Of the three major Budget announcements related to the banking sector, privatisation of PSBs is the most audacious, says Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
Department of financial services secretary Sanjay Malhotra held a meeting with heads of PSBs, insurance companies and financial institutions for identifying ways to support Agniveers on completion of their tenure of duty.
The home loan top-up, a kind of secured multipurpose personal loan, is on the regulator's radar, points out Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
Life has come full circle for Nobel laureate Professor Mohammad Yunus, who faced persecution during Sheikh Hasina's regime for embezzlement, is now all set to head of the interim government in Bangladesh after she resigned and fled the country.
Among major Sensex movers, ITC rose the most by 1.70 per cent, Wipro by 1.43 per cent, Tech Mahindra by 1.36 per cent and Nestle India by 1.27 per cent. Other gainers included HCL Tech, Asian Paints and Reliance. On the other hand, ICICI Bank, NTPC, UltraTech Cement and Tata Steel traded with a loss of up to 0.82 per cent.
Lot of money is now being withdrawn from the Swiss banks and transferred to Singapore.
From the Sensex basket, Tata Consultancy Services, Nestle, Bajaj Finserv, Wipro, Maruti Suzuki India, Reliance Industries, Larsen & Toubro and NTPC were the major laggards. Tata Steel, Bajaj Finance, JSW Steel and Bharti Airtel were among the gainers.
A prominent Indian Diaspora body, FIIDS, on Monday urged Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman to allow non-resident Indians and overseas citizens of India (OCI) card holders to invest in the Indian stock market. Such a move would boost the Indian economy further by attracting investment from the global Indian community, said the Foundation for India and Indian Diaspora Studies (FIIDS) USA. FIIDS is a US-based institute for US-India policy studies and awareness.
S&P Global Ratings on Wednesday said Indian banks face a systemic risk as the second COVID wave will impair the performance of financial institutions in the April-September period. Stating that economic recovery remains highly vulnerable to setbacks due to COVID, particularly if fresh outbreaks trigger new lockdowns, S&P said the banking sector's weak loans will likely remain elevated at 11-12 per cent of gross loans in the next 12 to 18 months. "The second wave has front-ended weakness in asset quality," said S&P Global Ratings Credit Analyst Deepali Seth Chhabria. "Financial institutions face a strained first half amid weak collections and poor disbursements."
The awarding of in-principle licences for 10 small finance banks is likely to be a game changer in a way which may not be adequately realised right now.
According to the finance minister, India was compliant with most of the internationally accepted standards in banking, securities markets and insurance sector.
Among the Sensex firms, Maruti, NTPC, Tata Motors, ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank, Reliance Industries, JSW Steel, ITC and Mahindra & Mahindra were the major laggards. Bajaj Finance, Larsen & Toubro, Bajaj Finserv and Titan were among the gainers.
'The banking channel is gradually becoming the most preferred way of transaction for terrorist outfits.'
Indian start-ups breathed a sigh of relief after the UK government facilitated the acquisition of the now-defunct Silicon Valley Bank's (SVB's) British arm by HSBC. In a bid to allay fears, the US Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FIDC) announced recently that it had transferred all deposits of start-up-focused SVB to a newly created bridge bank and all depositors would have access to their money. President Joe Biden also sought to reassure jittery depositors that they can have confidence that the US banking system is "safe".
The message is clear: The 60-year-old wise uncles need to handhold the 40-year-old entrepreneurs when, obsessed with ambition and greed for growth, they become a victim of hubris, points out Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
The size of the hole in today's banking crisis appears to be roughly 10 per cent of GDP.
Indian banks have started exploring opportunities in the space, including lending to crypto exchanges, and accepting bitcoins as collateral, among others.
'I found it unbelievable that L&T said 45,000 jobs were waiting to be filled because of unavailability of suitable skillsets.' 'So, when the Opposition sweepingly says there are no jobs, I'm sorry... I'm not saying it's raining jobs, but there are jobs. The (skill) gap has to be bridged.'
'The prime minister's comment on 'revdi culture' was welcome. But I am disappointed he did not follow up on that.' 'All political parties, including the BJP, have been guilty of this.' 'Now, Modi's guarantees, the Congress's 'nyay' path and both ruling and Opposition parties are vying with each other for freebies in my home state Andhra Pradesh.'
But there are challenges, observes Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
No word on appointment of Shagun Kapur Gogia
Figures sourced from the IIMC placement cell say that 32 top investment banks and consultants are recruiting for summer jobs this year. They have already signed up most of the batch.
Notwithstanding the recent sharp decline in the stocks of public sector companies, analysts at Jefferies remain bullish on this segment. State Bank of India, Coal India, and NTPC are their top picks in this space, they said in a recent note. The public sector undertaking (PSU) or state-owned enterprise (SOE) index, with a 70-percentage-point outperformance versus the National Stock Exchange Nifty50 over the past 12 months, comes after a decade of underperformance before 2020.
The Election Commission (EC) had, in 2019, flagged its concerns in the Supreme Court on the changes made in several laws relating to political funding to facilitate the electoral bonds scheme, saying it will have 'serious repercussions' on transparency.
On November 12, 2021, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) decided to ring in uniformity in asset classification and income recognition across all lending institutions. Shadow banks, or non-banking financial companies (NBFCs), like commercial banks, are to test non-performing assets (NPAs) on a daily basis and upgrade them to "standard assets" only when interest and principal arrears are settled by borrowers. This is going to create all manner of headaches for shadow banks and their clientele. Says Y S Chakravarti, managing director and chief executive officer (CEO), Shriram City Union Finance: "NPA levels will go up, especially of small borrowers.
IPO-bound mobility platform Ola, said it has successfully raised $500 million via a Term Loan B (TLB) from marquee international institutional investors. This term loan has no impact on the valuation of Bhavish Aggarwal-led Ola. The Bengaluru-based firm recently raised $139 million. This is part of a $1 billion funding round for which the company is in talks with investors, increasing its valuation to about $7.5 billion, according to the sources.
From the 30-share pack, Indusind Bank, Axis Bank, Maruti Suzuki, Bajaj Finance, Bajaj Finserv, UltraTech Cement and Mahindra & Mahindra were the biggest drags, tumbling up to 7.63 per cent.
'This micro-finance sector has seen a tremendous upsurge in the recent time. There is a huge potential in this domain'.
Banks may have to spend up to Rs 800 crore (Rs 8 billion) in training close to one million employees to comply with the Reserve Bank of India's proposed loan recovery norms. RBI has proposed that banks should tie up with the Indian Institute of Banking and Finance (IIBF) or organise programmes in their own training colleges to ensure that every agent passes the exam conducted by IIBF during a one-year period. 'Agents' would include agencies as well as bank employees.
Sun Pharma, Bajaj Finserv, Tata Consultancy Services, Infosys, Hindustan Unilever, JSW Steel, Wipro, Maruti, HCL Technologies, Tech Mahindra and ICICI Bank were the other major gainers. State Bank of India, Tata Motors, Axis Bank, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Bajaj Finance, Tata Steel, Nestle and HDFC Bank were the laggards.
Even as you fight the ongoing health challenge, here are some tips to strengthen your personal finance in the time of coronavirus.
'To the believers of crypto regulations, I have only one question to ask, how will you regulate it?'
With the last quarter of 2023-24 (FY24) expected to have been soft owing to lower discretionary spend and macro uncertainty, many are hoping FY25 will be a year of recovery for the information-technology (IT) industry. The fourth quarter, January-March, is considered soft, and will continue to see the headwinds the sector has been facing. And the sector has entered the new financial year on a weak footing. Analysts are expecting Tier-I firms to report sequential growth of -1 per cent to 1.5 per cent and midcap players' growth may range between 0.7 per cent and 4 per cent.
All banks are eligible for privatisation. A committee of secretaries will decide which banks will be privatised, says Financial Services Secretary Debasish Panda.
A paper authored by Rajan said, state-linked banks can be a first step in altering the ownership structure of some PSBs, where the government brings down its stakes to below 50 per cent, creating distance from operations of banks, and improving governance along the way.
Among the Sensex firms, Hindustan Unilever, Tech Mahindra, Infosys, Reliance Industries, Bajaj Finance, Tata Consultancy Services, Titan and UltraTech Cement were the major laggards. Mahindra & Mahindra, Power Grid, IndusInd Bank, Tata Motors, Larsen & Toubro and Maruti were among the gainers.
India's unabated tryst with Russian crude oil is slowly coming to an end. The time has come for Indian refiners to navigate, creatively, the choppy waters of the post-honeymoon period, and for Indian policymakers to take cognisance of the broader impact on India from the spillover of the Russian crisis - after Washington's warning to transgressors last week. Shipments from Russia to India have averaged over 1.8 million barrels a day since February, according to data from Paris-based market analytics firm Kpler. But much of the crude shipped to India was non-sanctioned because it traded below a price cap set by the US led G-7 nations in December.
The banking regulator was uncomfortable with the runaway pace at which consumer credit was growing.
With the Swiss government showing eagerness to help India trace suspected black money hoarders, banks based in Switzerland appear to be losing traction among the wealthy Indian clients and could not get much business commitments during the just-ended WEF summit.