Gold reserves were up by $1.525 billion in the reporting week to $37.625 billion.
Neither the foreign exchange, nor the gold, and certainly not the revaluation reserve should be available for spending by anyone. he revaluation account is simply not money. It is simply an accounting entry, says Rashmin C Sanghvi.
The currency market won't care for our moans, groans, cries and sighs. The rupee will find its own level, explains Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
India's exports in April jumped nearly three-fold to USD 30.63 billion from USD 10.36 billion in the same month last year, according to government data released on Friday.
President Ram Nath Kovind on Monday said that India has once again established itself as the world's fastest-growing economy. "Due to consistent endeavours, India has again emerged as one of the fastest-growing economies in the world. "GST collection has consistently remained above Rs 1 lakh crore during the last several months," President Kocind said while addressing both Houses of the Parliament at Central Hall ahead of the Budget Session. In the first seven months of the current financial year, the inflow of 48 billion dollars, the President said is a "testimony to the belief the global investor community has in India's growth story."
Sliding from a lifetime high, India's forex reserves declined by $4.148 billion to reach $603.933 billion for the week ended June 18 due to a fall in gold and currency assets, RBI data showed on Friday. The forex kitty had surged by $3.074 billion to a record high of $608.081 billion in the previous reporting week. The foreign currency assets (FCA), a major component of the overall reserves, declined by $1.918 billion to $561.540 billion for the reporting week, as per data by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI).
The Indian rupee is expected to trade between 80 and 84 against dollar in the first three months of 2023 with support from overseas inflows though worsening current account deficit (CAD) and reduced interest rate differential between the US and India pose challenges. According to a Business Standard Poll of 10 participants, most said the rupee could gain strength in January due to foreign inflows, and the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is not expected to allow the currency to depreciate ahead of the Union Budget scheduled on February 1. The rupee depreciated 10.15 per cent in 2022, its worst performance since 2013 as the war in Europe and the interest rate increase by the US Federal Reserve prompted investors to flee emerging markets.
China's forex reserves witnessed an increase of $509.7, a 12.8 per cent rise from 2012, People's Bank of China said.
Equity benchmark Sensex on Monday crashed about 1,546 points to sink below the 58,000-level due to across-the-board selloff tracking sluggish global markets. Besides, persistent foreign capital outflows continued to affect the market sentiment, traders said. Benchmark indices started the session on a weaker note and the selling intensified during afternoon trade, with almost all sectoral indices ending in the red. The 30-share BSE Sensex ended 1,545.67 points or 2.62 per cent lower at 57,491.51.
India needs foreign exchange buffer reserves to insulate itself from exchange rate volatility as we have "no friends" for swap lines and Japan was the only country that helped during the taper tantrum in 2013, former RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan said on Tuesday. Participating in a virtual event organised by economic think tank NCAER, Rajan said during the taper tantrum in 2013, India asked for swap lines, and only country who helped was Japan. "We need this (foreign exchange) reserve buffer to insulate ourselves because we have no friends.
'India's sizeable foreign exchange reserves should serve as a buffer.'
"President of Sri Lanka Gotabaya Rajapaksa is still in the country, I made a mistake in the (BBC) interview," Speaker Abeywardena told ANI in a telephone call.
A sharp rally in domestic stocks from June lows has once again rendered Indian markets expensive to their emerging-market (EM) peers. The 12-month forward price-to-earnings (P/E) multiple for the Nifty50 Index is around 20.6x - 82 per cent higher than 11.3 per cent for the MSCI EM Index. India's valuation premium has hit a five-month high. This is on the back of sharp outperformance to EM and global peers from June lows and also due to earnings downgrades, following the April-June quarter of 2022-23 earnings.
The finance ministry said on Tuesday that high energy and commodity prices due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine may provide an upside risk to inflation and continued vigil is required. "Going forward, elevated energy and commodity prices may act as an upside risk to the inflation outlook in the near-medium term. "Given the inherently unsustainable nature of high prices, international commodity prices are expected to level off early with an increase in supplies outside the crisis zone," the department of economic affairs said in its latest monthly economic report for February.
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is precariously balancing two opposing objectives - maintaining easy financial condition in the domestic market, while ensuring external stability - and economists have started taking note. They say India is going through the classic trilemma of the 'Impossible Trinity'. The RBI cannot have an independent monetary policy (setting domestic interest rates) in an environment of an open capital account and flexible exchange rates. What is even more complicated for the central bank now is that financial market stability overlays all the other three objectives.
India's forex reserves increased for the second consecutive week, touching $584.554 billion as of February 26, up by $689 million, the Reserve Bank said on Friday. The overall reserves had increased by $169 million to $583.865 billion in the previous reporting week. The reserves, which have been steadily increasing over the last few months, had touched an all-time high at $590.185 billion for the week ended January 29 this year.
India, he said, has already taken a host of reforms in banking and other sectors and is now focussing on stepping up public investment. "Compared to other nations, even among advanced countries, I think India is relatively better placed for the simple reason that India paid a certain price last decade... we had a banking system stress which was then compounded by stress in the non-banking financial sector towards 2018," he said at Amazon Smbhav Summit.
The central government is on track to meet its fiscal deficit target of 6.4 per cent of the GDP for 2022-23 on the back of strong growth in revenue collections, the World Bank said in its India Development Update on Tuesday. High nominal GDP growth in the first quarter supported strong growth in revenue collection, especially Goods and Services Tax (GST), despite tax cuts on fuel. Notwithstanding an increase in spending due to expanded fertilizer subsidies and food subsidies for vulnerable households in response to the commodity price shock, the government is on track to meet its FY22/23 fiscal deficit target of 6.4 per cent of GDP and the general government deficit is projected to decline to 9.6 per cent from 10.3 per cent in FY21/22 and 13.3 per cent in FY20/21.
For the banking system a new cycle starts in FY2024. It's fraught with fresh challenges on asset quality and profitability, warns Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
Exports dipped 1.6 per cent to 8.95 trillion yuan.
With economic activity still to reach pre-pandemic levels, the RBI may slow down the pace of rate hikes until next year to quell soaring inflation while supporting growth, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) says in its latest report. The Manila-based multilateral funding agency has raised the inflation forecast for the current fiscal year ending in March 2023 to 6.7 per cent from its earlier projection of 5.8 per cent. For the next fiscal year too, the forecast has been revised upwards to 5.8 per cent from 5 per cent earlier.
The Reserve Bank of India on Friday raised the benchmark lending rate by 50 basis points to 5.40 per cent to tame inflation.
The Pakistan Parliament witnessed multiple adjournments and heated arguments, but the voting on a no-confidence motion against him appeared to be a distant possibility.
The rise in reserves was $2.12 billion.
The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) on March 17 had announced that State Bank of India (SBI) would extend a term loan of $1 billion to Sri Lanka, fully guaranteed by the Indian government, and this was part of India's financial aid to the troubled island nation. Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) spokesperson Arindam Bagchi was quoted saying by news agency PTI that the loan would be used for importing food, medicines, and other essential items. "India has always stood with the people of Sri Lanka and we will continue to extend all possible support at this juncture.
The windfall taxes on domestic crude oil production and fuel exports will generate close to $12 billion (Rs 94,800 crore) for the government in the remainder of the current fiscal while trimming profits of firms such as Reliance Industries Ltd and ONGC, Moody's Investors Service said Tuesday. On July 1, the government imposed windfall gain taxes on the export of petrol, diesel and aviation turbine fuel (ATF), and on the domestic production of crude oil. It has also mandated exporters to meet the requirements of the domestic market first.
It plans to use it as collateral, along with forex reserves, to print currency.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Wednesday said the Indian economy may have slowed down but there is no threat of a recession.
India's current account surplus moderated to $15.5 billion or 2.4 per cent of the GDP in the July-September quarter of the current fiscal, the RBI said on Wednesday. The same was at $19.2 billion or 3.8 per cent of the GDP in the preceding three-month period on account of a rise in the merchandise trade deficit, the RBI said in a statement on 'Developments in India's Balance of Payments during the Second Quarter (July-September) of 2020-21'. It is for the third consecutive quarter that India's current account remained in surplus. In the last quarter of 2019-20, the surplus was $0.6 billion. Current account deficit/surplus reflects the difference between the outflow and inflow of foreign exchange in a country's current account.
Finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Wednesday exuded confidence that inflation would further decline and the government is on track to meet its budgetary target for deficit and said that there is no fear of stagflation in India. Replying to the debate on first batch of Supplementary Demands for Grants 2022-23 in Lok Sabha, the finance minister said inflation has come down and it is now in the tolerable band of the RBI. Inflation has been declining since April 2022 and it is declining further, she said.
The ruble has recouped most of its losses and become the top-performing currency globally. It continues to gain and is up 60 per cent against the US dollar from its lows in the first week of March. The ruble appreciated to 83 to the dollar intraday on Tuesday against a record low of 139 on March 7.
The move by Islamabad comes as it is also approaching Western and Gulf donors for rescue packages at a time when its foreign exchange reserves fell to a six-year low of less than $8 billion. Experts have said Pakistan's foreign exchange reserves, in real terms, are barely adequate to cater for imports for one-and-half months.
Saudi Arabia has agreed to provide US$ 4.2 billion worth of assistance to cash-strapped Pakistan to support its economy, it emerged on Wednesday after Prime Minister Imran Khan held talks with Saudi Prince Mohammad bin Salman in Riyadh this week.
For the week under review, Special Drawing Rights fell by $ 13 million to $4.19 billion, while India's reserve position with the International Monetary Fund was down $3.5 million to $1.14 billion.
Foreign exchange reserves jumped $1.17 billion to touch a new record high of $355.46 billion.
Reserves provide a cushion against shocks.
Foreign exchange reserves had touched a record of $363.5 billion in the week through June 3, 2016.
The increase has been mainly on account of higher FII inflows, deposits by non-residents and short-term credits.
Theoretically, the currency with the public should expand in sync with the nominal income, which again moves in relation to the nominal growth rate of the economy. But the correlation breaks easily when other factors come into play, says Anup Roy.
Gold reserves were up by $712 million to $34.729 billion.
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