On Episode 827 of The Core Report, financial journalist Govindraj Ethiraj talks to Ajay Srivastava, Founder of the Global Trade Research Initiative (GTRI) as well as Amit Tandon, Founder and Managing Director at Institutional Investor Advisory Services (IIAS).

SHOW NOTES

(00:00) Stories of the day

(01:00) Markets tank again, give up three days of gains on US threats to attack Iran’s gas fields again

(04:43) Gold and silver fall on inflation fears, major commodities crash

(06:54) HDFC Bank chairman quits after likely boardroom battle but leaves behind questions

(19:44) Will India curtail exports of oil products like petrol and diesel?

(21:24) Trade data for last year has been positive but the US is coming after India again

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NOTE: This transcript contains the host's monologue and includes interview transcripts by a machine. Human eyes have gone through the script but there might still be errors in some of the text, so please refer to the audio in case you need to clarify any part. If you want to get in touch regarding any feedback, you can drop us a message on feedback@thecore.in.

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Good morning, it's Friday, the 20th of March and this is Govindraj Ethiraj broadcasting and streaming weekdays from Mumbai, India's financial capital.

Our top stories and themes…

The stock markets tank again, give up three days of gains on US threats to attack Iran's gas fields once again.

Gold and silver fallen, inflation fears, major commodities crash.

Trade data for last year has been positive, but the United States is coming after India once again.

HDFC bank’s chairman quits after a likely boardroom battle but leaves behind questions that are unanswered.

Will India curtail exports of oil products like petrol and diesel?

Markets and War

The one thing that US President Donald Trump has been consistent is his statements, which seem like suggestions but usually turn into executive orders in hours.

He promised to bomb Iran's gas fields and he did and now he's promised to bomb them again if Iran retaliates to that bombing as it did attacking Qatar's gas field, which is physically adjacent to Iran's gas field, geographically speaking. Trump said in a social media post that neither the US nor Qatar were involved in the Israeli operation targeting the South Power's field, calling on Iran to act with restraint and he said if Iran continues its strikes on Qatar's LNG assets, the US will massively blow up the entirety of the South Power's gas field at an amount of strength and power that Iran has never seen or witnessed before. So rest assured, there is a good chance he will.

And of course there is also a good chance of a ground invasion. Reuters is reporting that Trump is considering deploying thousands of US troops to reinforce its position in the Middle East as the US military prepares for possible next steps in its campaign against Iran. The deployments could help provide Trump with additional options as he weighs expanding US operations with the Iran war well into its third week, says Reuters.

The specifics include manning the Strait of Hormuz and ground forces to Iran's Karg Island, the hub for 90% of Iran's oil exports. Now a few weeks ago all of this would have been considered risky and next to impossible. It does appear though now that Trump and the United States have crossed that bridge a while ago and are keen or rather very keen on a fight to the finish.

Given all of this, not surprisingly crude oil prices have shot up more than 10% hitting a high of $119 a barrel on Thursday, bringing its advance according to Bloomberg since the start of the war to more than 67%, even as European natural gas rose as much as 35% following those strikes in Iran. Now it does not matter of course as we've been saying to the United States that countries across Asia and particularly South Asia and of course India are reeling from energy shortages of both gas and oil and downstream products and taking severe hits to their economies and not to mention tanking stock markets. My own sense in speaking to energy experts is that we are not in full control of our gas supplies despite best efforts and things could get worse from the present which is obviously not good and when I say gas I mean both liquefied petroleum gas LPG that's cooking gas or LNG that supplies pipe natural gas to homes and of course to industries.

The war has now entered its 21st day and as per Bloomberg estimates has claimed more than 4100 lives across the region with more than three quarters of that in Iran. Right now crude oil prices are around $113 a barrel, a level which is bad enough to smash any estimates or forecasts of inflation that were made a month ago. Speaking of tanking stock markets, India's benchmarks were down more than 3% on Thursday and that was their worst session since June 2024 according to Reuters.

The benchmarks were also pulled down by heavyweight HDFC Bank following the abrupt exit of its chairman and then of course a surge in crude prices. The Nifty 50 and Sensex were both down sharply. The Nifty 50 was down about 2.9% or 687 points to 23,090 and the Sensex was also down similarly and 2,199 points.

Note that 2,199 points or three days of gain to 74,504. Broader markets were also down. The Nifty Mid Cap and Nifty Small Cap indices were down around 3% and 2.9% each.

Reuters reported that about $140 billion in market value was wiped out on the National Stock Exchange on Wednesday with market cap losses since the start of the war now touching about $400 billion. Meanwhile gold prices are also falling on inflation fears and fell to their lowest level in more than a month on Thursday thanks also to a stronger dollar and rising treasury yields. Spot gold was down about 3% to $4,687 per ounce on Thursday morning after falling to about $4,665, its lowest since February 6th.

In India, prices fell close to 6% futures falling over Rs 9,000 to about Rs 1,43,000 or Rs 143,800 per 10 grammes. A note from commodity analyst Ajay Kadia pointed out that in addition to gold, the copper market saw a historic flash crash on Thursday with MCX copper marsh contracts plunging almost 9% to hit Rs 1,050 a kilogramme. London Metal Exchange or LME copper fell to a low of $11,800 a tonne as exchange inventories rose to touch 334,000 tonnes, the highest since 2019 according to Kadia.

Meanwhile, aluminium also fell the most since 2018 on the LME thanks to growing worries about the global economic impact of the war which hit several industrial metals according to Bloomberg, adding that prices fell as much as 8% to $3,115 a tonne and all of that wiped out gains seen since the start of the Iran conflict. On Wall Street, US equities were down on Thursday and the Dow Jones Industrial was down about 227 points or 0.5% roughly the same fall or a little more in the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq Composite.

HDFC Bank Governance

Even as the war raged in Asia, with the United States all set to bring boots on ground or bomb Iran and all its energy assets to extinction, an unusual controversy broke out at HDFC Bank after its non-executive chairman, a former Government of India bureaucrat, appointed or rather approved by the Reserve Bank of India to this position, abruptly resigned on Wednesday. He cited differences over values and ethics. That's also reviving governance concerns at India's largest private sector lender.

Reports suggest the resignation could be due to a rift with the bank's management team on issues of appointments and re-appointments of top brass. HDFC Bank's CEO and Managing Director Shashidat Jagadishan on Thursday said its former chairman Atanu Chakraborty was asked to reconsider his decision to quit taken on Tuesday and elaborate on concerns involving ethics and also take back some of the language in the resignation letter according to reports put together by the Economic Times following a call by the bank on Thursday afternoon. Addressing reporters in that call, a majority of the board members of HDFC said they were baffled by Chakraborty's move because he did not offer any specific concerns that he was alluding to in his resignation letter.

It also denied a media report suggesting that there was a extension discussed for Jagadishan as Managing Director and CEO. The Economic Times quoted Jagadishan as saying that he had not expressed this kind of a feeling to anyone either to his self or to the board. That's on the issue of reappointment.

He also said that every board member tried to persuade Chakraborty to take back his resignation or elaborate on the concerns so that the same could be readdressed but he did not relent. The resignation was dated March 17th, that's Tuesday and came up for discussion during a meeting of the Nomination and Remuneration Committee of the board on Wednesday and at about 7 p.m four board members including two full-time members and two independent members initiated a with the Reserve Bank of India about the happenings according to Jagadishan with the chairman clearly not relenting Jagadishan said this led to a briefing to the Reserve Bank of India and the regulator was kind in appointing KK Mistry as the interim chairman for three months. KK Mistry is a former Managing Director of HDFC which was merged into HDFC Bank.

The Reserve Bank of India also weighed in on Thursday saying there were no material concerns regarding governance or conduct at HDFC Bank. It also said that HDFC Bank is a domestic systemically important bank or DSIB with sound financials, professionally run board and competent management team and based on its periodical assessment there were no material concerns on record as regards its conduct or governance. While HDFC has been reasonably open and responding to the issue so far more so since its stock price crashed in the morning till the former chairman clarified that there was nothing materially wrong in the company the larger issue of governance and what went wrong is still pertinent.

I spoke with Amit Tandon, Managing Director of Institutional Investor Advisory Services based in Mumbai and I began by asking him what was the way forward.

INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPT

Amit Tandon: I'll begin with the disclosure that HDFC Bank owns 10% equity in IIS. So that's something which your listeners will have to factor in. I'll just say that look, it's the ambiguity of the resignation letter that is HDFC's biggest problem right now.

There's simply no clarity with regard to what the underlying issues are. And if some of us were hoping to get clarity when the bank kind of had its conference this morning, unfortunately that was also not there because the bank said they're also equally in the dark about why this has happened. And in a sense, it kind of reminds me of the time when Cyrus Mystery was defenestrated where, you know, everyone was unsure in terms of why that defenestration had taken place.

But anyway, nonetheless, to come back to it, I think the bank needs to treat it as a governance stress test and get ahead of any regulatory enquiry rather than react to one. And to my mind, just given what has happened, the most credible path forward is to facilitate a structured dialogue between Mr. Tanu Chakraborty and whether you call it an independent agency or subcommittee of the board or, you know, a law firm or whatever, to kind of examine what his concerns are. And then they need to publish what the conclusions are.

I'm pretty mindful of the fact that look, any of these committees, they are seen to be some attempt to whitewash or rush everything under the carpet. And if in case there is no material finding or no material misconduct, then the first assumption will be that look, that is what the purpose was. But look, unless you do something along these lines, it's going to be very difficult to kind of move ahead because we need to remember and maybe I'm going to repeat this during our conversation today that unresolved ambiguity lingers.

And, you know, this governance uncertainty will erode trust. And you can't hope that financial matrices will repair this trust. So you need to get rid of, you know, the ambiguity and get some clarity in terms of what the underlying issues are.

Govindraj Ethiraj: Right. And that's a useful point. I mean, financial matrices, however good they are, cannot counter the sense of ambiguity or the cloud that's hanging over company.

Now, two points that have emerged. One is, of course, that they were personality clashes. And second, of course, linked to that is that maybe the chairman, who's, of course, a non-executive one, was exerting more weight than he should have or could have.

What's your sense on both these points?

Amit Tandon: I'm going to say two things. First is the boards are uncomfortable places to be in. I mean, if you're a comfortable board and there's consensus, et cetera, et cetera, you can argue that there is no meaningful discussion, which is not to say that look, there is dissent.

You know, they have to be factuous because, you know, you both have the same end result. There may be different means in terms of trying to achieve it. But everyone is working for the shareholders in general, but also more broadly a wider set of stakeholders.

So, you know, I know you can have a very belligerent discussion, but after that sit on the same dining table and eat, have a meal together, but taking into account that look, this is a specific issue and it's not going to impact our relationship. The other aspect in terms of, you know, which you're asking is again, very important because we need to remember that, you know, the role of the CEO and the role of the board chair are, while they're often discussed together, they're not the same. In fact, the difference between them goes into the heart of how a company is run.

And a healthy organisation needs both a strong management and strong oversight. And that's where the CEO and the board chair come in. So let me say that the role of the CEO, the chief executive officer or the managing director is responsible for the day-to-day leadership of the company.

This is a person who runs the business, leads the executive team, is accountable for the execution of a policy. There are people who decide what the strategy is, manage the operations, allocate resources, and so on and so forth. The board chair, by contrast, does not manage the company's affairs on a daily basis.

The chair leads the board of directors. Main job is to oversee the management, protect the long-term interests of the company and its stakeholders. It's more a governance role to kind of see that, look, when the business or the business team of the management comes up with what its strategy is, to question what the assumptions underlying the strategy is, are they achievable, are they not?

You know, taking that into account, what needs to be the allocation of resources to provide an effective oversight over what is happening? And a part of that, of course, will be to challenge the management, you know, hold them accountable, play a role in evaluating the CEO, oversee succession planning, ensuring issues like ethics, risk, corporate culture, do receive proper scrutiny. And, you know, a part of that is also deciding on the compensation of the CEO.

So those are two very different roles and problems arise when the lines between the two roles become blurred. And, you know, if we say that the chairman is too dominant or too active, you can also argue that they've become too passive and the oversight is weak. So finding the right balance is always going to be a bit of a challenge and a difficult task.

Govindraj Ethiraj: Right. In a bank, and this is for those who are not very conversant, the chairman and more so in a private bank is appointed by the Reserve Bank of India.

Amit Tandon: It's a part-time chairman. The designation or what the RPI always says is we are appointing a part-time chairman.

Govindraj Ethiraj: Right. And therefore, the board itself or the shareholders have no real say in who that person is and how he or she is appointed.

Amit Tandon: It's also straightforward. I mean, at the end of the day, it's for the board to find the chairman, have a discussion, DNRC to find the chairman, you know, run it through the board and then take it to the Reserve Bank of India. And if the Reserve Bank of India has strong views, they should kind of go along with what the recommendations are.

Of course, the RPI has certain, they will have a fit and proper, they do want the chairman to be independent and not someone who has been associated with the bank in any capacity. And that, you know, COVID, you would have seen, it's a change from the past. So, you know, Mr. Waghul was the, you know, he was the chairman and then he kind of became chair of ICICI Bank and Mr. Kamath became the managing director and then Ms. Kamath became the chair and Chanda became the managing director. So, they've kind of tweaked that model to a very large extent, saying that we would all need an independent chair. Again, as I mentioned, the two have different roles and therefore, it makes sense to do that.

Govindraj Ethiraj: Right. What's the takeaway for other banks? In the context of banks, the chairman, chairperson is appointed with Reserve Bank or along with the Reserve Bank and comes from a slightly different position.

What should other banks be looking out to do or how do they or what do they take away from this episode?

Amit Tandon: At the end of the day, what it seems to be and what I've heard and I have no way of knowing and most of it has surfaced over the last, you know, most of it has surfaced today before that, you know, people used to allude to it, used to say it's a question of personalities. And therefore, it's, you know, it's very difficult to kind of and say that, look, we need to do A, B or C. All you can say is that, look, you hope that, you know, you've made the selection and at both levels because, you know, here you had a CEO and the chairman came in, but that could well happen that you have the chairman and the CEO's term is over and you need a new CEO.

So, all you need to do in both cases is you bring in people who have maturity, who've kind of gone through cycles, who understand the business, who understand what their role and responsibilities are at both ends and there is some degree of maturity and there is, I guess, a healthy, you know, constructive dialogue between both the parties. Now, you know, these things, you know, it's all very well to say this is what you want and you go into it thinking that you've kind of ticked all the boxes, but it's only as you kind of have with the passage of time that some of these relationships start fraying and that's when you want to ensure that it isn't but it's something which kind of there is still a healthy dialogue and constructive conversation between the two for the benefit of the organisation which both of them are supposed to be stewards of.

Govindraj Ethiraj: Right. So, two appointments. I mean, I think the company is sort of denying this, but one is of the managing director and CEO himself and another director.

So, in a normal situation, and I'm talking about a bank now, can the chairman reject an appointment or question and thus reject or, I mean, really the question is about powers.

Amit Tandon: It depends. You have some chairman who are very dominant, you have some who are passive, but at the end of the day, what there needs to be is some kind of try and go this whole thing through consensus and try and build a consensus to the extent it's possible. There could be strange instances where there isn't a consensus, but then, you know, that's what you need some add-ons in the room for so that there can be and if there is, I'd hate to say it, but let me still for the sake of saying, you know, moving things along, if you need to have some compromise, you make the compromise and get on.

I remember a conversation with, you know, a board director who was vehemently opposed to a large acquisition and his take was that, look, the whole board was in favour of it, I was against it, but, you know, in the interest of moving ahead, we went ahead with it. So, you sometimes have to say that, look, I have a point of view, understand what the other's position is and try and see what are the meeting grounds. Unfortunately, there's no right answer to say that, look, if, you know, there isn't the fact that we come from a voting advisory firm, I'd kind of say that to have a vote on the board and see where the majority is.

In those circumstances, you could turn around and say that, look, the chair has the deciding vote if there is, you know, eight people on the board.

Govindraj Ethiraj: Right. Amit, thank you so much for joining me.

Amit Tandon: Thanks a lot.

Critical Inputs for Fertilisers

Meanwhile it's not just gas and crude as we've been saying supply of critical inputs for fertilisers for instance is also under threat. India is exploring increasing purchases from Russia, Belarus and Morocco as the tensions rise in West Asia and China's export curbs also make it potentially tight ahead of the summer planting season according to Reuters.

India imports fertilisers like urea diammonium phosphate or DAP and muriate of potash as well as LNG that's liquefied natural gas which is a key feedstock for urea production. The Middle East accounts for roughly half of India's DAP and urea imports with Saudi Arabia being the largest DAP supplier and Oman the biggest urea supplier according to Reuters. The report also said India holds higher stocks of fertilisers with urea and DAP inventories up 11 percent and 105 percent respectively from a year earlier according to the latest data though there are no shortages at present the government is keen to avoid any shortfalls during the summer season according to sources who spoke to Reuters.

Demand of course will rise in June and July when farmers begin planting crops like rice, corn, cotton and oil seeds. India will also review its fuel exports if needed to ensure availability in the local markets Reuters quoted a government official saying on Thursday the joint secretary in the ministry of petroleum and natural gas said that domestic consumption is a priority and the government will review the export plan China has stopped exporting by the way something we discussed on the core report a few weeks ago and asked whether India would do the same.

Indian Exports

Where could India end the current financial year in terms of exports of both goods and services of clearly what's been a very turbulent period India's exports continue to grow in the fiscal year through February led by services while imports rose faster widening the country's trade deficit according to data put together by the global trade research initiative or GTRI.

Total exports of goods and services touched about 791 billion dollars in the April to February 25-26 period that's up about six percent from the same period a year earlier. Merchandise exports rose only to about 403 billion reflecting weak global demand and services exports rose 10 percent to about 388 billion. The interesting thing is that trade with the United States was positive India's exports to the U.S. touched about 79 billion dollars in that April to February period which is up about 3.8 percent from a year earlier despite the higher tariffs on several products and what could happen now with a 10 percent tariff and we'll come to that in a moment.

If the current trend holds GTRI says India's total exports could touch about 863 billion dollars for the full year including 439 billion dollars in merchandise exports and 423 billion dollars in services exports so you can see that physical goods and services exports are almost equalising by the end of the year. India imported about 900 billion dollars worth of goods during April to February that same period a 7.4 percent increase from the previous year. Merchandise imports were at about 713 billion dollars driven by strong demand for energy electronics and intermediate goods while services imports increased more moderately to 187 billion dollars.

GTRI also points out that there could be higher remittance flows for 24-25 overseas Indians sent about 135 billion dollars and if remittances remain at similar levels it would more than offset the merchandise trade deficit. Now to come back to the tariff rate for exports into the United States which is at 10 percent. Where do we stand today and is there any relief on the trade front with the United States ahead? I reached out to Ajay Srivastava founder of the Global Trade Research Initiative based out of New Delhi and I began by asking him how he was seeing trade trends right now.

INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPT

Ajay Srivastava: So, Govind, if we divide our exports into goods and services, it will be easier for us to see the growth. So, goods growth is almost flat. So, exports were where they were last year, and we are lucky for that, despite upheavals in the U.S. fund. Services, of course, has grown more than 10%. So, overall exports growth is about 6%. That's a good sign.

U.S. exports are presently variable. In fact, we have two data sets. One is January to December 2025 over 24.

The exports grew by more than 15%, $82 billion to $92 billion. And within this January to December, if we focus on April to December, the exports were down by 21%. So, January, April to December exports, 2025, they were down by 15% over previous year's same period.

But January to December, they were up by 15%. What does that tell us? It tells us that January to March, April, they rose fairly quickly.

In the first three months of last year, they rose quickly. And now this year, if we look at the data for April to February, then since April to December were down by 21%, and April to February are up by 2.8%. That means our exports in January and February have picked up massively from minus 15% negative in the positive trajectory of 3.8%. So, January to February exports have picked up and they must have picked up because of anticipation, because this joint statement came only on PEP 6.

But people were talking that deal may happen, deal may come and both the sides in many sectors, for example, textiles, garments, leather, they were taking losses. Both the sides, they were taking losses to continue the business. I think that must have paid them off and if it's been good in the trade fields.

Right. And the current tariff is 10%. Is that correct?

So current tariff is 10% plus whatever is the MFN tariffs, which varies with the product. So for a garment exporter, what would it be at this point? If I talk about dent shirts, the MFN tariff is 12%.

So it's 12% plus 10%, 22%. It used to be 80% plus 50% would be 62%.

Govindraj Ethiraj: Yeah. So, and there is no change in this 10% figure as of now. I'm really asking because there's some confusion.

I'm sure maybe it's not for the exporters, but at least for the world outside, what exactly is applicable in terms of the tariffs post the Supreme Court decision?

Ajay Srivastava: It's 10% plus MFN. Trump administration doesn't have power to patch MFN tariffs, cut MFN tariffs. And they impose this 10% over and above that.

So today, starting from 24th of Feb, the tariffs for all over the world on exports to US are MFN tariffs plus 10%.

Govindraj Ethiraj: Got it. And what's the path forward likely to be? You had written a note on Malaysia pulling out of the tariff deal officially or formally, and basically saying that we will stick to 10%.

India's own statements in subsequent days suggest that we are waiting, or rather we will wait before we sign anything. So does India need to formally announce something? Or if we do nothing, is it assumed that we are basically going by the 10% tariff rate?

Ajay Srivastava: You know, when this joint statement was signed on 6th Feb, it was expected that the US would be issuing notification implementing this 18% tariff. But since Supreme Court judgement came, lowered the tariffs below 18% to 10%, US side did not see any need for notification for India. Indian side was also expected to give its long list of the products where they specifically cut the tariffs for the US products.

It was to come on mid-March. It has not come. It means both the sides are keeping quiet at this point of time, and they may take action in future.

But this is not the dilemma only India is facing. India's deal was only at first stage where the statement of intent was issued, that is joint statement. It was not implemented.

But many countries have implemented. For example, UK, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, Indonesia, European Union. They did the framework agreement.

They implemented the agreement with the US. So they are trading with the US at the new negotiated tariffs. Now, the problem with all of them is that, for example, Europe, Japan, Korea, they negotiate 15% tariff.

Now, whole of the world will pay 10% tariff. They also will have to pay 10% tariffs. So you have a trade deal.

You pay 10% tariff to the US. So what's the need for the trade deal, especially when you have been extracted heavy price by the US in terms of billions of dollars of commitments, cutting off tariffs, and so many other commitments are there. So what's the need for that?

One more thing. I'm talking to my friends in, say, Belgium, Japan, Korea. They say one more thing.

Now, they have done the trade deal. It's under implementation. And even after that, US is not stopping.

There is no peace for them. US has started now Section 301 investigations over them. That means US may be imposing fresh penalties, fresh tariffs.

So there is no peace even after doing the trade deal. So the clear question amongst everybody is this, what's the utility of the trade deal? Since the reciprocal tariffs, that was the carrot dangled by the US to get to the trade deal.

Now that is gone. So there is no incentive from the US side. So what's the need for the trade deal, especially when US is not stopping even after the trade deal?

They are starting new investigations. So that's the feeling. And Malaysia took the lead.

They overcommitted themselves and they very smartly, they took a decision to come out on the deal.

Govindraj Ethiraj: Right. Speaking about the new investigation, and that's my last question as well. So you mentioned that this is linked to forced labour practises or one set of investigations is linked to alleged forced labour practises.

And those forced labour practises could happen outside India. But if they involve, let's say, inputs or raw material for goods that come to India, and then subsequently the finished product is exported from India, then India too can face those strictures. So what's your sense?

Is there or are there things that we are importing, which could be falling under this category?

Ajay Srivastava: So US has been investigating China, especially the Xinjiang province, where they feel that people, they are being used for forced labour to produce solar panels and electronics and many products. And they are distributed across many Chinese provinces. So US wants to stop the use of that.

So for example, if India is importing solar cells from China or wafers from China or APIs from China, and the US would prove that it's made using forced labour in China, then US would be imposing heavy tariffs on India for use of that. That US may be doing across 60 economies, including European Union for this. There's one more investigation.

First is, as you rightly said, about the forced labour. Second investigation is about excess industrial capacity. The way US is talking about excess industrial capacity is simply laughable.

What they say, India has excess industrial capacity in solar panels. India's capacity is three times India's requirement. They are also investigating India for textiles.

That means whatever you are exporting, that means you have surplus of that item. That's why exporting. So they're stretching the logic, forgetting that US is flouting all these rules inside to various ads, giving subsidies so much.

But US, being US, they launched these and we expect the results before the end of the week.

Govindraj Ethiraj: And this is a one-sided investigation, as in, does India have a voice in this? So countries like India, do we have a voice in this? No, no, their investigation process on paper looks very perfect.

Ajay Srivastava: They say anybody can submit written submissions and they will consult the country in the first week of May. And then after that, they will take a call. The basic point remains, the people like me, it looks like they are threatening countries not to walk out of the trade deal, else be ready to face massive new tariffs.

But it's putting people off.

Govindraj Ethiraj: Right. Mr. Srivastava, thank you so much for joining me.

Ajay Srivastava: Thanks, Govind.