Every 10 per cent rise in crude oil price will shave off around 0.2 percentage point (pp) from India's GDP growth and widen the current account by 0.3 per cent, says Nomura.
The Rs 20 lakh crore package includes Rs 1.7 lakh crore package of free foodgrains to the poor and cash to poor women and elderly, announced in March, as well as the Reserve Bank's liquidity measures and interest rate cuts.
The Indian services sector activity fell to a six-month low in September, as new business inflows rose at the slowest rates since March, amid inflationary pressures and competitive conditions, a monthly survey said. The seasonally adjusted S&P Global India Services PMI Business Activity Index fell to 54.3 in September, from 57.2 in August, highlighting the weakest rate of expansion since March. For the fourteenth straight month, the services sector witnessed an expansion in output. In Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI) parlance, a print above 50 means expansion, while a score below 50 denotes contraction.
Industry growth has started picking up in recent months fueling suggestion from RBI and other analysts for partial roll back of stimulus measures taken to ward off the impact of global economic slowdown last year.
The government's second round of stimulus will spur consumer spending in the near term but support to economic growth will be minimal, Moody's Investors Service said.
There could be multiple measures announced in quick succession, not only by the finance minister but also other ministers regarding their respective sectors, and by the Reserve Bank of India. The total size of these announcements could rival that of other G-20 nations as a percentage of GDP.
These sweeping financial sanctions follow the action earlier this week to cut off Russia's frozen funds in the United States to make debt payments.
The government is aiming for an 8-10 per cent annual economic growth.
Larsen & Toubro (L&T), India's largest construction and engineering player, has lost as many as 14 large orders in the country because companies that don't possess adequate technical expertise and experience, of late, have won the projects by bidding lower, claimed A M Naik, non-executive chairman of L&T. But the company has made up for the losses by winning projects overseas, where it has acquired a sizeable market share amid tough competition from large global players, he said.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is likely to strike a fine balance between being fiscally prudent and growth supportive when she presents her fourth straight budget on Tuesday, which is expected to have plans to boost spending to revive investment and create jobs. The Budget for the fiscal year starting April 1, 2022 is likely to raise spending on infrastructure to set the economy on a firmer footing. The stage for the Budget presentation was set by the Economic Survey stating that the government has the fiscal space to do more to support the economy that is forecast to grow at a healthy 8-8.5 per cent growth in the 2022-23 fiscal.
The stimulus package announced by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman "fails to involve" banks in the economic revival process, a member of the Reserve Bank of India's central board said on Wednesday. The stimulus package is "imaginative and forward looking, yet fails to involve banks as frontline warriors in revival of economy," Satish Marathe, a member of RBI's central board, said in a social media post.
Sliding for the fifth straight session, the rupee fell 3 paise to close at a fresh lifetime low of 79.06 against the US dollar on Thursday amid a strong greenback overseas and unrelenting foreign fund outflows. At the interbank forex market, the local unit opened at 78.92 against the greenback and witnessed an intra-day high of 78.90 and a low of 79.07. It finally settled at 79.06, down 3 paise over its previous close of 79.03.
The World Bank has approved loans totalling $1.75 billion (about Rs 13,834.54 crore) to fund India's PM Ayushman Bharat scheme and private investment to boost the economic growth. Of the total loan, $1 billion will go towards the health sector, while the rest $750 million will be in the form of development policy loan (DPL) to fill the financing gaps through private sector investment in the economy. The World Bank Board of Executive Directors approved two complementary loans of $500 million each to support and enhance India's health sector.
Pegging the cost of the covid-19 lockdown at USD 120 billion (approximately Rs 9 lakh crores) or 4 per cent of the GDP, analysts on Wednesday sharply cut their growth estimates and stressed on the need to announce an economic package. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI), which is scheduled to announce its first bi-monthly policy review on April 3, is set to deliver a deep rate cuts and it should also be assumed that the fiscal deficit targets will be breached, analysts said.
Fitch Ratings on Monday said it expects a moderately worse sector outlook for Indian banks for the next fiscal beginning April 1 based on muted expectations for new business and revenue generation, and deteriorating asset quality. Fitch believes that the disproportionate shock to India's informal economy and small businesses, coupled with high unemployment and declining private consumption, have yet to fully manifest on bank balance sheets. The rating agency said the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is likely to pose challenges to Indian banks' improving financial performance once asset-quality risks manifest in the financial year ending March 2022.
The budget-making exercise offers golden opportunities despite challenges, observes Shankar Acharya, former chief economic adviser to the Government of India.
S&P Global Ratings on Wednesday lowered India's economic growth forecast to 5.2 per cent for 2020, saying the global economy is entering a recession amid the coronavirus pandemic. The agency had earlier projected a growth rate of 5.7 per cent during the 2020 calendar.
The IMF chief listed three key policy areas for women's empowerment as the education, getting a job and having a family.
China's national health commission said 39,452 new cases were reported on Monday, including 36,304 local asymptomatic cases, as authorities scrambled to contain the fresh surge in infections.
With the fresh wave of COVID-19 plunging the hospitality sector back into uncertainty, industry body HAI on Monday said it has asked the government to consider granting infrastructure status to hotels, extend moratorium on loans and rationalise taxes. In its pre-Budget memorandum, the Hotel Association of India (HAI) said policy interventions are imperative for the sector's survival and its early and quick rebound to normalcy. "The hospitality industry was slowly getting into a recovery mode on the strength of domestic tourism - leisure and events, only to be plunged back into uncertainty on account of the Omicron threat.
There are various estimates of India's debt to GDP ratio, but the consensus is that that it would be over 80 per cent at the end of the current fiscal year.
House economists at the nation's largest lender State Bank of India (SBI) have urged the government to budget for nursing the pandemic-ravaged economy and not to focus too much on fiscal consolidation as there is a need for more stabilisation measures to sustain the fledgling recovery. And one of the best way to begin the new fiscal is to complete the share sale of LIC this fiscal. This can go a long way in repairing the overstretched balance sheet which in turn will bring down fiscal deficit to a much lower 6.3 per cent in FY23 as the public coffers will be left with a cash surplus of at least Rs 3 lakh crore to begin the new fiscal, SBI chief economist Soumya Kanti Ghosh said in a pre-Budget note on Wednesday.
Moody's Investors Service on Thursday upped India growth forecast to (-) 10.6 per cent for the current fiscal, from its earlier estimate of (-) 11.5 per cent, saying the latest stimulus prioritises manufacturing and job creation, and focuses on longer-term growth. Last week the government had announced a new fiscal package amounting to Rs 2.7 lakh crore. Moody's said the latest measures aim to increase the competitiveness of India's manufacturing sector and create jobs, while supporting infrastructure investment, credit availability and stressed sectors.
'I believe the modified scheme is much more beneficial and simpler.'
The Budget kept away from mood dampeners such as an increase in taxes (capital gain taxes) and even the much-feared introduction of Covid cess and wealth taxes, says Nimesh Kampani, chairman, JM Financial.
S&P Global Ratings has forecast India's economy to shrink by 5 per cent in the current fiscal. It, however, has projected GDP growth to be 8.5 per cent in 2021-22 and 6.5 per cent in 2022-23.
India's macroeconomic situation is certainly better than what it was a year ago, eminent economist Pinaki Chakraborty said on Monday, while expressing hope that the country will be back on the path of economic growth if there is no major third wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. In an interview with PTI, Chakraborty, who is the director of the National Institute of Public Finance and Policy (NIPFP), said that inflation may remain at an elevated level as there was a significant fiscal and monetary expansion in the last 18 months. "The current macroeconomic situation is certainly much better than what it was one year back. We are seeing recovery in most sectors," he said. Chakraborty noted that COVID-19 vaccination has been going on at a very fast rate in India.
RE of GDP for 2015-16 show that the economy grew 7.9% in 2015-16, rather than the earlier estimate of 7.6 per cent.
Chief Economic Adviser K V Subramanian on Monday said the overall impact of the second wave of COVID-19 on the country's economy is not likely to be large but cautioned about an uncertainty surrounding the pandemic going ahead. He further said that given the circumstances due to the pandemic, it is difficult to forecast if the country would achieve a double digit growth in the current fiscal. The Economic Survey 2020-21 released in January this year had projected GDP growth of 11 per cent during the current financial year ending March 2022.
Fitch reaffirmed India's rating at 'BBB-' with a Stable Outlook saying the rating balances a still strong medium-term growth outlook compared with similar category peers and relative external resilience stemming from solid foreign-reserve buffers against high public debt, a weak financial sector and some lagging structural factors, including governance indicators and GDP per capita.
EY said out of the nearly Rs 21 lakh crore package, Rs 8.01 lakh crore is on account of liquidity enhancing measures taken by the RBI since February.
Any number tilting towards 5.5 to 6 could lead to a great disappointment for foreign institutional investors fuelling the current market rally.
The Indian economy, severely hit by the coronavirus pandemic, is projected to contract by a massive 10.3 per cent this year, the International Monetary Fund said on Tuesday. However, India is likely to bounce back with an impressive 8.8 per cent growth rate in 2021, thus regaining the position of the fastest growing emerging economy, surpassing China's projected growth rate of 8.2 per cent, the IMF said in its latest 'World Economic Outlook' report.
It is also likely to assume a deflator of around 4 per cent. That could take the nominal GDP outlook for FY21 to around 10 per cent. It is this nominal GDP forecast on the basis of which the finance ministry is calculating key Budget targets like the fiscal deficit as a percentage of GDP and tax revenue growth for the coming year.
Moody's Investors Service on Tuesday slashed India's growth forecast for the current financial year to 9.3 per cent saying that the second wave of coronavirus infections hampers economic recovery and increases risk of longer-term scarring. Moody's, which has a 'Baa3' rating on India with a negative outlook, said obstacles to economic growth, high debt and weak financial system contrain sovereign credit profile. The US-based rating agency had in February forecast a 13.7 per cent economic growth for the current fiscal (April 2021-March 2022).
The Reserve Bank is expected to go for another rate hike of 0.40 per cent at the scheduled review of the monetary policy next week, a foreign brokerage said on Friday. The central bank's rate setting panel will follow it up with a 0.35 per cent hike in rates at the next review in August, or make it into a 0.50 per cent hike next week and a 0.25 per cent increase in August, to make the total quantum of rate hikes at 0.75 per cent, the report by Bofa Securities said. On May 4, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) hiked rates by 0.40 per cent, and Governor Shaktikanta Das has already called a rate hike at the forthcoming review as a "no brainer" given the pressure to maintain its core mandate of inflation in the targeted band of under 6 per cent.
Moody's Investors Service on Friday said India's economy is expected to contract for the first time in more than four decades saying economic damage owing to the coronavirus-induced lockdown will be significant with lower consumption and sluggish business activity. Even before the coronavirus outbreak, Indian economy already was growing at its slowest pace in six years and with the stimulus measures announced by the government falling short of expectations, the disruptions are likely to be greater. "We now expect India's growth to register a real GDP contraction for the fiscal year ending in March 2021 (fiscal 2020-21), from our earlier projection of zero growth," it said in a research note.
Senior Congress leader and former finance minister P Chidambaram said the stimulus package has left several sections like the poor, migrants, farmers, labourers, workers, small shopkeepers and middle class high and dry.
'RBI is already late in addressing inflation pressures.'
With India's GDP clocking a lower contraction of 7.5 per cent in the September quarter, industry and experts expressed confidence of further recovery in the coming months and said the government's actions are bearing fruit. In a tweet, Vedanta chairman Anil Agarwal said, "Q2 #GDP numbers show that economy is recovering. Government's efforts on stimulus and reform are showing results. Hopefully, we will have positive growth in H2 FY21 and double digit growth in FY22."
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