A notable financial event, India Ideas Conclave, was held in Bengaluru and organized by the India Foundation. The Conclave was attended by top minds in the financial ecosystem in India, including India's chief economic advisor (CEA), Anantha Nageswaran.
During the event, Nageswaran mentioned that the advancement and volatility in financial technologies such as cryptocurrencies and the stock market are linked to human emotions like fear and greed. According to him, on Friday, the conflict in Ukraine showed that cryptocurrencies and stock markets are merely a partial answer to the challenges that the world faces.
History has shown how technology heightens the human emotions that lead to issues. At the event, the chief economic advisor noted,
"The conflict that has broken out in Ukraine is a reminder that technology is at best a source of partial answers to the challenges that we face."
He further added,
"The kind of turmoil and volatility we are witnessing in the stock market, or for that matter, the craze with which people are investing in crypto assets, or stable coins backed by crypto assets — both of which have no capital spinoff, is also a reminder that humans are still driven by fear and greed, and sometimes technology accentuates them, rather than eliminating them."
Some quarters, replying to what the CEA had stated, believe that people trooped to instruments they felt would hedge the risks linked to the Ukraine crisis. This was what prompted more people to become interested in these financial areas.
He added that technology couldn't eliminate greed in humans and that India was still recovering from the issues linked to the pandemic. Nageswaran stated that the country had developed the appropriate financial sector to ensure that the economy grew to the middle-income stage. A 20-year plan was designed to achieve this.