, it hasn't suffered quite as much. As Table 1 shows, the rupee has lost a great deal against the dollar since January 1, 2013, but is not doing as badly this year to date. Nor, as Table 2 shows, has the stock market suffered as much as most peers.

One big reason is shown in Table 3: India has done better than any other competitor in controlling its current account deficit. Still, problems remain. As Table 4 shows, its Budget deficit is still bigger than many other countries' - perhaps affecting the yield on its government securities, shown in Table 5. Table 6 shows that Indian retail inflation is also an outlier. But the country is not an outlier in terms of wholesale inflation, as Table 7 shows. In terms of growth, laid out in Table 8, India has slowed, but is still reasonable compared with peers. Its industrial slowdown, as Table 9 shows, is shared by many other countries. Finally its proportion of debt, in Table 10, is high but not worrying.