Sudip Bandyopadhyay’s Blog

For thousands of years, gold has been valued as a global currency, a commodity, an investment and simply an object of beauty.  In the 1981 Iranian hostage crisis, Iran refused to accept U.S. dollars in return for releasing the American hostages it held. So the U.S. transferred 50 tonnes of gold instead. As then Treasury [...]

“History demonstrates conclusively that a modern economy cannot grow if its financial system is not operating effectively.” So said Ben Bernanke, Federal Reserve chairman, last  week in London.  It sounds obvious, but it is also fundamental - and for three reasons. First, banks allow people to pay each other easily - without them commerce would [...]