General Awareness

BUSINESS AND ECONOMY - December 2015

Dec 2015

Jun 08, 2020

NABARD Provides Special Liquidity Facility to Assam Gramin Vikash Bank

National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) provided Rs. 270 crore Special Liquidity Facility (SLF) to Assam Gramin Vikash Bank in the wake of COVID-19 pandemic to support the agricultural activities of the farmers.
This support and separate line of credit will enable to intensify farmers' crop production.
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) announced a Rs. 50,000 crore refinance facility for 3 All-India Financial Institutions (AIFI) namely: NABARD, the Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI), and the National Housing Bank (NHB).
From the total of Rs. 50,000 crore NABARD received Rs. 25,000 crore to refinance Regional Rural Banks (RRBs), co-operative (co-op) banks and Microfinance Institutions (MFIs) to ensure credit flow to farmers for agricultural operations during COVID-19 pandemic.

Western Coalfields Opens Three New Coal Mines

Coal India Subsidiary Western Coalfields Ltd (WCL) opened three new coal mines in Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh. These mines will have combined annual production capacity of 2.9 million tonnes (MT). The company will infuse total capital expenditure of Rs. 849 crores on these projects and generate direct employment for 647 people. Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray, Union Minister of Road Transport & Highways Nitin Gadkari and Union Minister of Coal and Mines Pralhad Joshi inaugurated the mines through video conference.
The three mines which WCL has opened are (a) Adasa Mine in Nagpur Area of Maharashtra, (b) Sharda Underground Mine in Kanhan Area and (c) Dhankasa Underground Mine in Pench Area of Madhya Pradesh. The annual coal production capacity of Adasa Mine is 1.5 MT whereas Sharda and Dhankasa Mines are having annual coal production capacities of 0.4 MT and 1 MT, respectively.

DFC to Invest $350 Million in Indian Firms

To support multiple projects in India, the US International Development Finance Corporation (USIDFC) is planning to invest 350 million USD in sectors of finance, health infrastructure, renewable energy and food security space also look to empower smallholder dairy farmers, generate solar power increase access to education. It is one of the largest approvals made by the Board of Directors.
USIDFC has approved $1 billion of investments for advance development in other countries across the globe. Sixty per cent of the investments are being made in the low to lower-middle income countries.

Customs Dept. Launches Faceless Assessment of Consignments

In order to improve transparency and the ease of doing business, the customs department will on Monday roll out the first phase of the country-wide faceless assessmemt of consignments. Under the system, consignments will be assessed by officials electronically, irrespective of the port where the goods arrive.
The first phase will commence in Chennai and Bengaluru. It will cover a specific set of items and will be expanded across India by this calendar year-end.
The Board has decided to begin faceless assessment in phases. The first phase would begin from June 8, 2020, in Bengaluru and Chennai for items of imports primarily covered by Chapters 84 and 85 of the Customs Tariff Act, 1975.
Introduction of faceless assessment is part of the string of reforms called 'Turant' Customs, which include paperless customs through intelligent e-Sanchit and Machine Release or end-to-end automated clearance without any interface of officer at any stage.

ADIA Arm Invests in Jio Platforms

Reliance Industries Ltd announced that a unit of Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA) has invested Rs. 5,683.50 crore in Jio Platforms Ltd, taking the total capital-raising by its digital services subsidiary to around Rs. 1 lakh crore in just seven weeks.
The investment by an undisclosed wholly-owned subsidiary of ADIA, valuing Jio Platforms at Rs. 4.91 lakh crore, comes just two days after RIL announced two large investments by foreign investors adding up yo Rs. 13,640.4 crore in Jio Platforms.
With this investment, Jio Platforms has raised Rs. 97,885.65 crore from seven marquee global investors.

L&T Board of Directors Give Approval for Reappointment of AM Naik

Larsen and Toubro's (L&T) board of directors gave its approval for reappointment of AM Naik as the company's non-executive chairman for three years beginning October 1, 2020. The engineering and construction major announced that Naik's current term is due to end on September 30, 2020. The conglomerate's board also gave its nod to extend the tenure of whole-time Director Dip Kishore Sen.
Joining the company as a Junior Engineer in 1965, Naik rapidly rose to positions of increasing responsibility as he moved from General Manager to Managing Director and CEO, leading to his appointment as Chairman and Managing Director on December 29, 2003. He was the Group Executive Chairman of L&T from 2012 to 2017. In October 2017, he stepped down from executive responsibilities and was appointed Group Chairman.

Jun 07, 2020

HDFC Bank Launches Campaign "Summer Treats"

With the easing of the lockdown restrictions, private sector HDFC Bank launched a special 'Summer Treats' campaign with offers for both merchants and, salaried and self-employed customers.
As part of the campaign, the bank will offer no cost EMI and no down payment for large appliances, discounts and cashbacks on select brands and 50 per cent extra reward points on online spend using credit cards.

CCI Gives Nod to Peugeot and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles Merger

Competition Commission of India (CCI), a statutory body of the Government of India (GoI), has given its nod to the proposed merger between French car maker Peugeot S.A (PSA) and London headquartered Fiat Chrysler Automobiles N.V (FCA).
The merged entity will be the 4th largest original equipment manufacturer by volume and the third largest by revenue after Toyota, Volkswagen, and Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi. It will generate €3.7 billion ($4.1 billion) in savings, which will come from sharing investments in vehicle platforms, engines as well as new technology and leveraging scale on purchasing.
Having presence in India, both the firms announced their merger in December 2019.

Jun 06, 2020

Standard Life Sells Stake in HDFC Life

Standard Life, the joint venture partner in HDFC Life Insurance, sold 1.98 per cent stake (40 million shares) in the life insurance firm.
The share sale was conducted at Rs. 496.4 per share and fetched the UK-based firm Rs. 1,986 crore ($263 million). More than 50 institutional investor accounts bought the shares. Some of them include Capital World, Nomura, Morgan Stanley and Societe Generale. Birla MF, ICICI MF and Mirae MF were among the domestic institutions that bought the stake. Following the stake sake, Standard Life's stake will decline to 10.27 per cent.
Standard Life has pruned its stake in the life insurer in several trances. At the time of HDFC Life's IPO in November 2017, Standard Life held 35 per cent stake.

India's 1st Mobile App Based Facility for Opening Current Accounts

IndusInd Bank Limited has introduced a first-of-its-kind facility for customers to open current accounts (CA) through its 'Indus Corporate' mobile app.
Current account can be opened for all types of businesses including proprietorships, partnerships and private and public limited companies through this facility.
The process of opening a current account in the bank with the mobile app will be paperless and the account will be opened in a few hours. Bank officials will go to the customer's home and gather information about them and his/her business on a real-time basis and verify it.
IndusInd Bank's 'Indus Corporate' mobile app uses several 'Application Programme Interface' (APIs), which enables secure validation of KYC documents from authorised government platforms such as Goods and Service Tax (GST), Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA), National Securities Depository Limited (NSDL), Import Export Code (IEC) and Aadhaar etc.

RBI Creates Payments Infrastructure Development Fund

In order to encourage the deployment of Points of Sale (PoS) infrastructure in smaller cities and towns, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has created a Rs. 500-crore ($66 million) Payments Infrastructure Development Fund (PIDF), in which it will start with an initial contribution of Rs. 250 crore and the remaining half of the amount will be installed by card issuing banks and card networks working in the country.
The fund will encourage businessmen from Tier-3 to Tier-6 centers and in the northeastern states to adopt Point of Sale (POS) machines (both physical and digital modes).
PIDF will continue to receive other cash contributions from card issuing banks and card networks at regular intervals to meet operating expenses.
RBI will also continue to meet the capital deficit on an annual basis, if required.
The PIDF will operate under the supervision of the RBI & will be run by an Advisory Council.

India Extends Anti-dumping Duty on Chinese Steel for Entire Year

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi urged moves towards a self-reliant economy while announcing a $266 billion economic stimulus package in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Addressing Indian industry leaders earlier this week, the PM expressed confidence that economic growth would soon return.
India has extended anti-dumping duty on certain varieties of steel until December this year (2020) to insulate domestic companies from cheap imports of the commodity from China and other nations like Korea and Malaysia.
India will charge import duty in the range of $180-316 per ton on steal to safeguard its domestic industry.
The Indian government previously imposed import duty on 'hot-rolled flat products of stainless steel 304 series' being imported from China, Malaysia and South Korea on June 5, 2015, for a period of five years.

Jun 05, 2020

Mubadala to Buy Stake in Jio Platforms

Mubadala, the Abu Dhabi-based sovereign investor, has agreed to invest Rs. 9,093.60 crore in Mukesh Ambani led Jio Platforms for 1.85% stake, valuing Jio Platforms at enterprise value of Rs. 5.16 lakh crore.
Jio Platforms with this investment has raised Rs. 87,655.35 crore from leading global technology and growth investors including Facebook, Silver Lake, Vista Equity Partners, General Atlantic, KKR and Mubadala in less than six weeks.
Jio Platforms, a next-generation technology platform focused on providing high-quality and affordable digital services across India, has more than 388 million subscribers.
Mubadala's Ventures business currently manages several venture funds in the US, Europe and Middle East.
Mubadala's portfolio spans advanced manufacturing, semiconductors, metals and mining, pharmaceutical and medical technology, renewable energy and utilities, and the management of diverse financial holdings.

Eurozone in Fresh Emergency Action to Boost Economy

The European Central Bank has taken further dramatic measures try to boost the eurozone economies, amid their biggest recession since World War Two.
Just months after emergency measures, the central bank said it would increase the size of its bond buying programme by €600bn (£546bn) to €1.35tn.
The programme will run until June 2021, six months longer than planned.
The move will keep borrowing costs low for countries and firms as they face huge budget deficits and recessions.
The bond purchases are often referred to as Quantitative Easing (QE). When central banks buy bonds with printed money, the value of the bonds rise and borrowing costs drop.

Double Whammy for Textile Mills as Operations Resume

Textile mills in the State (Tamil Nadu), numbering over 2,000, are facing a difficult situation despite resuming operations — orders are less, prices have fallen, and export enquiries are yet to pick up.
Tamil Nadu has almost 45% of the country's spindle capacity and produces approximately 175 million kg of yarn a month.
As per Ashwin Chandran, chairman of Southern India Mills' Association, with the mills resuming operations in the last one month, the average capacity utilisation is just 40 %.
Some mills operated at 80% to 90 % capacity, only resulting in rising inventory. Of the total yarn produced in Tamil Nadu, nearly 40% was sold in the powerloom weaving clusters in north India, mainly Maharashtra. Weaving activities were yet to gain momentum in these clusters. Even in Tamil Nadu, where there were nearly five lakh powerlooms, the weaving clusters were operating at just 50% capacity.
Mr. Ashwin appealed to the Union and State governments to come out with schemes to boost exports so that Indian yarn was competitive in the international market.
The mills face labour shortage as most of the migrant workers have gone home. The demand should revive by the time the workers return, say the spinners.

Zomato and Swiggy Get Permit to Test Drone Delivery

Hyperlocal delivery start-ups including Dunzo, Swiggy and Zomato can begin to test fly beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) drones for deliveries, after receiving permission from Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA).
A senior DGCA official confirmed the development that along with the delivery start-ups, budget airline SpiceJet, Reliance-backed drone startup Asteria Aerospace were among the 13 consortia which had received the approvals to test fly these drones.
The DGCA wanted to see the commercial possibilities which could be achieved through the BVLOS drones, and set up the BVLOS Experiment Assessment and Monitoring (BEAM) committee, in the first half of 2019, calling in for applications.

India's Unemployment Rate Saw a Small Dip in 2018-19

As per the latest Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS), released by the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation in May 2020, India's unemployment rate improved from the 45-year high of 6.1% in 2017-18 to 5.8% in 2018-19. The labour force participation rate also improved marginally, from 36.9% in 2017-18 to 37.5% in 2018-19. The labour force is defined as people who are working, or seeking work or available for work. Its participation rate is the percentage of the labour force in the population. The unemployment rate is the percentage of people without work within the labour force.
The report shows the dip came across all categories, though women and rural workers showed the most improvement.
Women's unemployment fell from 5.7% to 5.2%, while male unemployment only fell from 6.2% to 6%. Urban unemployment was still at a high of 7.7% in 2018-19, a marginal drop from 7.8% in 2017-18, while rural unemployment fell from 5.3% to 5%.

Jun 03, 2020

Horticulture Production in 2019-20 Estimated

In 2020, onions are not likely to bring tears as the government expects 17% rise in the onion output from last year.
As per the second advance estimate, the production onion is likely to be 26.74 million tonnes in 2019-20 as against 22.82 million tonnes in 2018-19.
The second advance estimates also places total horticulture production in 2019-20 to be at 320.48 million tonnes - 3.13% higher than last year.
The official said that the production of fruits is likely to be 99.07 million tonnes as compared to 97.97 million tonnes in 2018-19.
The production of vegetables is also likely to be higher in 2019-20.

SBI Creates Separate Business Vertical for Financial Inclusion

State Bank of India has created a separate business vertical to focus on financial inclusion and micro-markets (FI&MM) in semi-urban and rural areas.
Under FI&MM, the bank will offer loans predominantly for agriculture and allied activities, and micro/small enterprises and vastly improve customer experience for the citizens in the hinterland.
About 8,000 branches in rural and semi urban areas have been identified for providing specialised services to the micro segment including micro credit for small businesses and farmers under new vertical.
At the national level, the FI&MM vertical will be headed by Deputy Managing Director, Sanjeev Nautiyal.

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