Penalty must act as a deterrent. If it is too low, it could encourage the regulated entities to lap up penalty instead of complying with the norms, suggests Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
Chanda Kochhar, who was arrested for a cash-for-loan scam on Friday, was once a powerful banker and instrumental in making ICICI Bank the country's biggest private sector lender. Kochhar, a regular feature on Forbes top global honchos lists, was arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) along with her husband Deepak Kochhar in connection with alleged cheating and irregularities in loans sanctioned by ICICI Bank to Videocon Group companies. Kochhars were called to the agency headquarters and arrested after a brief questioning session. Her chapter at ICICI Bank ended abruptly in 2018 when the board of directors approved a request from Kochhar to seek early retirement following allegation of corruption and quid pro-quo while extending loans to the now bankrupt Videocon Industries.
Because they have become too big and pervasive and the time to regulate is long gone, points out Debashis Basu.
Investors are yet to warm up to the concept of sustainable investing with sustainable or ESG (environmental, social, and governance) funds in India witnessing outflows of Rs 315 crore in 2021-22. This comes following a staggering inflow of Rs 4,884 crore in FY 2020-21. Prior to that, sustainable funds saw an infusion of over Rs 2,000 crore, according to data compiled by Morningstar India.
Tax consultants and chartered accountants have started receiving a flurry of calls from their clients - both corporate and individuals - seeking clarity over changes in the reassessment regime made during the recently concluded Budget Session of Parliament. Tax experts apprehend the amendments may lead to the income-tax (I-T) department sending out more notices. The new provisions, effective from April 1, have extended the scope for tax sleuths to reopen the past assessments.
Debt-ridden telecom operator Vodafone Idea is evaluating the option of converting interest dues arising out of the deferment of statutory payments into equity, a senior company official said on Monday. The company is also in talks with banks and investors for raising funds and part of the proceeds is likely to be utilised towards meeting obligations related to debt maturing this fiscal, Vodafone Idea Limited (VIL) chief financial officer Akshay Moondra said during the company's earning call. VIL MD and CEO Ravinder Takkar said the company expects to conclude fund raising plan by the end of the current financial year.
Two Indian Americans -- Congressman Ro Khanna and Vijaya Gadde -- prominently figure in United States President Joe Biden's son Hunter Biden's laptop story whose full disclosure Twitter CEO Elon Musk has announced would be released on the microblogging site.
In Kerala, the use of black ranges from such convenience to strictures by community and religion to fashion and personal choice. One would have to be really insecure or too fond of the well settled life to see black solely as a badge of protest, points out Shyam G Menon.
On a week long visit to push sales of the upcoming Trump Towers in the country, he said the "spirit" of doing business in India is much more aligned with the US way of doing business.
The Supreme Court on Friday said there should be a robust mechanism to ensure that the interests of Indian investors are protected in the stock market and sought views of the Centre and market regulator SEBI on PILs alleging exploitation of innocent investors and "artificial crashing" of the Adani group's stock value.
Roopam Asthana, CEO and whole-time director, Liberty General Insurance Ltd, will answer your queries on HEALTH insurance and AUTO insurance.
Advertisers will have to put a disclaimer while promoting the "highly risky" and unregulated cryptocurrencies from April 1, a self-regulatory body for the industry said on Wednesday. All virtual digital assets (VDAs), which are commonly referred to as crypto or non-fungible tokens (NFTs), will have to put the disclaimer in a "prominent and unmissable" way in campaigns for products and services, the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI) said. The announcement of the guidelines, done after consultations with industry stakeholders, government and financial regulators as well, comes as the advertising for the controversial products and services is on the upswing.
In yet another move to close the regulatory gap between banks and shadow banks, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has mandated exposure limits to the non-banking finance companies, in line with commercial banks. In the large exposure framework released on Tuesday, the regulator capped aggregrate exposure of NBFCs which are in the upper layer toward one entity at 20 per cent of capital base. The limit can only be extended by another 5% with board's approval. For a particular borrower group, the cap is at 25 per cent, with additional 10 per cent if exposure is towards infrastructure.
Capital markets regulator Sebi on Tuesday asked listed companies to work towards splitting the roles of chairman and managing director before the April 2022 deadline, as the new directive is not aimed at weakening the position of promoters. Listed entities were initially required to separate the roles of chairperson and MD/CEO from April 1, 2020 onwards. However, based on industry representations, an additional time period of two years was given for compliance. The regulation will now be applicable to the top 500 listed entities by market capitalisation, with effect from April 1, 2022.
The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) is working on a new payment system for the secondary market, which could prevent brokers from accessing their client funds. It will be on the lines of the Application Supported by Blocked Amount (ASBA) process used for subscribing to initial public offerings (IPOs), where funds move out of an investor's bank account only after the trade is confirmed. Sebi chairperson Madhabi Puri Buch on Wednesday said that despite the challenges, the new system would be ready in a few months.
'Quality of management, corporate governance, allocation of capital, full disclosures should form the basis to decide investing in a particular stock.'
Some of the world's biggest banks including HSBC, JPMorgan Chase and Standard Chartered moved trillions of dollars identified as being potentially tied to money laundering or other crimes despite raising concerns about those transactions in filings with US regulators, reports South China Morning Post.
SBI will auction two non-performing accounts (NPAs) next month to recover dues of over Rs 313 crore, according to a notice by the lender. The two accounts to be put up for e-auction on August 6 are Bhadreshwar Vidyut Pvt Ltd (BVPL) with a loan outstanding of Rs 262.73 crore and GOL Offshore Ltd with Rs 50.75 crore dues. "In terms of the bank's policy on sale on financial assets, in line with the regulatory guidelines, we place these accounts for sale to ARCs/banks/NBFCs/FIs, on the terms and conditions indicated there against," SBI said in the notice. The reserve price for the auction of Bhadreshwar Vidyut is set at Rs 100.12 crore and for GOL Offshore at Rs 51 crore.
Because it costs a shit-ton of money. Full disclosure: I won't accept a wedding ring that costs Rs 1L or less. But Rs 1L and more seems like a LOT of money. Enough for me to think about better ways to spend it. Stocks? Mutual Funds? SIPs? *GASP* NFTs and Crypto?
Corporate social responsibility rules that kicked in on Friday also set a three year time-limit for any CSR project, among a series of other amendments introduced by the government.
After getting rapped for accepting Vedanta group's bid that would give just 5 per cent of their outstanding loans, lenders to Videocon Industries on Monday approached the insolvency appellate tribunal NCLAT seeking fresh bids for the debt-laden consumer durable firm. Billionaire Anil Agarwal's Twin-Star Technologies had offered Rs 2,962 crore to takeover Videocon Industries, which was 4.15 per cent of the admitted claims of Rs 64,838.63 crore of lenders. SBI, the leading lender of Videocon Industries, has approached the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT) requesting for a rebidding of the 13 companies of the debt-ridden group, on account of strong observations against Rs 2,962 crore takeover bid by Anil Agarwal's Twin Star Technologies.
Despite strong AUM growth, MFs lag behind other popular investment avenues. MFs received only 6 per cent of total household savings in 2021-2022.
The law firm had specifically named the bank's chief executive and managing director of over 25 years, Aditya Puri, his designated successor Sashidhar Jagdishan and company secretary Santosh Haldankar as defendants.
The National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) has directed to freeze and attach assets and properties of Videocon promoters following a petition by the ministry of corporate affairs. The NCLT Mumbai bench has directed the Central Depository Services Ltd (CDSL) and National Securities Depository Ltd (NSDL) that securities owned or held by the Videocon promoters "in any company or society be frozen, and be prohibited from being transferred or alienation" and the details be shared with the Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA). It directed the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) to disclose information about all assets of the Videocon promoters in their knowledge or possession, for the purpose of freezing and restraining such assets.
Sharad Pawar reckons that the NCP has value as a united, going concern, not as a gaggle of leaders in search of followers, notes Shreekant Sambrani.
Investors are pushing back more often against companies' resolutions on what is paid out to top executives. In the first four months of financial year 2022-23 (FY23), there have already been five such rejections, according to shareholder voting data from tracker Adrian, a platform maintained by the proxy advisory firm Institutional Investor Advisory Services India (IiAS). Two of these have been at multiplex chain PVR and direct-to-home company Dish TV India.
The SME segment has been grappling with lack of liquidity and lacklustre institutional participation.
The government will "notify such countries or territories outside India to which a data fiduciary may transfer personal data", according to the draft unveiled on Friday for public feedback.
The political economy of the IPO market involves regulators empathising with intermediaries, and designing a bridge that systematically takes wealth away from founders, VC and PE funds, and business houses, explains Ajay Shah.
The I-T department had issued re-assessment notice in March 2015 to the media group after noting that Rs 642 crore has allegedly not been computed for the tax assessment purposes of NDTV for financial year 2007-2008.
The regulator has extended the deadline by 45 days till June 30 for submitting half-yearly financial results for NCDs, NCRPS and CPs, while it has given a time period of another 30 days till June 30, for filing annual earnings.
UK Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak has written to his boss, Boris Johnson, to be referred to one of the British Prime Minister's independent advisers to review all his ministerial declarations of interest amid a row around his family's tax affairs. The Indian-origin finance minister, who has been fighting back attacks over wife Akshata Murty's tax arrangements in India and also Opposition allegations around his own finances, said in a Twitter post on Sunday that he is confident the independent review by House of Lords peer Christopher Geidt, the Independent Adviser on Ministers' Interests, will provide "further clarity". "My overriding concern is that the public retains confidence in the answers they are given and I believe the best way of achieving this is to ensure those answers are entirely independent, without bias or favour," Sunak states in his letter to Johnson.
The insurance regulator wants the removal of the minimum entry capital requirement of Rs 100 crore for setting up an insurance business in a bid to facilitate the entry of multiple players such as standalone micro insurers and niche players. Debasish Panda, chairman, Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (Irdai), said it should be left to the regulator instead to decide what should be the entry fee for interested players, depending on the size of the business and operations. According to the current norms, insurers are required to have a minimum paid-up capital of Rs 100 crore.
Besides, auditors are required to mention in their reports whether the companies have made adequate disclosures about dealings in junked notes during demonetisation
Bombay Oxygen Investments Ltd shares have been witnessing a particularly sharp rally for many days now and have more than doubled from about Rs 10,000 level seen in March-end and the market watchers feel the only reason for this kind of stupendous rally is the name of the company.
Weeks after confusion over three Mauritius-based funds whipsawing shares of Adani group firms, billionaire Gautam Adani on Monday said that "twisted narrative" seems to imply that companies have regulatory powers over their shareholders and can compel disclosures. Shares of port-to-energy group nosedived last month after reports that accounts of three of the six Mauritius-based funds that have invested most of their money in Adani group firms had been frozen by the national share depository. The three funds owned about $6 billion of shares across the conglomerate.
'We will take tough calls where needed in the interest of doing what is right.'
Companies spent less money buying back their shares from the public last year than at any time since 2015. They announced buybacks of up to Rs 14,341 crore, show numbers from primary market tracker Prime Database. The total amount spent was Rs 13,597 crore. Both the amounts are lower than what was offered (Rs 39,564 crore) and spent (Rs 36,517 crore) in 2020.
Experts say that despite the sizeable client base, PMS providers lag their domestic MF counterparts by quite a distance, when it comes to reporting and disclosure standards.
Growth-oriented technology companies have raised Rs 15,000 crore through initial share sales in the last 18 months and IPOs worth around Rs 30,000 crore by such firms are in the pipeline, Sebi chairman Ajay Tyagi said on Thursday. "Growing number of unicorns in the startup ecosystem is a testimony of the new age tech companies coming of age in our economy. These companies often follow a unique business model focusing more on rapid growth than immediate profitability," Tyagi said at an event organised by industry body CII. During the last 18 months, growth-oriented technology companies have raised a sum of around Rs 15,000 crore through IPOs (Initial Public Offerings).
