Returning to Nepal with a US degree, good or a bad idea?

 What about the current power crisis in Nepal? I am heading home pretty soon. I have made arrangements for web work from my current place of work. But I fret about the loadshedding. How bad does it get and are there any hope for immediate future? The generator thing would be pretty costly, I guess. I am thinking of solar options. Does anyone have any idead regarding a way to get over the power crisis so that one can operate at least two computers for at least 12hrs a days.

Ashu makes sense in #7.

However, the question is: Why would a guy with Capital Market background go to Nepal?  South Asia is not yet a "Capital Market" market.  One day I thought to have fun and run a screen for Investment Banking clients in Nepal.  Guess what, my analyst brought me the spreadsheet in the evening and it was very interesting. There was only ONE company that came in the radar of investment banking.  Now, should we just do one deal and retire?  In a country like India, I found 792 companies; the likelihood of paying the hefty fees of investment bankers is slim.  One of the CEOs I was chatting with almost got a heart attack when I told him that our initial consultation fees is $50K USD.  He immediatly ran the numbers into Indian Rupees and said he can't afford IB service.  Last week, I had a meeting with the CFO of a Chinese publicly traded firm.  Although they were sitting on 11Mil USD cash, they were hesitant in paying our discounted retainer fee of $45K.  We refused to attend the second round of call.  I must say, China has volume in terms of great EBITDA margin companies.  But when it comes to capital market activity, it's dormant.

Name	Value	Scale	Unit	Simple Growth Rate %	Y-o-Y Change %	Annual % Rate
Balance of Payments - Nepal  (Quarterly)	-453.32	Million	US Dollar	-	-	-
CPI (Y-o-Y %) - Nepal  (Monthly)	10.45	Actual	Percentage	-	-	-
Current Account Balance - Nepal  (Annual)	-256.07	Million	US Dollar	-	-	-
Current Account Balance - Nepal  (Quarterly)	-984.88	Million	US Dollar	-	-	-
Current Account Balance (% of GDP) - Nepal  (Annual)	-1.65	Actual	Percentage	-	-	-
Exchange Rate - Nepal  (Monthly)	72.56	Actual	Nepalese Rupee	0.25 %	(1.26) %	3.06 %
Exports (USD) - Nepal  (Monthly)	75.38	Million	US Dollar	(1.24) %	36.35 %	(13.96) %
Foreign Currency Reserves - Nepal  (Annual)	1.49	Billion	US Dollar	2.60 %	2.60 %	2.60 %
Foreign Currency Reserves - Nepal  (Monthly)	1.64	Billion	US Dollar	3.32 %	7.86 %	47.92 %
Foreign Currency Reserves - Nepal  (Quarterly)	1.58	Billion	US Dollar	5.80 %	5.62 %	25.27 %
Foreign Currency Reserves (% of GDP) - Nepal  (Annual)	21.47	Actual	Percentage	-	-	-
Foreign Direct Investment Inflows - Nepal  (Quarterly)	17.97	Million	US Dollar	(44.86) %	417.10 %	(90.76) %
GDP - Nominal - Nepal  (Annual)	522666	Million	Nepalese Rupee	2.50 %	2.50 %	2.50 %
GDP - Real - Nepal  (Annual)	96612	Million	Nepalese Rupee	5.80 %	5.80 %	5.80 %
GDP - Real (Growth - YoY%) - Nepal  (Annual)	5.8	Actual	Percentage	-	-	-
GDP - Real (USD) - Nepal  (Annual)	5644.04	Million	US Dollar	5.80 %	5.80 %	5.80 %
GDP Per Capita - Nominal - Nepal  (Annual)	18477.25	Actual	Nepalese Rupee	0.58 %	0.58 %	0.58 %
Imports (USD) - Nepal  (Monthly)	197.95	Million	US Dollar	15.36 %	1.66 %	455.52 %
Population - Nepal  (Annual)	29.33	Million	Persons	1.81 %	1.81 %	1.81 %
Reserves - Total - Nepal  (Monthly)	1654.79	Million	US Dollar	3.30 %	7.78 %	47.59 %
Trade Balance (USD) - Nepal  (Monthly)	-122.57	Million	US Dollar	-	-	-

 i thought that we already established that going to Nepal to for doing exceptionally well is depended on you family background, your talent  of course and how much money you have. sorry , no offense but i don't need anyone to tell me that Nepal is poorer than USA. there is 40% or more unemployment rate in Nepal,but i am sureif i go there tomorrow i can land a job withing a couple months, and i don't ahve any family members or friends that is sitting in Nepal as umemployed but sadly i can't say the same things about my friends in the usa and ironically the state i live only has about 8-9% unemployment rate. so yes it does matter where you are but what matters the most is what is your status in that place and what kind of background you have too. also lets not forget personal reasons to go to Nepal after graduation not just money and career. 

Nagarikreport asks:

"However, the question is: Why would a guy with Capital Market background go to Nepal?"

Depends on what the guy wants to do in Nepal. Not every guy -- including bulge-bracket bankers -- wants to do the same thing.

This guy, an Indian national now working Nepal for a private firm, seems to have made a choice for himself for now.

http://www.abhiyan.com.np/article-personality_25_magh

In any case, I see the development of (capital) markets as a 'marathon' sort of work, which takes years and years to develop and mature.

oohi
ashu

@ Ashu,

Agreed.  Let's not ignore the trend though.  Most bulge bracket bankers eventually start their own BD (including myself).  The reason is only one: more money.  We are about 40 in our firm and we all come from bulge bracket.  When asked why we chose to leave JPMorgan, Goldman...the answer is same, more money.  Even a struggling ibanker makes more money than anyone else could possibly fathom.  Capital market is not known to everyone.  Even in US, only the corporate development, capital market and few others know what ibankers do.  I have failed to educate my dad what ibankers do.  Since he lives in Nepal, for him banking is all about deposits and money.  ibanking is all about advising at least to micro cap companies.

Good to have your feedback though.

 God, we seriously got some veterans here in this thread. It's amazing to read the views of people from different backgrounds like, IT, Business, Journalism etc. Even though i don't want to post anything on this thread because i think my level of understanding and expressing is way too much lower than the people here in this thread. Just wanted to say great job and keep going with all your ideas, hopefully i'll be able to follow all your ideas and do something better for myself as well as my country. 

Yea....keep dreaming. Those who really do it , DO NOT have time to sajha and waste time posting their theasis.



Look what he says about our people, nailed it.

 vhootee, i am sorry to say but i think you got it wrong, people here in this thread are not dreaming but just sharing and expressing the ideas about their experience on their own field. I've also watch the French Cowboy in Nepal as well, and i really do admire the guts of that guy who chose Nepal as his destination, left his journalism career and is doing business in Nepal. Correct me if i am wrong but that's what people are talking here in this thread. They are talking about how our generation can make a huge difference after going back to Nepal and how we can open an opportunity for our upcoming generation. sorry bro, didn't mean to educate you but trying to show the right direction to look for everything in positive way. Thanks.

bd 

What will be best buisness with the 10 karods as intial investments?

 8848m, i've known you from years here in sajha. I am positive that you will do enough of research before investing that much of money on anything in Nepal or overseas but if i were you, i would first do enough homework with enough people from various field. Even though every people have their own opionion depending upon which field they are from but i would listen to everybody first. I don't whether you've updated with this thread or not but if you keep reading from the beginning, trust me, you can find lots of valuable things here. Last but not the least good luck bro. 

 This French Guy is good, may be he will start making a wine factory in Nuwakot. 

It is really good to have some french working in agricultural field in Nepal. I lived in France for few years and there are tons of things to be learned from that country culturally as well as in tourisme. In many ways Nepal has a great potential in tourisme, both internal and external. Since nepal's ecology is quite fragile, it cannot support huge industries. So a better bet would be to go for mico economy. One example from France that I saw during my stay, a lot of torn down old traditional country houses were renovated by new habitants giving them charm and touristic value. In Nepal we should also encourgae this kind of trend instead of building cement blocks which are not very compltable with the surrouding and look damn ugly.

That French citizen looks like Hollywood star From the move 'the incredible hulk'

Its long term plan Bolevard. Thanks Buddy.

 8848M, You're welcome sir, talking about the long term plan. 10 crore is huge sum of money. One can do anything whatever they want with that much of money depending on their interest. If you ask me, than being a journalism major, i would say i would like to open an new media house in Nepal but that might be something you might not have interest in. With that kind of money you can generate a new job related to IT, Software, Business, Agriculture etc.

Now the question is whether you want to work hard in the field or you want to stay inside the office and be a CEO. If you wan't a white color job than obviously you can do some homework and talk with the entrepreneur and try to create new ideas where you can invest the money or if you don't want to do that and want to stay outside of ktm, than go and talk with the  farmers outside the like village like  Pokhara, Chitwan, Gorkha, Birgunj, Dharan, Nuwakot and see what's the most growing agricultural business. I would suggest, Animal breeding like cow, buffalo, fish etc or you can also think of growing fruits, vegetable, honey and other things as well. But remember that this is very difficult task, you can't just rely on somebody and leave it. You yourself have to be in the field all the time before the business grows. 

If i were you i would definitely go to some village and do the same thing because i don't think i will be able to adjust with the environment of KTM anymore, One's life is terrible in KTM, Most importantly KTM is not far from Nuwakot, Gorkha, POkhara and Chitwan. You can always crash into KTM during the weekends for hangout, like the people of country do here in U.S in most of the cities. My two cents :-) Have a great weekend. 

bd

 10 karod bhae pachhi pani afai kam garne ho? Just give me the money, and I will do whatever business you ask me to start:)

Honesty, if I have 10 karod, this is what I always wanted to do.
  (i) Start 24 hour convenient stores in some parts of Kathmandu as a pilot project. Most of them will initially be located near police office. [Allocated 1~2 karod my own money, get loans from the bank if insufficient for this]
 (ii) Somewhere afar, near river Trishuli, I want to start food processing factory. I want to make a few small chhapro near Trishuli and play baghchal with my workers. I want to make sure their children are getting good education and die with infinite happiness that at least 100 families lived better because of me.

 24 hour convinient store is a great idea newStudent, Like the way they have Conoco, QT, Shell and Love's, one can always think about opening a franchise location in some parts of Nepal. I think that's going to be a good and profitable business. I like the way you said that you wanted to buil a chapro and play baghchal with your workers but one question bro, are you gonna pay for the hourly wage to your workers for the time they play baghchal with you or not?  Just kidding ;-) 

 Factory workers won't be hired in hourly basis, Boulevard Dreams. 

There is a reason why I want to do it. I used to go to 'paani laauna' in our Terai farm in Asar-Bhadau period after planting rice. It used to be very hot, and we had a small chhapro near our farm. Some of us honed our Baghchal skill there. I was very good at Baghchal.

 Yeah of course they won't get hired on hourly, i was just kidding, no offense. 

Though i haven't never done that but yeah i remember when i was child, my grandfather and grandmother used to go to the field and when they come home working all day they used to do some enjoyment by singing and playing some musical instrument. Even though that was not something that i was interested in doing when i was a kid but now i think that was the best thing that one can do all of them were happy. When i look at myself, i feel like i'm living luxuious life, i have almost all the basic needs that a human beings need but still i'm not happy, don't know why :-(

 During today's lunch hour, I was talking to a co-worker who did her MBA from the US and she sounded extremely upset as she's lost her independence. Further, she's married to a dude who was brought up in a traditional family and she said her in-laws nagged her about her dress code ( she wears pants while working at the bank as opposed to her in-laws' desire to wear saree ). 

I don't know...Women seem to really "suffer" a lot by returning back....