Banking Awareness of 13, 14 and 15 September 2022

Topic: Agriculture

1. East Africa has become top supplier of tur to India.

• Pigeon pea (tur/arhar) producing countries of East Africa have become largest supplier of tur to Indian market.
• East Africa has displaced traditional supplier Myanmar. Myanmar has traditionally been the main source of import of tur in India.
• Over the past five years, tur imports have increased from Tanzania, Mozambique and Malawi.
• Mozambique has emerged as the largest exporter of tur to India.
• According to the fourth advance estimates, India’s tur production has grown from 25.6 lakh tonnes (lt) in 2015-16 to 43.4 lt in 2021-22.
• However, consumption has also grown. Annual import of tur was 8.6 lt in 2021-22. This was almost double than 4.42 lt of last year.

Topic: Committees/Commissions/Taskforces

2. The centre forms an expert committee to suggest measures for scaling up of venture capital and private equity (VC/PE) investments.

• The expert committee has been formed under the chairmanship of former SEBI chairman M Damodaran. It has six members.
• In addition to Damodaran, other members of the committee are G Mahalingam, D P Nagendra Kumar, Ashish Verma, Poonam Gupta and Prabhat Ranjan Acharya.
• In her budget speech this year, Finance Minister has announced that an expert committee would be formed to examine and suggest measures to address regulatory as well as other issues to enable scaling up investments by VC/PE investments.
• The expert committee will review issues and compliances. It will suggest simplifications and changes for further accelerating the growth of alternative capital to participate in the VC/PE industry.
• The expert committee will also suggest measures to further accelerate investments into start-ups and sunrise sectors.
• PE/VC investments have declined to a 19 month low of $ 2.2 billion in August 2022.
• In 2021, PE/VC investment inflows stood at record level of over $70 billion.

Topic: Appointments

3. Justice M N Bhandari appointed as Chairman of the PMLA Appellate Tribunal.

• The Centre appointed Justice Munishwar Nath Bhandari as the Chairman of the Appellate Tribunal under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).
• He is appointed for four years, or until he reaches the age of seventy.
• The President of India appointed Mr. Bhandari as Chairman of the Appellate Tribunal under the Smugglers and Foreign Exchange Manipulators Act (SAFEMA).
• Through the Finance Act of 2016, SAFEMA and the PMLA Appellate Tribunal were merged.
• BharatPe has appointed two new independent directors. They are BP Kanungo, former Deputy Governor of RBI, and Kaushik Dutta, current Chairman and Independent Director at Zomato.
• Sanjay Khanna has been appointed as the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and Country Manager of American Express Banking Corp (AEBC) India.
• Janak Dalal has been appointed as Head of Securities Services for India and Sri Lanka by Deutsche Bank.
• Prasad K Panicker appointed as chairman of Nayara Energy, a privately held oil company.
• Dinesh Kumar Batra has taken additional charge as Chairman & Managing Director (CMD) of Bharat Electronics Limited (BEL) on 1 September 2022.

Topic: Taxation

4. Income Tax Department said that issuance of bonus and right shares by listed company will not attract Tax Deducted at Sources (TDS).

• Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has said that issuance of bonus share or shares issued under rights issue by listed company and subsidiaries will not come under new provision of TDS on perquisites and benefits.
• The new Section, 194R mandates a person providing any benefit or perquisite to a resident will deduct TDS at the rate of 10% of value.
• The new Section has become effective from July 1, 2022. It applies only if value of the benefit or perquisite is more than ₹20,000.
• Banks will not have to pay tax deducted at source under Section 194R on one-time settlement.

Topic: Indian Economy/Financial Market

5. Growth of India’s industrial production declined to a four-month low level of 2.4% in July.

• Industrial production has grown at 2.4% in July 2022. Previous low was recorded at 2.2% in March 2022.
• IIP had grown at 6.7% in April, 19.6% in May and 12.7% in June.
• Factory output, measured in terms of the Index of Industrial Production (IIP), had grown 11.5% in July 2021.
• According to the data released by the Statistics and Programme Implementation Ministry, the manufacturing sector expanded 3.2% in July 2022 as against 10.5% recorded in the year-ago period.
• The power sector reported a growth of 2.3% in July 2022 compared to 11.1% recorded a year ago.
• A contraction of 3.3% was recorded in July 2022 in the mining sector.
• During April-July 2022, IIP grew 10% as against 33.9% growth in April-July 2021.
• Capital goods output grew 5.8% in July 2022. The consumer durables segment grew 2.4% in July 2022. The primary goods segment expanded 2.5% in July 2022.

Topic: Miscellaneous

6. India and France will work towards setting up of an Indo-Pacific Trilateral Development Cooperation Fund.

• External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and his French counterpart Catherine Colonna decided this in their bilateral meeting held recently. 
• They agreed to work towards setting up of this fund to support India-based innovators and start-ups in taking their innovations to third countries, especially in the Indo-Pacific region.
• They also expressed interest in continuing again the cooperation under the India-France-Australia Trilateral mechanism.
• They welcomed the conclusion of Credit Facility Agreement between the Department of Economic Affairs, Ministry of Finance and the French Development Agency (Agence française de développement or AFD) for the drinking water project in Chandigarh.

Topic: Banking System

7. Federation of Indian Export Organisations (FIEO) said State Bank of India has agreed to facilitate trade in rupees with Russia.

• However, Russian government has yet not chosen a correspondent Russian bank.
• Russia may choose the correspondent Russian bank to work with SBI for rupee trade in the following 15 days, according to A. Sakthivel, President of FIEO.
• Once the rupee payment system is in place, exports to Russia may rise by $5 billion annually.
• India's imports from Russia rose by 369.29% to $9.26 billion in April–June 2022, while exports fell by 37.82% to $435.62 million.
• After Russia attacked Ukraine, Western countries—including the EU and the US—imposed sanctions on several Russian banks and prohibited them from using the SWIFT messaging system.
• India's exports to Russia have declined since the imposition of Western sanctions against Russia.
• The UCO Bank was a participant in the rupee-rial payment system that had been established a few years prior to conducting bilateral trade with sanction-hit Iran.

Topic: Indian Economy/Financial Market

8. Fitch Ratings has cut India's GDP growth forecast for current fiscal year (FY23) to 7%.

• In June, Fitch Ratings has estimated India’s GDP for current fiscal year to grow at 7.8%.
• Fitch Ratings has also lowered economic growth forecast for next fiscal year (FY24) to 6.7% from earlier estimate of 7.4%.
• The agency said that India’s economy recovered in the June quarter with a growth rate of 13.5%. This was below its June expectation of growth of 18.5%.
• In its latest global economic outlook, the agency expects policy rates to remain at 6% throughout next year.
• The agency now expects global GDP growth at 2.4% in 2022 and at 1.7% in 2023.
• Fitch Ratings is an American credit rating agency. It is one of the Big Three credit rating agencies.

Topic: Indian Economy/Financial Market

9. WPI inflation reached to 11-month low level of 12.41% in August 2022.  

• WPI inflation eased due to decline in prices of manufactured and fuel products. The prices of food items remained high.
• Wholesale Price Index (WPI) based inflation declined for 3 consecutive months.
• WPI based inflation remained in double digit for 17^th month beginning April last year.
• It was 11.64% in August 2021. It reached a record high level of 15.88% in May 2022.
• Inflation in food articles in August increased to 12.37% on account of costlier vegetables, fruits and cereals.
• Inflation in vegetables was 22.29% in August. In case of potato, it was 43.56%.
• Inflation in cereals was 1.77% in August. In wheat and fruits, it was 17.35% and 31.75% respectively in August.
• In fuel and power basket, inflation was 33.67% in August. In July, it was 43.75%.

Topic: MoUs/Agreements

10. Vedanta and Foxconn signed an MoU with the Gujarat government to establish a semiconductor manufacturing unit in the state.

• Both companies will invest Rs 1,54,000 crore for the establishment of this unit.
• This will provide employment to one lakh people in the state. This will be India's first semiconductor plant in Gujarat.
• Vedanta-Foxconn will establish a semiconductor fab unit, a display fab unit, and a semiconductor assembling and testing unit on a 1000-acre plot of land in the Ahmedabad district as part of the 60:40 joint venture.
• In 2021, the Indian semiconductor market was valued at $27.2 billion and is projected to grow at a high CAGR of over 19% to reach $64 billion by 2026.  
• Foxconn is a Taiwanese electronics manufacturing giant. Vedanta Limited is an Indian multinational mining company.  

Topic: Regulatory Bodies/Financial institutions

11. Insolvency and Bankruptcy Board of India (IBBI) has introduced two changes in the regulations pertaining fees charged by resolution professionals (RPs).

• One change is that resolution professionals cannot accept or share fees with other professionals and other support services providers appointed under Corporate Insolvency Resolution Process/Liquidation process.
• Another change is minimum fixed fee structure has been introduced. This is linked to the quantum of claims admitted.
• The minimum fixed fee per month ranges from ₹1-5 lakhs based on the quantum of claims admitted.
• Committee of Creditors (CoC) can increase the fixed fee depending on the cases with reasons recorded in writing.
• Performance linked incentive fee for timely resolution has been introduced with a cap of ₹5 crore.
• IBBI has introduced performance linked incentive fee for value maximization.
• This fee is to be paid to the RPs at the rate of one percent of the amount by which the “realisable value” is more than the liquidation value.
• No performance linked fee is payable if the resolution process takes more than 330 days.

Topic: Banking System

12. Axis Bank announced partnership with PayNearby that would aid in achieving priority sector lending targets.

• Axis Bank wants to achieve its priority sector lending targets in organic way, therefore, it tied up with PayNearby to use its distribution-as-service network of 50 lakh microbusinesses.
• This partnership will be used to open current and savings accounts for both retail and individual customers in remote areas.
• As per RBI guidelines, 40% of adjusted net bank credit (ANBC) should be extended to the priority sector.
• Bharat Bank is one of the key initiative of Axis Bank.
• PayNearby is a DIPP Certified Fintech Company set up in April 2016. It operated on a B2B2C model. It is the branchless banking network.
• Priority Sector Lending (PSL) guidelines issued by Reserve Bank of India were last reviewed for Commercial Banks in April 2015 and for UCBs in May 2018 respectively.
• The categories under priority sector lending are:
  • Agriculture
  • Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises
  • Export Credit
  • Education
  • Housing
  • Social Infrastructure
  • Renewable Energy
  • Others

Topic: Banking System

13. Google Cloud ties up with HDFC ERGO for digitalization of purchasing insurance in India.

• HDFC ERGO General Insurance is planning to shift to the cloud by 2024 by using Google’s data analytics.
• This partnership will help in developing a platform to digitize purchase and services of insurance in India.
• Google Cloud will help HDFC ERGO in its various operations ranging from customer experience and IT systems integration to data analytics and infrastructure.
• HDFC ERGO is a joint venture between HDFC and ERGO International AG (51:49). It offers products in retail, corporate and rural sectors. Its MD & CEO is Ritesh Kumar and Chairman is Mr. Keki M Mistry.

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