Inflows into foreign currency non-resident (bank), or FCNR (B), deposits have significantly underperformed market expectations, leading to a more than 1 per cent depreciation of the rupee against the dollar this week. Analysts point to fading RBI support measures, tepid interest due to rising global bond yields, and narrowing interest rate spreads compared to 2013 as key challenges.
India and China are in what experts call 'a cooperation-versus-competition situation'.
The central bank is yet to consider actions such as a rate hike or mobilising dollar inflows from non-resident Indians to boost forex reserves as it cannot afford to continue with them for long when the rupee's internationalisation tops its agenda, explains Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
The Reserve Bank of India's 2024 norms for the voluntary conversion of Small Finance Banks (SFBs) into universal banks, particularly the subjective 'diversified loan portfolio' criterion, are proving to be a significant hurdle, with Ujjivan SFB and Jana SFB having their applications returned.
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Wednesday met the long-standing demand of banks by allowing them to finance acquisitions by Indian companies, a move that also expands banks' capital market lending in the country.
In 2023-2024, 95 scheduled commercial banks received over 10 million complaints from their customers. The process of KYC at many banks has become 'HYC' -- harass your customer, points out Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
India Inc, which is sitting on cash balances of 13.5 trillion, is using the funds to meet capital expenditure as well as brownfield expansion, resulting in 'anaemic' demand for bank loans, State Bank of India (SBI) chairman CS Setty said at an event on Monday. He added that a slowdown in corporate credit is mainly due to lack of demand.
UCO Bank, Bank of Maharashtra, Bank of India, Indian Overseas Bank, Indian Bank, and Central Bank of India don't have a non-executive chairman.
State Bank of India (SBI), the largest lender in the country, has launched a share sale to institutional investors to raise upto Rs 25,000 crore, the biggest qualified institutional placement (QIP) so far by an Indian firm, and has set a floor price of Rs 811.05, which is at a 2.5 per cent discount on Wednesday's closing price.
Banks have raised concerns over the new international trade settlement in rupee, fearing that facilitation of such a mechanism could result in them facing the ire of economic sanctions by the West, people aware of the matter said. Large banks with overseas operations have sought clarity and assurance from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) that they will not be targeted with sanctions for facilitating rupee trade with a sanction-hit country such as Russia. The present payment mechanism is a shift from earlier such arrangements, like the one with sanction-hit Iran, which involved banks facilitating settlement of international trade that did not have business in the sanctioned nation.
Feature for feature, bank FDs are indeed better than debt funds today, mainly thanks to Ms Sitharaman, notes Debashis Basu.
A lot depends on how Srei shapes up under the new administrator and his team, which is critical for investors' interest.
Bankers, who met the Reserve Bank of India Governor D Subbarao on Monday, two weeks before the annual monetary policy scheduled for April 20, said none of them was presently contemplating hike in lending rates given the 'reasonable' liquidity in the system.
'The book captures Rana Kapoor's hunger for real estate leading to bungalows in Delhi, Mumbai, London and other cities; the multiple companies -- over 100 -- to fund his family's various ventures; the attempt to game the system by showing lower non-performing assets,' notes Joydeep Ghosh.
Banks have urged the Reserve Bank of India to allow time till July to implement the proposed base-rate model, which was introduced by the apex bank early this month to bring in transparency in the lending.
The message to bankers from Raghuram Rajan was clear.
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The minister, who will also be meeting foreign institutional investors whose money is key to funding CAD in the afternoon, did not speak to reporters waiting outside.
'Just the amount of work which is there just to become more and more successful in banking. For this to happen you need to have leaders who understand technology.'
The RBI under former governor Shaktikanta Das resisted pressures to cut interest rates through 2024 as it kept its 'Arjuna's eye' trained on inflation, but the central bank under a new detail-oriented head will soon have to take a call if it can continue sacrificing growth. Das, a career bureaucrat who in 2016 oversaw Prime Minister Narendra Modi's highly disruptive demonetisation move, left a lasting legacy as he demitted office towards the end of 2024 after expertly navigating monetary policy for six years, the highlight of which was steering India's recovery through the pandemic.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will hold discussions with public sector banks (PSBs) and financial institutions to draw up an action plan for banking reforms
The company and its sister concern, Forever Precious, owe close to Rs 5,500 crore.
India Inc expects hike in FCNR (B) rates among on Sunday's measures to arrest rupee fall.
Bankers have requested RBI to keep interest rates stable this fiscal, in lieu of sufficient liquidity in the system.
There's surplus liquidity and RBI, with plentiful forex reserves, is ready to pump whatever extra is needed
In 1910 the who's who of Wall Street met in total secrecy in an American town to work towards the first draft of the bill that would finally give the United States a central bank.
Ahead of the slack season Credit Policy, Reserve Bank Governor Y V Reddy on Monday met Finance Minister P Chidambaram amidst expectation of monetary measures to contain prices and keep interest rates stable to sustain high economic growth.
Payments banks will mainly deal in remittance services and accept deposits of up to Rs 1 lakh.
Banks argued that loans of most lenders are funded primarily by retail deposits and not from the wholesale market as was the practice abroad
Today, banks are being asked to discover niche strengths and focus on them
Bankruptcy proceedings are going at a slower pace than what the bankers had envisaged and many cases have gone beyond the 270-day timeline set under the IBC mainly because of litigation.
From zeroing in on the best means for stake dilution to moving beyond microfinance, Bandhan navigates a tough path. Namrata Acharya reports.
The Indian regulatory framework forced Citi to hibernate -- contrary to the claim that it never sleeps!
Tamal Bandyopadhyay discusses his latest book Bandhan: The Making of a Bank at Bandhan headquarters in Kolkata.
Ironically, bad loans and non-performing assets are on the rise in public sector banks in India, say sector watchers.
The speed at which he led the central bank in different areas -- ranging from internal reorganisation to inflation fighting, stabilising the currency, taking on rogue corporations, cleaning up bank balance sheets, and opening the sector -- makes one believe that Rajan knew he had only three years to do his job. A fascinating excerpt from Tamal Bandyopadhyay's MUST-READ Roller Coaster: An Affair with Banking.
Hawkish tone likely to guard rupee from further slide
'Credit expansion is probably the quickest way to get the economy going again.' 'Easy credit is like a shot of nitro in a race car: In timely, small, quick, doses it can give a tremendous boost but carried to extreme it can destroy the engine,' points out S Muralidharan, former managing director, BNP Paribas.
The RBI's mistake may have been in interpreting its mandate to maintain retail inflation at 4%, with 2% leeway in either direction, as being a mandate that permitted it to do nothing even when inflation was at or near the upper bound of 6%, observes T N Ninan.
