While sale of residential properties increased only marginally despite plethora of steps taken by the government through the year, office space leasing rose 40 per cent to touch an all-time high of 46.5 million sq ft -- a trend that drew investors to lap up India's first Real Estate Investment Trust at an issue size of nearly Rs 5,000 crore.
The total wealth of top 100 real estate barons accounted for Rs 2.37 trillion ($32.7 billion) in 2018, up 27 per cent against 2017's cumulative wealth of Rs 1.87 trillion ($28.6 billion).
Twenty-three of the 31 stocks in his publicly disclosed portfolio consist small-cap stocks. jhunjhunwala's portfolio rose 15.2% in Q3.
A personal loan can score over a loan against gold in some cases, if you compare the interest rate, tenure and charges for the two products.
Government-owned companies are more generous in rewarding their shareholders with dividends.
The Reserve Bank on Tuesday allowed infrastructure finance companies (IFCs) to raise money from overseas markets through the automatic route to increase fund flow into the resource-starved core sector.
The Credit Suisse on Thursday said that it has received a license from the Reserve Bank of India to establish a bank branch in Mumbai.
The RBI panel has also recommended a government-sponsored 'fund of funds' of Rs 10,000 crore to support the venture capital and private equity firms investing in the MSME sector.
The government should have mentioned clearly the specific structural reforms that were responsible for the deviation from the fiscal deficit target by half a percentage point, says A K Bhattacharya.
If the interest rate on bank deposits is linked to any external benchmark, it would jeopardise the banks' fund-raising ability. Interest rates on small savings schemes are likely to be reduced very shortly, to maintain parity. All these steps would indeed affect retired people, and particularly those dependent on interest income, says Arindam Gupta.
In all, RBI has cut interest rates by 110 bps this year. But this has not yet led to a boost in economic activity. While the growth rate has slowed to a five-year low, consumer confidence is waning and foreign direct investment has plateaued.
The discussion on new banking licences will be posted on the website of the central bank for public comments, RBI governor D Subbarao said while unveiling the monetary policy for 2010-11.
Murugrappa Group on Tuesday said it has bought 37.48 per cent stake in Singapore based DBS Bank making it to hold controlling stake in their joint venture company Cholamandalam DBS Finance Ltd.
The government wants the RBI to part with most of its profit as dividend.
In the backdrop of Finance Minister Pranab Mukherji offering banking licences to NBFCs (Non-Banking Financial Companies), rediff.com spoke to T T Srinivasaraghavan, managing director, Sundaram Finance Ltd, the oldest NBFC in the country (founded in 1954).
Insurance firms and non-banking finance companies are heaving a sigh of relief as the revised draft of the Direct Taxes Code has suggested that book profits rather than gross assets be used to calculate the minimum alternate tax, or MAT, for both groups.
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) plans to amend its rules to pre-empt non banking finance companies (NBFCs) from misusing the liberal rules governing limited liability partnership (LLP) firms.
Since December 2018, monetary policy has been eased substantially by RBI with policy rates being cut by 75 bps and policy outlook being changed to 'accommodative'.
The government on Friday said gains from fake currency business are going abroad through the hawala route and admitted that the quality of fake currency has gone up with better imitation of security features.
Financial services firm Religare Enterprises on Wednesday said it will acquire a part of Citigroup India's home loan portfolio for Rs 500 crore (Rs 5 billion), representing 5 per cent of the latter's total mortgage book.
NBFCs which have not met Sebi criteria will face tough action.
Religare has engaged McKinsey to help it build an emerging market investment bank.
An NBFC must actively manage its collateral positions, differentiating between encumbered and unencumbered assets, and monitor such assets so that they can be mobilised in a timely manner, central bank says in circular.
The company also expects to benefit in its proposed banking foray through partnership with Japan's Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Bank and Nippon Life Insurance
Nearly three-fourths of the debt money, as of April 30, 2019, was invested in securities with duration of less than three years.
Fix India's real estate sector. Fix India's public sector banks, advises Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
There is little sense in trying to find stocks that will not be vulnerable in a situation where 87% of the market is trending down and India is getting set for a crucial election, says Devangshu Datta.
Almost 40 per cent of a durable company's sales are achieved during the festival season
Criterion for corporates will effectively rule out entry for business houses.
The new category would also help NBFCs raise more money from overseas markets, for which the government has raised the cap to $500 million from earlier $100 million under the approval route.
The Centre has set a steep divestment target of Rs 80,000 crore for 2018-19. In the first six months, it has managed to mop up less than Rs 10,000 crore.
One incident should not be used to generalise the health of all cooperative banks, says RBI governor Shaktikanta Das.
The RBI has this year cut interest rates by 110 basis points in four instalments but banks have passed only a part of it to borrowers. Before the last reduction earlier this month of 35 basis points, the bank on an average had passed only 29 basis points out of 75 basis points cut affected during 2019.
There are 4.7 million PoS terminals in the country. ICICI Bank had recently entered into a tie-up with First Data to set up PoS terminals.
The German luxury carmarker on Tuesday said it will invest $50 million (about Rs 230 crore) to set up a financial services subsidiary to better serve its customers besides industry as a whole.
In a time of tight credit, the facility will support grants to bank and non-bank institutions for activities to increase access to financial services, such as savings, credit, payments and insurance, in rural areas in developing countries as profitable business lines, the World Bank said.
Infrastructure Leasing and Finance Company is poised to acquire management control of the troubled infrastructure company Maytas Infrastructure owned by family members of Ramalinga Raju, former chairman and managing director of Satyam Computers, who confessed to financial fraud on January 7. The leading non-banking finance company is emerging as a government preference given its prominent role in infrastructure finance in the country.
NSC scores high on all three parameters that conservative investors are seeking -- safety, tax-adjusted returns and liquidity.
Like everything else, the structure of banks may change, and banks may depend more on digital technologies and artificial intelligence for dealing with both their customers and employees.
'It is not simply demonetisation or GST, it is this government's failure to manage the financial sector crisis.'
