Even if the Paytm fiasco does not mark the end of the bull run, at least some sanity will return to the wild IPO market, observes Debashis Basu.
The future of cryptocurrencies in India appears uncertain but that has not deterred young Indians from embracing the so-called 'fourth industrial revolution' world, where interconnectivity and smart automation, much of it relying on blockchain technology, drive human civilisation. Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Shaktikanta Das has repeatedly warned of macroeconomic instability and even "serious consequences" if cryptocurrencies turn mainstream. The country's monetary authority wants a China-like total ban on crypto, not even allowing these currencies to be treated as investments. Though Parliament's website had listed the Cryptocurrency and Regulation of Official Digital Currency Bill as one seeking a total ban of cryptocurrencies in the country, it was not presented in the Winter Session. India now has the highest number of cryptocurrency investors in the world.
'During the course of these two years, as new people have joined, we have no mental picture to associate with them and hence, have little connection with them.'
'A lot of first-time users who have entered the markets after Covid are increasingly investing in mutual funds, exchange-traded funds, and stocks for their long-term goals.'
With the 21 unicorns collectively valued at $73.2 billion, India is the fourth biggest in terms of unicorns, behind the US, China and the UK, as per the Hurun Global Unicorn List.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Tuesday said there were visible signs of revival in the economy but the GDP growth may be in the negative zone or near zero in the current fiscal.
Many in the US establishment must hope that the crisis would put the brakes on China's growing military might. Well, it ain't gonna happen, says T T Ram Mohan, who was appointed a member of the prime minister's economic advisory council on Wednesday, October 28, 2021.
Dubai-based billionaire BR Shetty has sued Bank of Baroda (BoB) and audit firm Ernst & Young (EY) in a New York court, accusing them of ignoring fictitious and fraudulent transactions that resulted in NMC Healthcare going bankrupt. Shetty is seeking $8 billion in damages in the suit that also names the top management of NMC Healthcare, and Netherlands-based Credit Europe Bank. A top NMC Healthcare official confirmed the development to Business Standard and said despite several meetings, senior BoB officials in India did not take remedial steps for fear of getting involved in an international ponzi scheme perpetrated by then senior management officials.
Barring stray references such as the 'dual control' of banks and shifting the goalposts during demonetisation, he is not in a fault-finding mode with the government, notes Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
The bank is using readily available satellite images from ISRO and NASA for the purpose, and plans to scale up to 63,000 villages in the next three months.
Changes in lifestyle due to aspects like lockdowns and work from home has created additional demand for items such as television sets, laptops, Wi-Fi routers and even vacuum cleaners, which the bank is funding at present.
Foreign banks set the template in consumer banking in its infancy, but have almost vacated this booming space.
Professionals with sharp technical skills and knowledge of emerging markets will continue to be in demand, says Nikhil Barshikar, founder and CEO of Imarticus Learning, a tech learning and training company.
For now, the concerns over bad loans have taken a back seat; a bigger challenge for the banking community is credit growth, explains Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
A slew of Indian firms, including Flipkart, Byju's and Zomato, is building a path to profitability and diversifying into newer business segments ahead of mega-IPO plans.
HDFC Bank on Thursday said network outages that led to a regulatory ban on new credit card sales were not due to transaction volumes, and affirmed that it continues to stay in touch with the RBI for restarting the services but giving a timeline for it will be difficult. The bank said it is on its way to creating a new technology architecture for the future as part of the "digital factory" and "enterprise factory" initiative. But, it conceded that outages will continue under the older system though it will be working to minimise the time taken to bring the service back. In December 2020, the RBI took the unprecedented step of stopping the largest private sector lender from selling any new credit cards and also launching new digital services, because of a series of network outages.
'There is pent-up demand for cricket after last year when no tournaments were played on Indian soil due to the pandemic.'
Many of them are housewives looking to increase income in households struggling with the economic devastation caused by COVID-19.
'Banking is a business of trust.'
Why settle for $400-500 million when you can make a billion or even more? That, in a nutshell, is why Krishna Kumar, 43, and Kashyap Dalal, 40, co-founders of Bengaluru-based edtech firm Simplilearn, one of the big players in the segment, sold a 51 per cent stake to Blackstone instead of selling 100 per cent as close competitor and rival Great Learning chose to do.
India needs a paradigm shift in personal data management that transforms the current organisation-centric data sharing system to an individual centric approach that promotes user control on data sharing for empowerment, said Niti.
While mobile wallets are still busy exploring the multiple facets of interoperability, experts believe that bringing in new customers would be costly affair and the numbers of new wallet users might not see a major hike anytime soon.
Modi hailed the close defence cooperation between the two countries and welcomed the completion of the logistics agreement between the two navies.
That's because India does not have a serious venture capital industry with an appetite for risk, observes T N Ninan.
The only feasible way to have a healthy banking sector could be making it mostly private, along with two or three large, better-run government banks, suggests T N Ninan.
E-KYCs and Aadhaar authentication are of crucial importance to the fin-tech companies as the recent RBI instructions require strict KYCs for these players to function in the market.
The content discovery platform designed to help you discover content and services in the language of your choice recently turned profitable. It has delivered 1 billion application installs and updates in the past 12 months, says Samreen Ahmad.
Ajit Balakrishnan offers a New Year resolution for our policy-makers.
Becoming a unicorn is surely a marker for a company in its growth story, but it's not a major achievement nor is it a turning point of any significant worth.
There seems to be no dearth of funds to fuel this growth, report Peerzada Abrar and Shivani Shinde.
'Those who come from outside are surprised at the relatively small strength of the RBI supervisory cadre, relative to the needs of the country and the needs of the financial sector.'
Mobile payments alone gathered close to $1.51 billion in the year 2017 through 13 rounds of funding, according to data compiled by Tracxn
During a three-hour long virtual meeting with CEOs of large public and private sector banks along with heads of NBFCs, the prime minister assured them that the government is ready to take all steps to support the financial sector.
Use a "virtual credit card" for every online transaction when you can't pay cash on delivery.
'Google and Facebook need to be tamed, their garb of 'Investing in India's future' need to be pulled off,' observes Vibhu Arya.
If banks won't lend, seek a loan from fintech lenders or P2P platforms to help you get out of a debt trap.
As many as 3.2 lakh shareholders attended the meeting on the newly-minted JioMeet platform from 550 cities in 48 countries.
The government is in no mood to buy the privacy and security argument pitched by WhatsApp, whereas the American firm says traceability will undermine end-to-end encryption and the private nature of the app, creating potential for serious abuse.
The race to get a New Umbrella Entity (NUE) licence for digital payments may get crowded. As many as six consortiums are said to be in the fray to apply for an NUE licence, which would create a for-profit National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI)-like body for retail payments. A consortium led by Financial Software and Systems (FSS), a leading provider of payment products and payment processor, is in talks and may file an application to the RBI for an NUE license, said sources aware of the development. The other constituents of this group include Indian Bank, Central Bank of India, India Post Payments Bank, National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (Nabard), and a few small finance banks.
Banking is first about trust and integrity and then about technology and the rest.
