Current Affairs For Bank, IBPS Exams - 09 August, 2015

Current Affairs for BANK, IBPS Exams

09 August 2015

:: Business ::

P-Notes require tough monitoring

Way back in 2005, the then Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Y. V. Reddy spoke on the need for a view be taken on the ‘quantity and quality of FII flows’ and expressed the need for taxing or capping such flows.
Immediately, the then Finance Minister P. Chidambaram denied any such moves, constraining Mr. Reddy to clarify his statement.
The issue again came up for discussion recently as the Special Investigation Team (SIT) on black money in its third report pointed out to the Supreme Court that the overseas derivative instruments (ODIs), popularly known as Participatory Notes (P-Notes), were used from destinations such as the Cayman Islands, a tax haven.
India allowed FIIs to invest in Indian capital market since 1992. As the Know-Your-Investor or Know-Your-Client (KYC) norms were applicable for these foreign funds, the FIIs started to issue P-Notes, which helped the beneficiary (end-user) to remain anonymous. P-Notes are, in essence, overseas derivatives instruments (ODIs), which have Indian stocks and derivatives as their underlying securities.
As per reports, P-Notes comprise around 15 to 20 per cent of the total FII investments in the country since 2009. While it held around 25 to 40 per cent in 2008, it was as high as 50 per cent in 2007.
Concerned with tax evasion through the stock market route and in an effort to curb black money, the SIT also suggested to the Government to obtain details of beneficial ownership or the end-user, which should be known to the capital market regulator, Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI).
Now under the new Foreign Portfolio Investors (FPIs) regime, which came into effect from 2014, the regulator had segregated the FIIs into several categories.
The SIT report stated that obtaining information on ‘beneficial ownership’ of P-Notes is of crucial importance to prevent their misuse. In this, the “final beneficial owner” of ODIs is known.
P-Notes are giving a varied and ulterior connotation to investors, especially among the retail and long-term investors in the country. It is the duty of the regulator to remove the doubt in the minds of genuine investors while curbing the black money in the country.

Commerce Ministry Moves Cabinet Note on Interest Subvention Scheme

To give a fillip to exports, the Commerce Ministry has moved a Cabinet note on a proposal to provide cheaper credit access to exporters from various sectors under the interest subvention scheme.
Under the interest subvention scheme, exporters are provided credit at subsidised rates by banks which are later compensated by the government.
Loans at subsidised rates will help exporters boost shipments as the country's exports stayed in the negative zone in the past seven months.
Last week, Commerce Minister Nirmala Sitharaman had told Parliament that the interest subvention scheme for various sectors was under consideration of the government.
The previous interest subvention scheme was available up to March 31, 2014.
For the seventh month in a row, India's exports fell 15.82 per cent in June to $22.28 billion.

:: India & world ::

Foxconn may set up a factory in every Indian state in 10 years: Terry Gou

Terry Gou, founder and chairman of the world’s largest contract manufacturer Foxconn, the trade name for Hon Hai Precision Industry Co. Ltd, made headlines this month when he announced the company’s intention to set up 10-12 factories in India over the next 10 years.
So when Gou cancelled his scheduled press conference in Mumbai where he was to launch the Foxconn Media Lab in association with Whistling Woods International—an institute for film, fashion and communication founded by filmmaker Subhash Ghai—on Friday, many were disappointed.
The reason became apparent on Saturday when Gou announced a $5 billion investment in Maharashtra in addition to the agreement with Ghai for media content creation.

India received $24 billion in FDI from EU in last 3 years

Despite the Free Trade Agreement talks with the European Union being in limbo, India has received an impressive $24 billion in foreign direct investment from the 28-nation bloc over the last three years.
As per official figures, India received $6.23 billion in FDI equity inflows from EU in 2012-13 which increased to $9.06 billion the next year.
The FDI inflow was $8.20 billion in 2014-15, which was a decline of $862 million compared to the year ago period. In 2015-16, the amount in first two months of current fiscal was $1.39 billion.
In total, India received $24.91 billion in FDI equity inflows from EU between April 2012 and May 2015.
The EU has been India's largest trading partner and the two-way trade is likely to swell significantly if the countries could firm up the long-pending Free Trade Agreement, officially called the Broadbased Investment and Trade Agreement (BTIA).
India had on Wednesday deferred scheduled talks on the proposed pact later this month which was to resume after a gap of two years after the EU imposed a ban on around 700 generic drugs which were clinically tested by India's GVK Biosciences on the ground of inaccuracy in data.
In March, the EU had not responded to India's proposal for a brief visit by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to Brussels, the headquarters of the bloc, during his trip to France, Germany and Canada in April.
However, it recently invited him for the India-EU summit just before or after the G-20 summit scheduled to be held in November in Turkey. The last India-EU Summit had taken place in 2012.
The two-way commerce between EU and India stood at about USD 99 billion in 2014-15 while it was USD 101.5 billion in 2013-14.

UN Kalam GlobalSat: Satellite named in memory of APJ Adbul Kalam

Aproposal has been made to name a global satellite after the late former President Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam who died on 27 July 2015.
The step is being taken to pay tribute to the Missile Man of India. According to reports, a global satellite called as GlobalSat for DRR (a satellite for observation of Earth and Disaster Risk Reduction) will be renamed as UN Kalam GlobalSat in the memory of the world-renowned rocket scientist.
The decision to rename the satellite after the late Missile Mans of India was made by Milind Pimprikar, Chairman of CANEUS (CANada-Europe-US-Asia) headquartered in Montreal, Canada.
According to Pimprikar, this step of renaming the satellite the will be a tribute to the great man who had contributed a lot in the field science and space explorations.
He further added that this will also symbolize his World Space Vision-2050 in which nations will join their hands in order to find solution to major problems of mankind including natural disasters, energy, health-care, education, water and weather related problems.
While explaining about the satellite, Pimprikar said that the ‘GlobalSat for DRR’ is a United Nation-driven initiative for sharing of technology and ideas to prepare and control the risk of natural disasters.
The project was proposed at the third UN World Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction held at Sendai in Japan in March 2015. More than 150 nations at the UN session will adopt the GlobalSat in New York in September this year.
Disaster Risk Reduction — DRR is a systematic process of identifying, analyzing and reducing the associated with a disaster.UN agencies explain DRR as “The conceptual framework of elements considered with the possibilities to minimize vulnerabilities and disaster risks throughout a society, to avoid (prevention) or to limit (mitigation and preparedness) the adverse impacts of hazards, within the broad context of sustainable development.”