Western Astrology

Our previous article talked about Indian Astrology and explained how it works. Now, we will focus on Western astrology that is widely prevalent in western countries. Its origin is traced to great ancient culture of Mesopotamia. It is said to be originated there and later on spread to other parts of the world. Egypt played a great role in development of western astrology. From Egypt, it moved to the historical land of Greece and there is witnessed the incorporation of new concepts.

Ptolemy was a Greek astrologer and astronomer and he is credited with introducing western astrological tradition. He wrote a book named ‘Tetrabiblos’ which contained foundations of the western astrological tradition. His theory took time of birth of a person in consideration and derived horoscope. Western astrology works on a different pattern than our own Indian astrology. According to them, different times witness different position of the cosmic bodies and that affects how our lives pan out.

Later on, western astrology moved to Middle-East and Arab and Persian scholars helped in reviving and refining western astrology and sent it to Europe. Astrology played a major role in European society. In medieval Europe, no function or policy announcement was performed without consulting astrologers. Western astrology is made up of twelve signs and further subdivided into four basic elements, Fire, Earth, Air and Water. The twelve zodiac signs represent twelve basic personality types.

Indian Astrology

Astrology is a very interesting subject. People from all over the world take help of astrology to figure out things in their lives. Astrology is a very ancient system. It has evolved and flourished over the years. If we talk about Indian astrology, it is also known as Jyotish or Jyotish astrology, Vedic astrology and Hindu astrology. The essence of astrology is to analyze the movements of the celestial bodies along with the divisions of time dependent. The Hindu Vedic religion had provision of several disciplines. One of the disciplines ‘Vedanga’ includes Indian Jyotish astrology as one of its six branches. Indian astrology is quite different from western astrology in terms of principles.

Unlike western astrology, jyotish does not rely heavily on tropical zodiac. However, it does use a bit of it for predicting the course of nature. Present since ancient times, Indian astrology has originated from spiritual customs of India. Jyotish shastra uses elements of karma and planet movements. It empowers with reality and knowledge. It uses subjects like mathematics, architecture, medical and military applications. According to Hindu scriptures, planets are also known as grahas. These grahas are known to affect a person’s life in a major way. The jyotish helps in understanding how movements of planets affect a person’s life. It also teaches ways to get rid of those hardships. Indian astrology uses 12 signs. These signs are also known as rashi. Once the reasons of problems are found out, religious ceremonies are performed to alleviate the problems.

Benefits of Tulsi Tea

Let’s talk about India’s ancient richness Herbs and Ayurveda. This form of science has given us several miracles. Known to be one of the oldest forms of medicine, Ayurveda is full of benefits and wonder methods. One of the plant and leaves often recommended by Ayurveda masters is tulsi herb. It is also known as holy basil. Found in almost all the households of India, tulsi has not only religious but health significance also. Western world has also started to acknowledge its benefits and one can see tulsi tea or tulsi supplements available in western stores.

Tulsi tea is made of tulsi herbs and it is very tasty. It can be enjoyed in both hot and cold form. It is recommended that tulsi tea should be a part of our day to day lives. Tulsi tea does not contain any caffeine and provides us amazing health benefits. One can also enjoy it in summer with ice and a squirt of lemon. The ideal to prepare it is in normal black tea mould with infusion of tulsi in gently boiled water and leaving it for two minutes. It helps our body from diseases by giving us effective antioxidants. It also helps in improved memory, healthy heart and vision. Tulsi tea is known to contribute significantly in strengthening of immune system. Other benefits include lessening arthritis pain and inflammation.

We live in a stressful environment and tulsi tea is known to provide calming effect. Its anti-stress properties are nothing less than blessings in the times of stress and consistent tension. Also known as queen of herbs, its healing properties have always been acknowledged in India. Tulsi has been regularly used in formation of Ayurveda medicines.

Facts about Papaya

The importance of health and nutrition can not be emphasized any further. We keep coming across world of information pertaining to different aspects of health and fitness. One of the most nutritious fruit is papaya. It is also a commonly seen fruit and available in almost every part of the country. Papaya plant is surprisingly not a tree but rather an overgrown herb. This herb is scientifically known as herbaceous perennial. It is found in almost all the tropical destinations. Central America especially Mexico is said to be the birthplace of this delicious fruit.

Papaya offers many nutritional values and foremost among them is in digestion. Papaya contains papain that helps in breaking down the protein and consequently that proves tremendously useful in digestion. Papaya is also considered wonderful for the people who want to lose weight. So all those people struggling with weight issues, start nibbling on this nutritional masterpiece. Apart from that papayas are known for having huge amount of folate, vitamin C and potassium. Other crucial things contained within papaya are, lycopene, vitamin A, carotenoids lutein (very important for eyes), vitamin E and zeaxanthin.

Papaya scores heavily in terms of its nutritional values. Compared to other fruits, it is definitely a nutritional masterpiece. It is recommended to eat 2 cups of papaya on a daily basis. One can use them in salad or blend them into sauces or salad dressings or even salsa.

Market Cap and Free Float Method

Most of you must have come across data pertaining to top companies. Many institutions and prestigious magazines publish such data every now and then. While deciding about a company’s position and size, few parameters are used. One of them and the most common one is market capitalization. Other parameters could be sales figure, net profit, or gross profit. Talking about market capitalization, it basically refers to multiplication of number of shares of a company and market value of each share. For example, if company X has total 1 million shares and per share value is Rs 50 then market capitalization of company X will be 50 multiplied by 1 million and that comes to Rs 50 million.

If we talk about market capitalization in terms of index then all the stocks listed in the index has a certain weight attached to it. This weight depends upon the market capitalization of the particular company. More the weightage of a company, higher the chances of it impacting the index. Also known as full market capitalization methodology. One more term that will help us knowing this concept even better is free float weightage. It refers to the fact that not the entire lots of shares are taken into consideration while giving weightage to the company in the index.

That’s because not all the shares are for trading. A good percentage of the shares are unavailable for trading because they are held by promoters or FII or government. In such case, the number of shares available for trade is multiplied by share prices and that’s how weightage of the stock is decided. India stock exchange; BSE use free-float method whereas NIFTY uses market cap method.

Stock Exchange- Advance Information

Previous article covered basics of stock exchange. To continue with our learning, let’s talk about few other interesting facts. Stock market is an indicator of price movement of the equity market. Whenever you hear that Sensex is rising it means prices of the stocks are going up. Now you must be wondering why the prices rise or fall? There could be few valid reasons for that. There will be news from macro-perspective. These news could be of terrorist attack, nuclear attack, war declaration, interim budget, news about monsoon, change in government etc. known as index news, these developments can make movements of index very volatile. All the above mentioned news can affect prices of all the stocks listed in the stock exchange. In popular terms, this is known as sentiments of the market or market sentiments. For example, when terrorists attacked Taj hotel in Mumbai, stock prices fell.

Stock specific news is different from index news. The former one refers to particular news about a company, its financial results, product launch, and news of collaboration or tax exemptions by government etc. such news have great power to affect the price movement of a particular stock. To maintain balance in price movements, the authorities make sure to pick stocks from diverse sectors.

That ensures even if particular news pertaining to one sector is causing heavy price movements in stocks of that sector, other stocks are not getting affected by it. That way balance is maintained and Sensex saves itself from forced manipulation.

Sensex – Basic Knowledge

Stock market has become an important part of several people. A robust stock market is indicative of a country’s rising wealth. Sky-rocketing stock exchange symbolizes power and growth of an economy. From India’s point of view Bombay Stock Exchange is the barometer of our financial health and performance indicator of hundreds of companies listed over there. Also known as Sensex, it has witnessed a topsy-turvy ride in last one year after 4-5 years of uninterrupted rise.

There are few not so known facts about Sensex. Let’s take a look at few of those interesting facts. However, to begin with Sensex is nothing but an abbreviated version of The Bombay Stock Exchange Sensitive Index. Sensex along with Nifty is most renowned terms in popular stock market. Nifty denotes National Stock Exchange whereas Sensex is the standard benchmark index of Indian stock market. Nifty is also known as S&P CNX Nifty in official terms. Nifty comprises of top 50 stocks whereas Sensex is comprised of 30 stocks.

Stocks represented in Sensex and Nifty belongs to diverse sectors and all of them are shining lights of their respective industries. Index committee also known as stock selection committee chooses these stocks based on market capitalization and industry standing. However there are few basic conditions to be fulfilled before getting picked in the index. One of them is chosen company must be among the top 150 companies in terms of trade number. Trade number signifies both number of shares sold and purchased apart from average value of trade. This data is considered over a period of one year.