General Awareness

BUSINESS AND ECONOMY - September 2015

Sep 2015

Dec 25, 2021

RBI Extends Card Tokenisation Rule by 6 Months

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) extended the deadline for wiping off card data on merchant sites and applying tokenisation by another six months until June 30, 2022 as merchants and payments companies expressed their inability to meet the December 31 deadline.
After that, all card data "shall be purged". In addition to tokenisation, industry stakeholders must devise an alternative mechanism to handle recurring e-mandates, equated monthly instalment (EMI) options, etc. or any post-transaction activity that currently involves the storage of card-on-file data by entities other than card issuers and card networks.

Govt. Appoints Non-official Directors on Boards of Various Banks

According to regulatory filings by banks, the government appointed independent directors on board of various public sector banks, including Union Bank of India, Punjab National Bank and Canara Bank.
The government has appointed Non-Official Director (NOD) on the board of these banks for three years.
Shashank Shrivastava and Sardar Baljit Singh were appointed as NODs of Bank of Maharashtra.
Ajay Singhal was appointed as part time non-official director on the board Bank of Baroda for a period of three years while Nalini Padmanabhan was appointed on board of Canara Bank.
Pankaj Joshi and Sanjeev Kumar Singhal were appointed on board of PNB and Suraj Srivastava on Union Bank's board.

Dec 24, 2021

India Displaces UK to be Third Top Country Hosting Unicorns

Adding 33 'unicorns' in a single year helped India displace the United Kingdom to be third in the list of countries that are home to such enterprises valued at over USD 1 billion each.
India was placed fourth when it comes to the number of unicorns last year. However, the US and northern neighbour China, who occupy the first two ranks, are way ahead, according to the data compiled by Hurun Research Institute.
The US added 254 unicorns and now totals 487 companies in the coveted list, while China added 74 to take its tally to 301 start-ups having a valuation of over USD 1 billion.

Bank of Baroda Grabs Top Spot in Digital Payments

Bank of Baroda won the #1 position in overall digital transactions amongst large banks for FY20-21. The bank showed the exceptional growth of digital payment transactions achievement and was felicitated by the Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology (MeitY), Govt. of India at the Digital Payments Utsav.
To commemorate the 75th anniversary of the Independence of India, MeitY celebrated "Digital Payments Utsav". As a part of the celebration, the Bank of Baroda was conferred with 5 DigiDhan awards for FY 2019-20 & 2020-21 in various categories.

Wizikey Report: Reliance is India's most-visible Corporate in Media

Reliance Industries Ltd, India's largest corporate by revenues, profits and market value, topped the 2021 Wizikey News Score ranking as India's most-visible corporate in the media. State Bank of India is a close second on the ranking, followed by Bharti Airtel, Infosys and Tata Motors. Others on the India list include HDFC at the sixth spot, followed by HDFC Bank, TCS, Maruti Suzuki India, Vodafone Idea and ICICI Bank.
Wizikey's News Score is the industry's first integrated metric that measures news visibility. The ranking is based on Wizikey's news score of each brand that analyses the volume of news, headline grabs, the unique reach of media publications, and readership.

IDFC Approves Anil Singhvi's Appointment as Chairman

The board of directors of IDFC approved the appointment of Anil Singhvi as the chairman of the board.
The board also approved a proposal to seek shareholders' approval, by means of a postal ballot, for the appointment of Anita Belani as an independent director of the company for a period of three years.
The board also approved a scheme of amalgamation of IDFC Alternatives, IDFC Trustee Company and IDFC Projects, all wholly owned subsidiaries, into IDFC, subject to regulatory approvals from various authorities.

Dec 23, 2021

Central Bank of India Signs co-lending Deal with Fintech platform U GRO Capital

MSME lending fintech platform, U GRO Capital signed a co-lending agreement with Central Bank of India.
Under this partnership, the two entities aim to disburse up to Rs. 1000 crore to U GRO Capital's varied MSME segments under its programmes like Pratham, Sanjeevani, Saathi, GRO MSME and Machinery financing, in the next 12 months.
The co-lending arrangement with Central Bank of India will work towards providing formal credit to underserved MSMEs at affordable rates across all product categories of U GRO Capital.

Mahindra's SsangYong Joins Chinese Firm for EV Battery Development

SsangYong Motor Co, the South Korean unit of Indian carmaker Mahindra and Mahindra Ltd, signed an initial pact with Chinese electric vehicle maker BYD Auto Co for EV battery development.
The partnership with BYD would pave the way for the company's plan to transform itself into an EV maker in the era of electrification
BYD's wholly owned battery manufacturer FinDreams Industry Co. would participate in the battery development project.

GoI & German Bank Signed Euro 442.26 mn loan for Surat Metro Rail Project

Government of India and the Germany Development Bank- KfW (Kreditanstalt fur Wiederaufbau) signed a 26 million euros loan for a 40.35 km Surat Metro Rail project in Gujarat. The total cost of the project is Euro 1.50 billion, out of which KfW is financing Euro 442.26 million. The project is co-financed by French Development Agency, AFD (Agence Française de Développemet) with Euro 250 million.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi had launched the Ahmedabad Metro Rail Project Phase-II and the Surat Metro Rail Project in January 2021. The project is aimed at reducing traffic congestion and long delays on major travel corridors in Surat city and urban areas.
The 40.35 km Surat Metro project aims to strengthen the transport infrastructure of the urban part of Surat. It comprises two corridors. While corridor-1 is 21.61 km long and is from Sarthana to Dream City. Corridor-2 is 18.74 km long and is from Bhesan to Saroli.

Himanshu Chakrawarti is Snapdeal President for Value Commerce Strategy

E-commerce platform Snapdeal appointed Himanshu Chakrawarti as its president, firming up its leadership after filing for an initial public offering (IPO).
Chakrawarti would lead various functions at Snapdeal to drive its value commerce strategy and steer various growth-related and operational initiatives. He was the chief executive officer (CEO) of Unlimited Fashion, Arvind Lifestyle Brands' value-fashion retail chain. V-Mart Retail acquired Unlimited Fashion earlier this year, adding its nearly 75 stores in West and South India to its national footprint.

Rupen Jhaveri Appointed Group President of Piramal Enterprises

Piramal Enterprises Limited (PEL) appointed Rupen Jhaveri as its Group President, with primary focus on financial services.
In the newly created role, Jhaveri would be responsible for business development, strategy, merger and acquisition, capital allocation and corporate finance. The appointment is effective January 24, 2022.
His appointment is following the company's announcement in October 2021 that it would demerge its financial services and pharmaceuticals operations, aimed at simplifying PEL's corporate structure and unlocking value.
Jhaveri joins PEL from global investment firm KKR, where he was a managing director at its India private equity team. Prior to joining KKR, he was with Goldman Sachs & Co in its Principal Investment Area (PIA) and Warburg Pincus in Mumbai.

Dec 22, 2021

Axis Bank Emerges Top Bidder for Citi Business

Private sector lender Axis Bank emerged as the highest bidder to buy Citi's consumer banking business.
American banking major Citibank in April announced its plan to exit from the consumer banking business in India as part of a global strategy.
The business comprises credit cards, retail banking, home loans and wealth management. The bank has 35 branches in the country and employs about 4,000 people in the consumer banking business.

Samsung Takes over Intel as Top Chipmaker by Revenue in Q3

Samsung Electronics took over the top spot in the global semiconductor market by revenue in the third quarter on the back of strong memory chip sales.
Industry tracker Omdia said that Intel, which had been the top chipmaker for 11 straight quarters, slipped to number two behind Samsung "as the memory segment, where Samsung is the number one DRAM and NAND supplier, was the largest growth area for semiconductor" in the three months ending in September.
As a result, three of the global top four chipmakers were memory-focused semiconductor companies -- Samsung, SK hynix and Micron Technology -- in the same period.

Oriental Insurance Co Categorised as Public Shareholder in Axis Bank

Axis Bank said that The Oriental Insurance Company was categorised to public category from promoter category shareholder in the bank.
In October, applications were made to BSE and NSE for reclassification of The New Oriental Insurance Co to public category from promoter category.

Dec 21, 2021

Equitas Small Finance Bank Empanelled as Maharashtra's Banking Partner

Equitas Small Finance Bank was empanelled as a banking partner of the Government of Maharashtra to offer its services to the state government employees.
As per an agreement, Equitas Small Finance Bank is entitled to distribute salaries and allowances to the existing employees as well as make provision of pension to pensioners, thereby providing solutions to institutions and value-added services for individuals.
Bandhan Bank, Karur Vysya Bank, South Indian Bank are the other three banks that are assigned the role of distributing salaries, allowances to government employees.
The agreement is for the liability base. The government has granted authority to Equitas Small Finance Bank to open salary and pension accounts for the existing and retired employees across 58 of its branches in Maharashtra.

Adani Bags Rs. 17,000 crore e-way, Country's Largest PPP Project

Adani Enterprises Ltd (AEL) received the letter of award from Uttar Pradesh Expressways Industrial Development Authority to implement three major stretches of the greenfield Ganga Expressway.
The company also said that the project cost is over Rs. 17,000 crore and this is India's largest-ever expressway project awarded to a private company under the public-private partnership (PPP) framework.
AEL will construct three groups of the access-controlled six-lane expressway, expandable to eight lanes in Uttar Pradesh and the concession period will be 30 years.
The Ganga Expressway in Uttar Pradesh, which will connect Meerut with Prayagraj, will be India's longest expressway to be implemented on the design, build, finance, operate and transfer (DBFOT) basis.

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