General Awareness

BUSINESS AND ECONOMY - February 2017

Feb 2017

Jan 18, 2021

France Wants Suspension of 'Poisonous' U.S.-Europe Trade Spat

According to France's foreign minister, the European Union and the incoming administration of U.S. President-elect Joe Biden should suspend a trade dispute to give themselves time to find common ground.
As per Jean-Yves Le Drian, the issue that's poisoning everyone is that of the price escalation and taxes on steel, digital technology, Airbus and more particularly our wine sector.
At the end of December the United States moved to boost tariffs on French and German aircraft parts, wines and other spirits in the Boeing-Airbus subsidy dispute, but the bloc decided to hold off on retaliation for now.
The EU is planning to present a World Trade Organization reform proposal in February and is willing to consider reforms to restrain the judicial authority of the WTO's dispute-settlement body.
The United States has for years complained that the WTO Appellate Body makes unjustified new trade rules in its decisions and has blocked the appointment of new judges to stop this, rendering the body inoperable.

India Delivers 1st Batch of Heavy Cranes to Bolster Operations at Chabahar Port

India has delivered a consignment of heavy equipment, including cranes, for further development of Iran's Chabahar Port, signalling New Delhi's commitment to the strategic connectivity project that can provide access to markets in Central Asia.
The consignment included two mobile harbour cranes of 140 tonnes, which were acquired from the Italian firm Italgru S.r.l. under a deal for a total of six cranes.

ICICI Bank Ties up with Fintech Niyo to Issue Prepaid Cards to MSMEs

ICICI Bank, a leading Indian private sector bank, and Niyo, a new age fintech company announced a tie-up to issue prepaid cards to Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) workers. MSMEs will now be able to get 'ICICI Bank Niyo Bharat Payroll Card' powered by Visa, for their blue-collar workers.
With this, MSMEs can upload the salaries of their workers on the card, which the workers can then utilise as per their need seamlessly.
These workers are mostly under-banked and are deprived of banking facilities.
The 'ICICI Bank Niyo Bharat Payroll Card' allows an individual to receive funds up to Rs. 1 lakh into the card account. It offers convenience and safety of digital banking to the blue-collar workforce while providing a state-of-the-art salary disbursement solution to the employers.
Any MSME can tie-up with Niyo to avail of the prepaid card. After the tie-up, cards are issued to the workers at their workplace itself while their KYC verification is done simultaneously using a biometric device.

GAIL Announces Share Buyback Programme

GAIL (India) Ltd, the nation's largest gas distribution firm, announced a Rs. 1,046.35-crore share buyback programme as it looked to return surplus cash to shareholders, the biggest being the Government of India.
The shares being bought represent 1.55% of the total number of fully paid-up equity shares. The company Board also declared an interim dividend of 25% (Rs. 2.50 per share) for financial year 2020-21. The government owns 51.76% of GAIL and is expected to participate in the share buyback.

Jan 17, 2021

PNB Names Six Branches after War Heroes

Coinciding with the 73rd Army Day, public sector lender Punjab National Bank (PNB) dedicated six of its branches to war heroes who were conferred gallantry awards in various battles and operations.
PNB's branch at Jalandhar Cantonment has been named after Flying Officer Nirmaljit Singh Sekhon, the only IAF officer to have been decorated with the Param Vir Chakra (PVC) – the nation's highest gallantry award.
The branch at Jammu Cantonment has been named after Naib Subedar (Honorary Captain) Bana Singh.
Two other branches have also been renamed after PVC recipients. Capt Manoj Kumar Pandey's name has been etched at the Lucknow's Sadar Bazar branch.
Company Havildar Major Piru Singh of the Rajputana Rifles has a branch in Jaipur named after him.
Two Maha Vir Chakra recipients, Brigadier Mohammad Usman and Captain Anuj Nayyar, have a branch in Agra and New Delhi, respectively, named after them.

India and Japan Sign MoU to Enhance Cooperation in the Field of ICT

India and Japan signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to enhance cooperation in the field of Information and Communications Technology (ICT), including 5G standardisation.
As per the agreement, both the countires will enhance mutual cooperation in the field of 5G technologies, telecom security, submarine optical fibre cable system to islands of India, spectrum management, smart cities, high-altitude platform for broadband in unconnected areas, disaster management and public safety.
It has been agreed that apart from Ministry-level cooperation, government of India organisations such as C-DOT and ITI Limited, along with industry partners from Japan, will also be part of this cooperation.
The MoU was signed between Ravi Shankar Prasad, Minister for Communications, Electronics and IT and the Japanese Minister for Internal Affairs and Communications Takeda Ryota, through a video conference.

Snapdeal, 4 Indian Shopping Complexes Figure in US Notorious Markets List

Snapdeal, one of India's largest e-commerce platforms, along with four Indian shopping complexes, two of them in New Delhi alone, have figured in the latest 2020 Review of Notorious Markets for Counterfeiting and Piracy issued by the Office of the US Trade Representative.
The four Indian markets that have found mention in the list are Heera Panna in Mumbai, Kidderpore in Kolkata and Palika Bazaar and Tank Road in Delhi.
Aizawl's Millennium Center was mentioned in the last list of notorious markets, but now it has been replaced by Palika Bazaar.

Telecom Giant Bharti Airtel Divests Stake in Seynse Technologies

Telecom operator Bharti Airtel has divested its stake in Seynse Technologies.
The stake was held through Bharti Airtel's wholly-owned subsidiary Nettle Infrastructure Investments Limited.
The divestment of 6,824 equity shares was for a cash consideration.
The company has divested its stake in Seynse Technologies Private Limited held through Nettle Infrastructure Investments, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the company.
It, however, did not disclose the price at which the shares were divested for the reasons of confidentiality.
Seynse is a financial technology company that has created Loan Singh platform.

Jan 16, 2021

Sri Lanka Revives Port Deal with India and Japan

Sri Lanka's President Gotabaya Rajapaksa has announced the revival of an Indian and Japanese investment project to develop a deep-sea terminal in Colombo harbour, next to a controversial $500m Chinese-run container jetty.
A tripartite deal by Sri Lanka's previous government had been on hold amid trade union resistance but Rajapaksa on Wednesday said the East Container Terminal (ECT) would proceed.
The approval came after reviewing regional geopolitical concerns, a reference to India's suspicion of China's role at the same port.
The terminal will be developed with 51 percent ownership by Sri Lanka's government and the remaining 49 per cent as an investment by India's Adani Group and other stakeholders including Japan.
The state-run Sri Lanka Ports Authority (SLPA) entered into a memorandum of cooperation in May 2019 with Sri Lanka, India and Japan to develop the ECT before Rajapaksa came to power in November 2019.
The deep-sea jetty is located next to the Colombo International Container Terminal, which is 85 percent owned by China and was commissioned in 2013. The SLPA owns the remaining 15 per cent.

RBI Forms Group to Regulate Digital Lending Frauds

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has set up a working group to study digital lending activities of the regulated and unregulated players, due to the growing instances of frauds in digital lending space. The group will suggest steps to regulate digital lending including online lending platform and mobile lending. The group will evaluate digital lending activities and assess the penetration and standards of outsourced digital lending activities in RBI regulated entities.
The six-member panel comprises of following four RBI internal and two external members:
Jayant Kumar Dash, Executive Director, RBI (Chairman), Ajay Kumar Choudhary, Chief General Manager-in-Charge, Department of Supervision (Member), P. Vasudevan, Chief General Manager, Department of Payment and Settlement Systems, RBI (Member), Manoranjan Mishra, Chief General Manager, Department of Regulation (Member Secretary), Vikram Mehta, Co-founder, Monexo Fintech (External Member) and Rahul Sasi, Cyber Security Expert & Founder of CloudSEK (External Member).

SoftBank, Hughes Network Invest in Bharti Global-owned OneWeb

OneWeb, the Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite communications company jointly owned by the UK government and Bharti Global, secured additional funding from SoftBank Group Corp and Hughes Network Systems LLC, bringing its total funding to $1.4 billion.
The capital raised so far positions the company to be fully funded for its first-generation satellite fleet, totaling 648 satellites, by the end of 2022.
Post the investment, SoftBank will gain a seat on OneWeb's Board of Directors. Hughes is an investor through its parent company EchoStar, and also an ecosystem partner, developing essential ground network technology for the OneWeb system.
OneWeb's mission is to deliver broadband connectivity worldwide to bridge the global Digital Divide by offering everyone, everywhere access including to the Internet of Things (IoT) future and a pathway to 5G.

RBI drains Rs. 2 Trillion in Bid to Nudge Shorter Rates Higher

India's central bank drained 2 trillion rupees ($27.4 billion) from the banking system, as it seeks to push up money-market rates that had crashed below the reverse repo rate.
The cutoff for the 14-day reverse repurchase operation was set at 3.55%, 20 basis points higher than the central bank's reverse repo rate of 3.35%. A Bloomberg poll of seven traders had estimated it at 3.50%. The central bank got bids worth 3.06 trillion rupees.
The RBI is draining excess cash after money-market rates crashed way below its 3.35%-4.00% interest-rate corridor late last year, spurring calls from investors for it to remedy a situation that could distort banks' asset pricing. Too sharp a rise could drive volatility, though, and raise concerns that the central bank is withdrawing stimulus support.

Jan 15, 2021

Google Closes Deal to Buy Fitbit

Search and advertising giant Google has closed its deal to buy Fitbit, even as the Justice Department said that it was continuing its probe of the $2.1 billion transaction.
The Justice Department, which sued Alphabet Inc's Google in October for allegedly violating antitrust law in its search and search advertising businesses, said it "has not reached a final decision about whether to pursue an enforcement action" regarding the Fitbit deal.
Google had said it was buying Fitbit, which makes a watch-like device to measure physical activity, as a way to enter the devices market and was hoping to address privacy concerns.

Eleven Indian Companies in Top-500 Globally by Value

As per a report, eleven private Indian firms have made it to the list of 500 most valuable companies across the world, and the country is ranked 10th on the chart.
The total value of these 11 companies grew 14 per cent and has been pegged at USD 805 billion or nearly a third of the Indian GDP.
All these companies in the list of non-state enterprises have gained in value during 2020, which was hit by the pandemic, barring tobacco major ITC and second largest private sector lender ICICI Bank, as per the 'Hurun Global 500' report.
The US accounted for nearly half of the enterprises with 242 of the 500 entries, followed by China at 51 and Japan at 30 companies.

RBI Releases Financial Stability Report

The Reserve Bank of India released to the financial stability report for December 2020. This is the 22nd issue of financial stability report of the apex bank. It is released twice a year.
The financial stability report says that the long-standing trend of private and public sector banks have been reversed. According to the report, the private bank credit has grown rapidly and the public sector bank credit has declined.
The RBI Financial Stability Report is released by the Financial Stability and Development Council. The idea of the council was mooted by Raghuram Rajan Committee in 2008. The Union Finance Minister is the chairperson of the Financial Stability and Development Council. The other members include RBI Governor and other senior officials of RBI.

Taiwan's Foxconn Joins Hands with China's Geely

Taiwan's Foxconn and Chinese automaker Zhejiang Geely Holding Group said that they will join hands to provide contract manufacturing for automakers.
They will each hold 50 per cent of a venture that will also provide consulting services on electric vehicle (EV) technologies to automakers.
It marks the latest move by Foxconn, a major Apple Inc supplier, into autos after a tie-up with Chinese electric car startup Byton and comes amid reports that Apple is likely to launch a self-driving electric car by 2024. For Geely, the partnership will allow it to share its first EV-focused platform with other automakers.

Jan 14, 2021

Intel Replaces its Chief Executive after 2 Years

Intel is replacing its CEO after only two years in what had been a rough stretch for the chipmaker.
Bob Swan, who became the company's chief executive in early 2019, will be replaced in mid-February by tech industry veteran Pat Gelsinger.
The choice of Gelsinger, who started his career as an Intel engineer decades ago, puts the semiconductor pioneer back in the hands of a tech expert at a time when it is struggling to keep up with market changes and growing competition.

Paytm Money to offer F&O Trading

Paytm Money, a wholly-owned subsidiary of fintech major Paytm, will provide Futures & Options trading (F&O) on its platform as it eyes facilitating daily turnover of Rs. 1.5 lakh crore in next 18-24 months.
The platform, which also offers services around stocks, direct mutual funds, ETF, IPO, NPS, and digital gold, is focussed on bringing "wealth services to 100 million Indians.
According to Paytm founder and CEO Vijay Shekhar Sharma, This product has been made keeping in mind the mobile-first experience and we believe that presenting simple, low price products can help make deep inroads into smaller towns and cities.
Given the limited penetration of stock investments in the country, Paytm sees a high growth trajectory for its stocks broking offering, similar to its mutual fund offerings.
Paytm Money will charge brokerage at Rs. 10 for all F&O trades, which is in line with its intraday charges of Rs. 10 and free for delivery.

Two crore Fine on Deutsche Bank for Non-compliance

The Reserve Bank of India has imposed a penalty of Rs. 2 crore on Deutsche Bank AG for non-compliance with certain provisions of directions concerning interest rate on deposits. The central bank said the statutory inspection of Deutsche Bank's financial position as on March 31, 2019, and the Risk Assessment Report revealed non-compliance with the 'Reserve Bank of India (Interest Rate on Deposits) Directions, 2016'.
The action was based on the deficiencies in regulatory compliance and was not intended to pronounce upon the validity of any transaction or agreement entered into by the bank with its customers.

Yes Bank Launches Wellness Themed Credit Cards

Yes Bank has announced its partnership with Aditya Birla Wellness Private Limited to launch the 'YES BANK Wellness' and 'YES BANK Wellness Plus' Credit Cards – aimed at the holistic health, self-care and wellness of consumers.
As consumers face new realities of home-schooling of children, working from home, and lack of physical contact with loved ones and colleagues, this is an innovative step to encourage and promote self-care, mental and physical well-being. Consumers can now enjoy the bouquet of complimentary health benefits by simply registering on the Aditya Birla Multiply App. The mobile app allows consumers to avail complementary benefits such as annual health check-up, round the clock doctor or counsellor helpline, in-studio or home based workout sessions, personalized diet plans, among others, right at their fingertips.

RBI Cancels the Licence of Vasantdada Nagari Sahakari Bank

RBI has requested the Commissioner for Cooperation and Registrar of Cooperative Societies (RCS), Maharashtra to issue an order for winding up the bank and appoint a liquidator for the bank.
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has cancelled the licence of Maharashtra-based Vasantdada Nagari Sahakari Bank, with immediate effect. Vasantdada Nagari Sahakari Bank Ltd will now not be allowed to conduct the business of 'banking', including acceptance of deposits and repayment of deposits, with effect from the close of business on January 11, 2021.
The Bank has failed to comply with the requirements of Section 11(1) read with Section 56 of BR Act and thus would be unable to pay its present depositors in full in its current financial position.

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