Lessons learned from GFC
There is strong evidence emerging that Indian corporates have learned their lessons from the global financial crisis very well. In the post Covid global risk rally, they have avoided most of the mistakes they made during the exuberant years of 2003-2008, and have emerged stronger. In pre-GFC buoyancy companies like Tata Steel (Corus), Tata Tea (Tetley), Tata Motors (JLR), Indian Hotels (Orient Express), Havells (Phillips), Sun Pharma (Taro), Suzlon (Hensen), Hindalco (Novelis), Reliance Telecom (Flag), etc. got lured by cheap debt and bought global businesses (in some cases bigger than their India operations), paying top dollars. Most of these acquisitions inflicted severe pain to the parent entities in the ensuing years. This time, despite near zero rates and abundant liquidity, they have been very careful in acquiring businesses abroad. IT services companies have some niche small sized acquisitions to augment their resource pool. These acquisitions have been mostly earnings...