Financial news

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☕🍔 25.12.2023 : Today's Banking / Financial News at a Glance 

🍒       SBI to sign 200 mn euro LoC with EIB for climate action projects :  State Bank of India (SBI) on Thursday said it will sign a 200 million euro (about Rs 1,800 crore) Line of Credit (LoC) with the European Investment Bank (EIB) for supporting climate action projects in the country. The agreement will be signed on December 21 at the bank's IFSC Gift City Branch in Ahmedabad, SBI said in a regulatory filing. The loan document will become operational, subject to necessary approvals, it said. Earlier this month, SBI signed a 70 million euro (about Rs 630 crore) LoC with German Development Bank KfW for promoting solar projects in the country. - economic times.

🍒       RBI imposes Rs 2 lakh penalty on TDCC Bank for sanctioning loan to its director : The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has said it has imposed a penalty of Rs 2 lakh on the Thane District Central Co-operative (TDCC) Bank for alleged violation of banking regulations by sanctioning loan to one of the directors of the bank. The RBI gave this information in a release issued by its Chief General Manager Yogesh Dayal on Friday. In an order issued on November 28, the RBI imposed a penalty of Rs 2 lakh on the TDCC Bank for the violation of sections 20 and 56 of the Banking Regulation (BR) Act, 1949, it said. - economic times.

🍒       Bank of Baroda fined ₹5 crore by RBI over soiled note remittances : Bank of Baroda on Friday informed, in an exchange filing, that the Reserve Bank of India had imposed a penalty of ₹5 crore on the bank, in light of a shortage in the soiled note remittances. The RBI also imposed an additional penalty of ₹2,750 on the bank after it detected "fake and mutilated" notes in the soiled note remittances. According to the exchange filing, the bank was informed of these penalties on December 18 and 20, respectively. A ‘soiled note’ is a "note which has become dirty due to normal wear and tear and also includes a two piece note pasted together wherein both the pieces presented belong to the same note and form the entire note with no essential feature missing," according to the RBI. - economic times.

🍒       NPCI swings into action to prevent AePS frauds : The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) has swung into action to prevent scammers from misusing customers’ credentials to empty their bank accounts. It has asked acquirer banks’ to allow interoperable AePS (Aadhaar-enabled Payment System) cash withdrawal transactions only after Aadhaar-based biometric authentication of business correspondents (BCs) and agents. Further, acquirer banks, which provide the necessary infrastructure to the merchant to accept payments and facilitate acceptance of payments through cards, have to ensure that there is no misuse of the BHIM Aadhaar Pay transactions for carrying out cash withdrawals and to have daily monitoring to identify and stop any misuse. - Business Line.

🍒       Assam: Bandhan Bank secures mandate to collect revenue on e-GRAS portal : Bandhan Bank has announced that it has secured mandate to collect revenue on e-GRAS portal from Assam government. This will enable people of Assam to make their tax payments as well as non-tax payments through the Government Receipt Accounting System Portal (GRAS). This will make transactions easier, paperless and accessible for people of Assam. Bandhan Bank is present in all 35 districts of Assam with nearly 500 banking outlets. Consumers can pay for house tax, vehicle registration tax, local body tax, water bill, examination fees conducted by Assam government, trade license renewal, amongst others, using this portal. Through Assam e-GRAS portal, a citizen can pay to 70 various departments for range of services offered by them. The total collection through Assam eGRAS portal for FY 2022-23 was nearly Rs 16,000 crore. - economic times.

🍒       RBI introduces card tokenisation facility at bank level : The RBI on Wednesday introduced a Card-on-File (CoF) token facility at the level of banks and other institutions to provide convenience for cardholders to get tokens created and linked to their existing accounts with various e-commerce applications. At present, a CoF token can only be created through the merchant's application or webpage. For a CoF, a token is a 16-digit number unique for a combination of card, token requestor and merchant. Through tokenisation, the actual card details are replaced with token credentials that can be used only with the intended merchant. - economic times.

🍒       RBI circular impact: Banks may have to set aside more cash, AIF inflows to be hit : Provisioning at a few banks hitherto keen on investing in Alternative Investment Funds (AIFs) could surge, while institutional flows into these aggressively managed pooled corpuses face disruption risks, after the central bank Tuesday announced wide investment curbs aimed at preventing evergreening of doubtful corporate loans. "The (central bank) notification is intended to curb window dressing of loan books and evergreening efforts by a few lenders," said Hari Hara Mishra, CEO, Association of ARCs in India. "The guidelines address conflict of interest by putting loan and investment transactions at an arm's length. Proper recognition of a non-performing asset (NPA) is the first step toward faster resolution." - economic times.

🍒       Bandhan Bank sells stressed home loan portfolio : Bandhan Bank on Thursday said that it will sell its stressed home loan portfolio to an asset reconstruction company. The bank has approved the transfer of 7.76 billion rupees ($93.23 million) in home loans, which were overdue by more than 180 days to an asset reconstruction company (ARCs), it said in a release to exchanges. The bank will recover 36% of this amount or 2.8 billion rupees upfront in cash as part of the sale, it said. - economic times.

🍒       Yes Bank cofounder Rana Kapoor gets bail in ED case related to loan fraud : A special court here on Thursday granted bail to Yes Bank cofounder Rana Kapoor in a money-laundering case linked to alleged financial irregularities at the bank. He, however, would not walk out of jail at present as he has not been granted bail in a related case registered by the Central Bureau of Investigation. Kapoor, 65, former MD and CEO of the private bank, was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) in March 2020. Special judge for PMLA court M G Deshpande granted Kapoor bail on Thursday. - economic times.

🍒       Policymakers open to looking into AIF circular concerns : India's policymakers are open to looking at the industry's concerns relating to the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) circular on December 19 that imposed restrictions on investments in Alternative Investment Funds (AIFs) by banks and non-banking finance companies (NBFCs). The Indian Venture and Alternate Capital Association (IVCA) lobby group has approached the government, concerned that the measure will impact the flow of funds to the startup sector, ET reported on Friday. The RBI had been keeping a close watch on these practices for the past several months and clamped down after investments rose sharply, said a person familiar with the details. - economic times.

🍒       All-in-one insurance product, Bima Vistaar, to be rolled out in Q1 of FY25 : Bima Vistaar, the first of its kind all-in-one affordable insurance product for life, health, and property cover, is set to be rolled out in the first quarter of the next financial year. “The product design and other key aspects for rolling out Bima Vistaar have almost been completed. We need a technology platform to launch the product, which is being looked into by the Life and General Insurance Councils,’‘ a senior official of the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI) told businessline on Friday. - Business Line.

🍒       Banks seek funds amounting to 2.43 times the notified amount at 7-day VRR auction : In an indication of the extent of liquidity deficit in the banking system, banks placed bids seeking injection of funds amounting to 2.43 times the notified amount of ₹1.75-lakh crore in the 7-day variable rate repo (VRR) auction conducted by the Reserve Bank of India on Friday. While banks placed bids aggregating ₹4,25,154 crore (against the notified amount of ₹1.75 lakh crore), the central bank allotted 7-day funds aggregating ₹1,75,013 crore in the auction at a higher weighted average rate (WAR) of 6.70 per cent against last Friday’s 6.63 per cent.

🍒       Credit card spends drop over 10% from festival spending-led peak in October : Spends for the month stood at ₹1.61-lakh crore, 10.04 per cent lower m-o-m. In October, they had surged over 25 per cent to touch the record of ₹1.78-lakh crore, according to data by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). Most major issuers registered a double digit decline in spends during the month with spends for the top four issuers falling 7-19 per cent. ICICI Bank saw the highest decrease at 18.7 per cent followed by Axis Bank at 14.5 per cent. The share of e-commerce payments in credit cards spends fell to 63.3 per cent in November after steadily increasing for the past three months to 67.6 per cent as of October 2023. On the other hand, the share of PoS (point-of-sale) transactions jumped to 36.7 per cent in November after falling for the last three months to 32.4 per cent in October.- Business Line.

🍒       ICICI Securities leases 1.9 lakh square feet space for ₹92.2 lakh/month : ICICI Securities has taken on lease around 1.9 lakh square feet of space in Mindspace Juinagar at a monthly rent of ₹92.2 lakh, registration documents showed. The tenure of the lease is 144 months, starting from January 1, 2024 and the effective monthly rental rate works out to ₹49 per square feet. The rent escalates 4 per cent annually, according to the documents made available by the data analytics firm Propstack. - Business Line.

🍒       Finance Ministry asks banks to monitor top 20 IBC cases : The Finance Ministry on Friday asked heads of public sector banks to monitor and review the top 20 Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code cases as part of their bad assets management. During a meeting with managing directors and CEOs of public sector banks (PSBs), Financial Services Secretary Vivek Joshi asked them to review the top 20 cases monthly for their resolution.Besides, he also asked them to monitor cases long pending for admission and resolution under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC). - financial express

🍒       RBI issues draft omnibus SRO framework for banks, NBFCs : The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Thursday issued a draft omnibus framework for self-regulatory organisations (SROs) for banks, NBFCs and other entities regulated by it. The RBI has sought feedback on the same by January 25, 2024. In order to be eligible to apply for an SRO license, the applicant shall set up a not-for-profit company with adequate net worth and the ability to create infrastructure to discharge various responsibilities on a continuing basis. The applicant must also represent the sector and have the specified membership, or should at least submit the road map for attaining specified membership within a reasonable timeline. - Business Line.

🍒       RBI nod for merchant onboarding : After having acquired payment aggregator licences from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), major players are now focusing on increasing merchants on their platforms by offering a range of products and services. “We will definitely be launching some special offers for new merchants who come on the platform,” said Harshil Mathur, chief executive officer and co-founder, RazorPay. Whatsapp payments to businesses and omnichannel payment acceptance are key focus areas for the company, he added. - Business Line.

🍒       Mcap of three of 10 most valued firms jump Rs 70,312.7 cr; Reliance biggest winner : The combined market valuation of three of the 10 most valued firms jumped Rs 70,312.7 crore last week, with Reliance Industries emerging as the biggest winner, amid volatile market conditions. From the top 10 pack, Reliance Industries, HDFC Bank and Hindustan Unilever were the gainers, while Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), ICICI Bank, Infosys, State Bank of India, ITC, Bharti Airtel and Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) faced erosion to the tune of Rs 68,783.2 crore. Last week, the BSE benchmark declined 376.79 points or 0.52 per cent after a record-breaking rally. - Moneycontrol..

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