Banking, Financial and Economic Awareness of 20, 21 and 22 June 2021

By PendulumEdu | Last Modified: 29 Jun 2021 21:51 PM IST

Main Headlines:

Topic: Indian Economy

1. Fiscal deficit for fiscal year 2020-21 remains lower than revised estimate in Budget.

As per Controller General of Accounts (CGA) data, the fiscal deficit for the fiscal year 2020-21 remains lower than the revised estimate in the Budget.
As per the data, fiscal deficit for the fiscal year 2020-21 reached slightly more than Rs 18.21 lakh crore as against the revised estimate of over Rs 18.48 lakh crore.
In terms of percentage of GDP, fiscal deficit stood at 9.3% against 9.5% provided in Budget.
Net tax collection was higher than the revised estimate by nearly 6%. Expenditure was 1.8% higher than the revised estimate.
Food subsidy was 124% of Revised Estimate (RE). Petroleum subsidy stood at 93% of RE.
Government’s market borrowing was higher. The government increased the borrowing target to more than Rs 12.73 lakh crore. Its borrowing stood up at Rs 13.19 lakh crore.
Fiscal deficit is defined as the difference between the government’s total income and total expenditure.

Topic: Committees/Commissions/Taskforces

SEBI has reconstituted Takeover Panel and appointed N Venkatram MD and CEO, Deloitte India as its new member.
The panel looks into applications for exemption from the mandatory open offer that an acquirer should make to minority shareholders.
The panel makes recommendations to SEBI on such applications. It is currently chaired by N K Sodhi, the former chief justice of the high courts of Karnataka and Kerala.
Darius Khambata and Thomas Mathew T are other members of the panel.
A four-member Takeover Panel was first constituted by SEBI in November 2007 under the chairmanship of former Bank of Baroda chairman K Kannan.

Topic: Agriculture

Farmers in Gujarat’s Saurashtra region are illegally cultivating indigenously developed genetically modified cotton.
The unauthorized variety is known by different names such as 4Bt, Bt4 and 4G.
It has been developed by crossing cotton grown locally in the Saurashtra region with cotton cultivated in Australia and the US.
It has a longer fibre length and immunity to pink bollworm.
The cultivation of HTBt cotton has not been authorised by the Genetic Engineering Appraisal Committee (GEAC). It is illegal.
Under Environment Protection Act 1986, the state government can take action for unauthorized cultivation.

Topic: Banking System

Instant cardless EMI facility for online purchases on e-commerce platforms has been launched by ICICI Bank.
Customers can convert transactions up to ₹5 lakh into easy EMIs.
The facility is available to ICICI bank’s pre-approved customers across 2,500 e-commerce brands.
ICICI Bank (ICICI Bank Limited) is a private sector bank. Girish Chandra Chaturvedi is chairman of its board of directors. Its MD & CEO is Sandeep Bakhshi.

Topic: Appointments

Centre has extended the tenure of Ananta Barua as a Whole-time Member (WTM) of SEBI for two years after July 31.
His tenure has been extended till July 31, 2023. He was appointed as Whole-time Member of SEBI in June 2018 for three years.
Centre has also extended the tenure of Santosh Kumar Mohanty as SEBI Whole-time Member by two more years.
His tenure has been extended up to June 24, 2023. He was appointed in April 2018 as a Whole-time Member of SEBI for a period of three years.

Topic: Reports and Indices

As per a UN report, Global FDI flows decreased by 35% to $1 trillion from $1.5 trillion in 2019.
As per UNCTAD’s World Investment Report 2021, global FDI flows in 2021 would be at about 25% below the 2019 level.
As per the report, India recorded a 27% growth in FDI in 2020 to $64 billion.
Increased investment in information and communications technology (ICT) and construction boosted FDI inflows in India.
FDI declined in other South Asian Economies such as Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Pakistan.
As per the report, FDI recorded a 45% decline in Latin America and the Caribbean. It recorder a 16% decline in Africa.
World Investment Report is a report focused on trends in foreign direct investment (FDI) worldwide, at the regional and country levels.
United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD):
- It is a permanent intergovernmental body that was established in 1964.
- It is a central agency that monitors the performance of investment promotion agencies (IPAs) and identifies global best practices.
- Secretary-General: Rebeca Grynspan
- Headquarters: Geneva, Switzerland

Topic: Banking System

IndusEasy Credit, a digital lending platform, has been launched by IndusInd Bank.
The platform enables customers to meet their financial requirements from their homes.
The platform will benefit both existing as well as a non-IndusInd Bank customer.
Both type of customers can instantly avail personal loans or credit cards in a completely paperless and digital manner.
IndusEasy Credit offers a fully digital end to end process that uses the power of India’s digital infrastructure, Indiastack.
Indiastack is a set of Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) that allows the use of a unique digital infrastructure to solve India’s problems.

Topic: Reports and Indices

All India House Price Index (HPI) increases by 2.7% year-on-year (yoy) in Q4FY21.
On 21 June, RBI has released its quarterly House Price Index (HPI) for Q4:2020-21.
HPI growth has shown an increase of 15.7% (Bengaluru) to a contraction of (-) 3.6% (Jaipur).
HPI is based on transaction-level data received from housing registration authorities in ten major cities.
Delhi, Bengaluru, Kolkata and Jaipur recorded a sequential decline in HPI, However, it increased for other cities.

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