Banking Awareness of 4 and 5 November 2022

Topic: Appointments

1. Centre has appointed non-executive chairman on the boards of four public sector banks.

• The names of these banks are Canara Bank, Punjab National Bank, Union Bank of India and Punjab & Sind Bank.
• Vijay Srirangam has been appointed as part-time Non Official Director and non-executive Chairman of Canara Bank for 3 years.
• K G Ananthakrishnan has been appointed as part-time Non Official Director and non-executive Chairman of PNB for 3 years.
• Srinivasan Varadarajan has been appointed as part-time Non-Official Director and non-executive Chairman of Union Bank of India for three years.
• Charan Singh has been appointed as part-time Non-Official Director and non- executive Chairman of Punjab & Sind Bank for two years.

Topic: Banking/Financial Schemes

2. Finance Ministry issued notification to implement the scheme named ‘India Infrastructure Project Development Fund’ (IIPDF).

• Under the scheme, Project Sponsoring Authorities (PSA) will get assistance up to Rs 5 crore.
• As per the notification, funding will be available for meeting project development costs.
• Project development costs may include expenses incurred by PSA in respect of feasibility studies, environment impact studies, financial structuring, legal reviews and development of project documentation, including concession agreement etc.
• It will not include expenses incurred by the PSA on its own staff.
• The fund was originally conceptualised in the Fiscal Year 2007-08 budget.
• Then Finance Minister P Chidambaram proposed setting up a revolving fund to quicken the process of project preparation.
• A fund was created with an initial corpus of Rs 100 crore.
• The fund has now been restructured with a total outlay of Rs 150 crore for a period of three years from 2022-23 to 2024-25.
• Under the scheme, the cost of consultants/ transaction advisors (TA) can be funded.
• As a Central Sector Scheme, the IIPDF Scheme will assist in development of quality PPP projects by providing funding support to the sponsoring authorities.
• IIPDF Scheme is in addition to the already operational Scheme for Financial Support to PPPs in Infrastructure (Viability Gap Funding, VGF Scheme) notified two years back.

Topic: RBI

3. The share of gold in value terms in India’s total foreign exchange reserves has increased as per RBI data.

• It has increased from nearly 5.88% as of end-September 2021 to about 7.06% as of end-September 2022.
• RBI’s gold holding increased by 41.51 metric tonnes to 785.35 metric tonnes during September 2021 to September 2022.
• As per RBI’s latest Half Yearly Report on Management of Foreign Exchange Reserves, 447.30 metric tonnes of gold is held overseas with the Bank of England and the Bank of International Settlements (BIS).
• As per the report, 296.48 metric tonnes of gold is held domestically.
• As per the report, the ratio of short-term debt (original maturity) to reserves increased from 20% at end-March 2022 to 22% at end-June 2022.
• The ratio of volatile capital flows to reserves increased from 66.6% at end-March 2022 to 67.6% at end-June 2022.
• On a balance of payments basis by excluding valuation effects, forex increased by $4.6 billion during April-June.
• Foreign exchange reserves in nominal terms (including valuation effects) decreased by $18.2 billion during April-June.

Topic: Banking System

4. Chqbook has partnered with NSDL Payments Bank to launch zero-balance digital current account.

• Small business owners like kirana owners, chemists, can open a digital current account instantly on the Chqbook app in a language they are comfortable with.
• The current account is available in eight languages. The current account facility on the Chqbook App digitises the entire process of account opening. 
• Chqbook is a neobank for small business owners. Vipul Sharma is its Founder & CEO.
• NSDL Payments Bank started functioning as a payment bank with effect from October 2018.

Topic: Appointments

5. VR Krishna Gupta has assumed additional charge of Chairman and Managing Director (CMD) of BPCL.

• He has assumed an additional charge on superannuation of Shri Arun Kumar Singh.
• He is currently a Board member in BPRL (Bharat Petro Resources Limited) and Fino Paytech Limited.
• Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited (BPCL) is a 'Maharatna' and a Fortune Global 500 Company. It is headquartered in Mumbai. It was founded in 1952.
• Bharat Petroleum is the second-largest Indian Oil Marketing Company.

Topic: MoUs/Agreements

6. Bharat Electronics Ltd (BEL) has signed multiple MoUs for co-operation across a variety of technological fields.

• BEL has signed MoU with Bosch Global Software Technologies, INERY, Singapore, and Motorola Solutions India.
• The aim of the MoU with Bosch Global Software Technologies is a collaborative implementation of projects in the fields of e-Governance, Enterprise resource planning (ERP), and cloud solutions.
• BEL and INERY will combine their capabilities in the field of blockchain technology to improve their product offering.
• Bharat Electronics Ltd (BEL):
  • It is a public sector undertaking under the Ministry of Defence.
  • It was established in 1954. It is headquartered at Bengaluru.
  • It caters to the strategic needs of the Indian Defence services.

Topic: Indian Economy/Financial Market

7. Services Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) for October increased to 55.1.

• Services PMI for October increased from a six-month low of 54.3 in September.  
• Services sector contributes more than 53% in Gross Value Added (GVA) in the Indian economy.
• PMI for services covers sectors including consumer (excluding retail), transport, information, communication, finance, insurance, real estate and business services.
• As per the results of the survey, consumer services led growth in business activity, new orders and employment.
• Finance & Insurance came in second on these three measures.

Topic: Indian Economy/Financial Market

8. Unemployment rate increased to four-month high level of 7.77% in October as per the latest data of the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE).

• Unemployment rate declined to a four year low level in September.
• CMIE showed that main reason for the increase in the unemployment rate in October is sharp increase in rural unemployment.
• Rural unemployment increased from 5.84% in September to 8.04% in October.
• Urban unemployment rate declined slightly from 7.7% to 7.21%.
• Six of the 25 states for which data is available with the CMIE had registered double-digit unemployment rates.
• Haryana registered the highest unemployment rate of 31.8% followed by Rajasthan (30.7%), Jammu & Kashmir (22.4%), Jharkhand (16.5%), Bihar (14.5%) and Tripura (10.5%).
• Madhya Pradesh, which replaced Chhattisgarh (0.9%) as the state with the lowest unemployment rate, has an unemployment rate of 0.8%.

Topic: Indian Economy/Financial Market

9. India’s foreign exchange reserves increased by 6.561 billion to reach 531.081 billion by the week ended on October 28.

• After falling for two consecutive quarters, India’s foreign exchange reached 531.081 billion by increasing 6.561 billion in the week that ended on October 28.
• Foreign currency assets have increased by 5.772 billion to 470.847 billion US Dollars.
• The value of gold reserves increased from 556 million to 37.762 billion US Dollars. The Special Drawing Rights has increased by 85 million to 17.625 billion US Dollars.
• However, the spot forex reserves are still low from $607 billion in end-March.
• In the week ended on Oct 21, the foreign exchange reserves had fallen to their lowest level to $524.52 billion since July 2020.
• Reserve Bank of India Governor Shaktikanta Das said that about 67 per cent reserve has declined during this financial year due to valuation changes arised from an increased US dollar and higher US bond yields.
• Forex reserves are external assets in the form of gold, SDRs and foreign currency assets held by the nation’s central bank.

Topic: Summits/Conferences/Meetings

10. 15th Urban Mobility India (UMI) Conference & Exhibition 2022 is being organized from 4th to 6th November 2022 in Kochi.

• The Union Minister of Housing and Urban Affairs, Shri Hardeep Singh Puri, and the Chief Minister of Kerala, Shri Pinarayi Vijayan, jointly inaugurated the three-day conference on November 4, 2022.
• The main goal of this conference is to provide information to the cities whose representatives participate in the conference to help them stay updated with the latest and best urban transport practices globally.
• The Urban Mobility India (UMI) conference and expo 2022 is focused on the theme of “Azadi@75 – Sustainable AatmaNirbhar Urban Mobility”.
• It will lay emphasis on designing and implementing efficient, high quality and sustainable transport systems in cities.
• The 2006 National Urban Transport Policy (NUTP) emphasizes establishing state and city capacity to solve urban transport issues and provides principles for developing equitable and sustainable urban transport networks for all segments of society.
• As a part of the National Urban Transport Policy (NUTP) announcements, the Ministry has taken the initiative to organize an annual International Conference-cum-Exhibition on Urban Mobility India, popularly known as Urban Mobility India - UMI.

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