VRITTAM (18 AUG 2014 - 24 AUG 2014)
THE WEEKLY FINANCIAL NEWS
South
Africa Avoids Recession as GDP Expands 0.6% in Quarter
India has banned Finmeccanica (SIFI.MI) from future contracts, a
defence ministry source said on Tuesday, as it presses on with an investigation
into a scrapped helicopter contract with the Italian company.
In January, India cancelled a 560 million
euro ($751 million) order with Finmeccanica's AgustaWestland unit for 12
helicopters after Italian prosecutors alleged the defence group had paid bribes
to Indian officials to win the contract.
South Africa’s economy avoided its second recession in five years,
expanding an annualized 0.6 percent in the three months through June. Gross
domestic product rose after contracting 0.6 percent in the first quarter, the
statistics office said in a report released today in the capital, Pretoria. The
median estimate of 23 economists in a Bloomberg survey was 0.9 percent.
Africa’s second-largest economy rebounded from a slump in the first
quarter that was caused by a five-month strike at the world’s largest platinum
producers. The economy remains under pressure, with Finance Minister Nhlanhla
Nene saying yesterday he will probably cut the government’s growth projection
for this year to 1.8 percent from 2.7 percent estimated in February.
Burger King Worldwide Inc. (BKW) agreed to acquire Tim Hortons Inc. (THI) for about C$12.5 billion ($11.4
billion) in a deal that creates the third-largest fast-food company and moves
its headquarters to Canada.
Tim Hortons investors will
receive C$65.50 in cash and 0.8025 a share of the combined entity for each
share they own, the companies said in a statement today. The transaction, which
is backed in part by Warren Buffet's Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (BRK/B), values each
Tim Hortons share at C$94.05, based on Burger King’s closing price yesterday.
Retirement fund body EPFO today announced 8.75 per cent rate of interest
on provident fund deposits for the current fiscal, a move which would benefit
its over five crore subscribers across the country. The decision to retain
interest rate of 8.75 per cent was taken at a meeting of EPFO's apex decision
making body the Central Board of Trustees chaired by Labour Minister Narendra
Singh Tomar here in the capital.
"EPFO will provide 8.75 per cent rate of interest on PF deposits
for 2014-15," Tomar told reporters after CBT meeting. As per practice, now
the Employees' Provident Fund Organisation's (EPFO) trustees' decision would be
implemented after the concurrence of the finance ministry.
(Reuters)
- The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) said it would conduct more frequent term
repos but retained the overall borrowing limit for lenders, in a bid to make
borrowing more flexible without injecting additional liquidity into markets.Bond
markets barely moved on the measures, with the 10-year benchmark 2024 bond and
the overnight cash rates broadly steady from levels before the announcement.
By
issuing more frequent term repos, the RBI addresses a key complaint by banks,
which had said irregular auctions of these cash-for-loan transactions had made
it difficult to manage near-term cash needs.Term repos are loans the RBI
extends to banks, for which government bonds act as collateral for a specified
period of time.
ICICI
Bank, the country’s largest private sector bank, announced the launch of EMI
(Equated Monthly Instalments) facility on debit cards to enable its customers
to convert high value transactions into easy instalments.
ICICI
Bank is the first in the country to introduce this facility.
”As
we approach the festive season, this initiative will empower over 22 million
ICICI Bank debit card customers to buy products of their choice and pay in easy
EMIs,“ said Rajiv Sabharwal, Executive Director, ICICI Bank.
NEW
DELHI--The International Finance Corp., the private financing arm of the World
Bank Group, said Wednesday that it will raise $2.5 billion by selling
rupee-denominated bonds and swaps in India over the next five years.
IFC
said it will use the money to finance infrastructure investments in India and
the issue would also help deepen the country's bond markets.
India
needs heavy investments to improve infrastructure facilities that have become
an impediment to speeding up economic growth. But lack of long-term financing
and shallow bond markets have made it difficult for infrastructure projects to
arrange the necessary funding.
"Issuance
of onshore bonds by IFC, with offer of longer-tenor bonds, will deepen the bond
market and also provide much-needed finance to infrastructure projects,"
India's Finance Secretary Arvind Mayaram said, according to the IFC statement.
NEW
DELHI—The Indian economy will expand close to 5.8% in the current fiscal year,
Finance Secretary Arvind Mayaram said Thursday, underscoring hopes that the
south Asian country's growth would recover strongly this year.
"There
is an uptick in core [industrial] sector," and recent indicators such as
sales of passenger vehicles and the Purchasing managers index are also pointing
to a recovery, he said.
The
projection is close to the higher end of the 5.4% to 5.9% growth forecast that
the government gave in a review of the economy last month.
Hopes
of a pickup in investments on the back of faster changes in policies by the
country's recently elected pro-business government have raised expectations
that growth could accelerate to as much as 6.0% this year after going through
the worst slowdown in years.
OPINION
Look East policy: going beyond rhetoric
Like the proverbial one hand not knowing what the other is doing, India’s Look East policy is in danger of becoming incoherent. Two events describe the state of affairs. External affairs minister Sushma Swaraj paid a visit to Vietnam this week, an event that hardly attracted the attention it merited. But days after that visit, commerce minister Nirmala Sitharaman skipped a planned visit to Myanmar to sign an important bilateral agreement with Asean countries. Her reason: she is needed at home for the launch of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Jan Dhan Yojna.
SLIDESHOW
Click on the slideshow below to have better view of A guide to Income Tax
Like the proverbial one hand not knowing what the other is doing, India’s Look East policy is in danger of becoming incoherent. Two events describe the state of affairs. External affairs minister Sushma Swaraj paid a visit to Vietnam this week, an event that hardly attracted the attention it merited. But days after that visit, commerce minister Nirmala Sitharaman skipped a planned visit to Myanmar to sign an important bilateral agreement with Asean countries. Her reason: she is needed at home for the launch of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Jan Dhan Yojna.
SLIDESHOW
Click on the slideshow below to have better view of A guide to Income Tax
