South Asia Investor Review

India's multi-billion dollar telecom scandal, also known as 2G scandal, is continuing to grow with new revelations coming out almost every day, especially since the failure of the blackout attempt orchestrated by some of the biggest Indian TV channels and newspapers. The main source of these leaks are over 100 tapes of 5,000 recordings made by India's Enforcement Directorate and Income Tax authorities as part of their surveillance of Ms. Nira Radia. Radia lobbied government ministers and politicians on behalf of India's business elite, including the biggest business magnates Mukesh Ambani and Ratan Tata. NDTV journalist Barkha Dutt and Hindustan Times columnist Vir Sanghvi are among those implicated by the tapes in the growing scandal. Initially, attention was focused on Ms. Dutt, who was accused of agreeing to pass on messages from Ms. Radia to the Congress party. Ms. Dutt denied that and defended herself on Twitter, in a statement and on television, and said that at mos...

Two prominent Indian-Americans, along with a Sri Lanka born billionaire, have been charged in what U.S. prosecutors say is the biggest insider-trading case in a generation. The scandal is now reverberating in South Asia, particularly the island nation of Sri Lanka. It is estimated that billionaire Raj Rajaratnam, the founder of hedge fund Galleon Group under arrest in New York on charges of insider trading, has invested more than $150 million in Sri Lankan shares. Even rumors of his trades can send the market up or down. Born in Sri Lanka, he was educated at the prestigious Wharton business school in Pennsylvania and went to set up a hedge fund for boutique investment bank Needham. The hedge fund was spun off with Mr Rajaratnam at its head in 1997. Galleon was well known for its extensive research reports, according to the New York Times, and for having many senior technology executives as its investors. In 2007, there was a minor scandal involving accusations of insider trading agains...

Investors of Indian Companies controlled by families are growing suspicious in the wake of the Satyam scandal involving the Raju brothers. Older brother Ramalinga Raju served as chairman and younger brother Ram Raju was managing director of Satyam. B. Ramalinga Raju admitted he had a fictitious cash balance of more than $1 billion on Satyam balance sheet and said in a letter of resignation that he overstated profits for the past several years, overstated the amount of debt owed to the company and understated liabilities. Eventually, he said, the scheme reached "simply unmanageable proportions" and he was left in a position that was "like riding a tiger, not knowing how to get off without being eaten." In the aftermath of the Satyam scandal described as "India's Enron", shares of the energy giant, Reliance Industries, controlled by one Ambani brother , are down 19%. The smaller listed Reliance units have likewise been punished in the market. Reliance ...

Satyam Computer Services Ltd., considered the poster child of India's information technology age, has shocked the world with a scandal of major proportions. The chairman of Satyam , a name that literally means "truth" in Sanskrit, said he cooked up key financial results, including a fictitious cash balance of more than $1 billion, raising doubts about the IT revolution hype in India that has attracted many international companies and significant foreign investments to the nation of over one billion people. The Wall Street Journal is reporting that B. Ramalinga Raju, founder and chairman of Satyam Computer Services Ltd., said in a letter of resignation that he also overstated profits for the past several years, overstated the amount of debt owed to the company and understated its liabilities. Eventually, he said, the scheme reached "simply unmanageable proportions" and he was left in a position that was "like riding a tiger, not knowing how to get off with...