Three challenges in the new year

The bond yield, currency and deposit mobilisation — all spillovers from last year

- TAMAL BANDYOPADHYAY

Ask your friends how 2025 has been, and the answers could vary vastly, depending on the perch or prism one views the year from.

For many, for instance, it was a golden year; for others, it was one of silver linings — reliant on the precious metal one added to the locker. Gold ended the year with annual gains of 64 per cent, the largest since 1979, but silver outpaced gold, with a rally of over 150 per cent.

Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Sanjay Malhotra finds the Indian economy in a rare “goldilocks period” — an ideal state of moderate, sustainable growth with low inflation. It's just right — not overheating (causing high inflation), and not too cold (risking recession). This balance supports strong employment, stable asset prices, and supportive monetary conditions, creating a steady environment for investment and consumer confidence.

This is much like Goldilocks finding the porridge in Baby Bear's bowl at the “just right” temperature, as opposed to “too hot” in Papa Bear's and “too cold” in Mamma Bear's, in the fairy tale, Goldilocks and the Three Bears.

Beyond high growth and low inflation, there are many other record-breaking data points in the year gone by.

For instance, 103 initial public offers raised ₹1.76 trillion in 2025. We had seen more IPOs in 2000 — the year of the “dot com boom’, but the money raised that year was a meagre ₹2,953 crore. Also, in 11 months, till November, the systematic investment plan, or SIP, inflows into the mutual fund industry were upwards of ₹3 trillion — the highest to date.

Not all markets-related numbers are, however, positive. For example, foreign institutional and portfolio investors booked net outflows of ₹1.6 trillion during the year, the highest annual outflow on record, on stretched valuations, modest earnings, geopolitical worries and, of course, concerns over high US tariffs on Indian exports.