The central bank's tough new rules spell major changes in the competitive landscape for financial services audits.
Catamaran, the family office of Infosys founder Narayana Murthy, is targeting 15 per cent returns on its portfolio investments per annum as it shifts focus from early-stage investments to growth and late-stage bets. This would double the firm's assets under management (AUM) from the current $1 billion to $2 billion over the next five years. "For direct investments, we are focusing on growth-stage investments and very selectively on early stage," Deepak Padaki, president, Catamaran, told Business Standard. "(This is) primarily because the early-stage space in India, in the last three-four years, has completely changed. "There has been a huge influx of capital in the last two years. It has become a very crowded space for early-stage investment," he said.
Believe it or not, the regulator is even stretching its arm to identify stressed borrowers and gauge the 'distance to default' as a measure of a particular bank's fragility, reveals Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
There has been an exponential increase in the use of technology to validate financial numbers, with a greater reliance on electronic evidence, use of live videos where possible, data analytics, and project management software to overcome the physical limitations in verifying transactions and accounts.
'Elections in Madhya Pradesh have so far largely avoided freebies.' 'But this time both the Congress and BJP are making such announcements.'
Despite the hope that lessons will be learnt, the next accident invariably shows that nothing has been learnt -- or if learnt, they have been ignored, observes Prosenjit Datta.
Bernard Madoff's accountant for nearly two decades was on Wednesday charged with securities fraud as US prosecutors widened their investigation into one of the biggest investment frauds in history.
ITC's first foreign venture in the hotel space - a premium and luxury mixed-use development - has been "adversely impacted" by Sri Lanka's economic crisis, the firm said. The $300-million project under WelcomHotels Lanka (Private) Limited (WLPL), a wholly-owned subsidiary of ITC, comprises a luxury hotel and a super-premium residential apartment complex on 5.86 acres of prime sea-facing land in Colombo. In its latest annual report for financial year 2021-22 (FY22), ITC mentioned that the project's construction was running on schedule till the third quarter (Q3) of FY19, but was adversely impacted due to disruptions in the aftermath of the terror incidents in 2019 and thereafter by recurrent waves of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Kavitha has asserted that she had done nothing wrong and alleged that the BJP-led Centre was "using" the ED as the saffron party could not gain a "backdoor entry" in Telangana.
Railway officials also indicated that possible 'sabotage' and tampering with the electronic interlocking system, which detects the presence of trains, led to the Friday accident.
This, Byju, was the time to apply the business lens, treat your company as a business, run your company as a business. Instead, you splurged, observes Suveen Sinha.
Although there is a lot of talk on social justice, Dalits in Tamil Nadu face atrocities of some kind every other day, Governor R N Ravi has said, apparently targeting the ruling Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam after a gap of about a month.
A key feature of the new version is to identify the people transacting on its portal by linking each user ID with the person's permanent account number (PAN), followed by a two-factor authentication through mobiles and email IDs. Those who cannot complete the KYC requirements cannot use the portal.
Chahal was facing multiple allegations with the primary one being, the enrolment of illegal voting members without consent from the Apex Council.
The RBI on Friday asked Paytm Payments Bank to stop opening new accounts amid "material supervisory concerns" observed in the bank. "Reserve Bank of India has today, in exercise of its powers, inter alia, under section 35A of the Banking Regulation Act, 1949, directed Paytm Payments Bank Ltd to stop, with immediate effect, onboarding of new customers," the central bank said in a statement. The bank has also been directed to appoint an IT audit firm to conduct a comprehensive system audit of its IT system.
The Sena and Shiv Sena-Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray labelled each other gaddar (traitor) after Shinde's rebellion split their original party last year, while Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis publicly asserted he had exacted revenge on Thackeray for his betrayal.
Maharashtra Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) president Jayant Patil appeared before the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in Mumbai on Monday in a money laundering case linked to alleged financial irregularities in the now bankrupt financial services firm Infrastructure Leasing and Financial Services Limited (IL&FS), an official said.
'It's an open secret that the UK business is structurally not in a great place.'
Sebi's move will help curb the illicit practice of keeping the parent company's account clean while maintaining debt in its subsidiaries.
One fallout of Rahul Gandhi's disqualification will be reflected in the Opposition's role in Parliament and related institutions.
US short seller Hindenburg Research has rejected Adani Group's charge that its report was an attack on India, saying a "fraud" cannot be obfuscated by nationalism or a bloated response that ignored response to key allegations. Commenting on the 413-page response Adani Group released late on Sunday evening in response to its report, Hindenburg said it believed India was a vibrant democracy and an emerging superpower with an exciting future and it was Adani Group which was holding it back through "systematic loot". Hindenburg stood by its last week's report that said its two-year investigation found Adani Group "engaged in a brazen stock manipulation and accounting fraud scheme over the course of decades".
The affidavit was filed in response to a petition seeking a direction to declare the PM CARES Fund a 'State' under the Constitution to ensure transparency in its functioning.
The Reserve Bank of India has on Wednesday lifted the ban on new customer acquisition by American Express which was imposed with effect from May 2021 due to non-compliance with local data storage norms. "In view of the satisfactory compliance demonstrated by American Express Banking Corp. with the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) circular dated April 6, 2018, on Storage of Payment System Data, the restrictions imposed, vide order dated April 23, 2021, on onboarding of new domestic customers have been lifted with immediate effect," RBI said. Similar bans were imposed on Diners Club International and Mastercard previously.
Significant controls and exemptions to the government under the proposed Digital Personal Data Protection bill 2022 are likely to make it harder for companies to invest in data centres and data processing activities in India, according to global technology industry body ITI. The ministry of electronics and IT has floated draft Digital Personal Data Protection (DPDP) Bill 2022 and has invited comments on the same till January 2. "The Bill grants significant controls to the executive arm of GOI (Government of India) and delegates much of the detailed rulemaking authority to separate, as yet undefined processes.
The decision to seek tie-up details from CA firms, especially those associated with the Big 4 -- PWC, Ernst & Young, KPMG and Deloitte -- follows a report by an Institute of Chartered Accountants of India committee on the multi-crore Satyam scam.
'They (the ransomware attackers) are not after any VVIP data.' 'Had that been the case, they would have quietly installed a different malware.'
Mihir Tanna, Associate Director, S K Patodia & Associates, answers your tax queries.
'We now understand things that we have to correct.'
Everything Everywhere All forgets to tell a coherent story, complains Mayur Sanap.
The Opposition party asked whether the prime minister will take responsibility for the 'deadliest rail tragedy' of this century.
Deloitte had challenged the jurisdiction of the NCLT to ban it, saying section 140(5) of the Companies Act pertains to auditors who are still auditing the company in question while it has already resigned from the service and thus cannot be banned under the given provisions.
Maharashtra Congress leader and former Lok Sabha MP Milind Deora has demanded a Central Bureau of Investigation probe into Rs 12,000 crore spent by Mumbai's civic body on road works between 2017 and 2022.
Experts say, auditors must not allow themselves to be intimidated by the client management into conducting audits by conversation. It is important for auditors to conduct proper interviews and ask probing and searching questions.
Mihir Tanna, Associate Director, S K Patodia & Associates, answers your tax queries.
Special audit report conducted by the PricewaterhouseCoopers on Multi Commodity Exchange has met with another opposition. Earlier FTIL, the promoter of MCX had opposed its contents and now Venkat Chary who is FTIL's non-executive chairman has sent a notice to PwC. PwC report submitted to the FMC in last April mentioned the names of Key Management Personnel of MCX and the name of Venkat Chary was mentioned in that list. Chary was Chairman, MCX, during that period. Chary who had in past also served as Chairman of FMC objected to the PwC mentioning his name as the key management personal of MCX. He wrote to the audit firm saying that he was FMC-nominated Non-executive Independent Director and Chairman on the Board of Directors of MCX till July 13 when he resigned following revised FMC guidelines which laid down 70 years as the maximum age for Chairman/Director. Chary sighted provisions of Companies act and Section 2(51) of the Companies Act, which defines " key managerial personnel" in relation to a company include CEO or MD, whole time director, CFO, company secretary and other officer as prescribed. "As non-executive independent director and Chairman nominated/approved by the FMC, I did not fall within any of the above categories," said Chary and hence blamed PWC for not showing due diligence in your special Report to the FMC. Chary has sent a notice to PWC asking it to take immediate steps to rectify this error. Since PwC Report was placed in the public domain, "it has caused serious damages to my reputation as a practising Advocate of the Bombay High Court." Chary has asked PWC if remedial action are not taken he will report the case to the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India for professional misconduct under the Chartered Accountants Act, 1949, by showing gross negligence in the in professional duties. Chary has said, "I also intend to resort to the civil and criminal courts for damages/action against PWC." When contacted PwC spokesperson said that, "Our work has been executed to the expected professional standards and we stand by the content of our report submitted to the Forward Markets Commission". Chary is not the first to oppose PWC, FTIL it self had said the report was prepared without giving them chance to respond and have not accepted contents. Recently, Riddhi Soddhi Bullion, had sent a legal notice for mentioning its name as 'indulging in wash trades on MCX.' The leading bullion trader had claimed damages in their defamation suit.
More than 70 per cent of Indian youth aged between 15 and 29 can't!
Regulatory capacity, hyperactivity and excessive prescription are the biggest challenges the financial sector is facing, said Meleveetil Damodaran, former chairperson, Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi). Speaking at the Business Standard BFSI Summit on Wednesday, Damodaran highlighted the need for simpler, clear, and continuous regulations in the financial sector. He opined that the industry had felt it challenging to keep pace with the changing regulations.
The auditors -- the local arms of the Big Four global firms Deloitte Haskins & Sells and KPMG which has BSR & Associates as an affiliate here-had challenged the jurisdiction of the NCLT to ban them.
A special court on Saturday granted bail to four former Indian Air Force (IAF) officers in the AgustaWestland chopper deal corruption case after they appeared before it following summons issued on the last date of hearing.
