TOP 35 NEWS RELATED TO RBI THIS YEAR ----------------------------------------------------------- ( LiKe & ShArE PoSt :) ) 1. RBI permits NBFCs to work as Business Correspondents of banks: With a view to achieve financial inclusion, the Reserve Bank of India has allowed Non‐Banking Finance Companies to operate as Business Correspondents (BCs) of banks, permitting them to offer limited services. Banks will be allowed to work with non‐deposit taking NBFCs as BCs. Note: The RBI took into account recommendations of Nachiket Mor Committee while reviewing the existing guidelines on the appointment of BCs. 2. RBI to consider over Payment bank as recommended by Nachiket Mor Panel i. The Reserve Bank of India will soon come up with India’s first payments bank, which will offer deposit and payment services but not provide loans. ii. This idea is in line with the recommendations made by the Nachiket Mor committee. The central bank sees huge potential for financial inclusion with focus on remittances by involving payment system product. 3. Provide information to SIT on black money: RBI directs banks and FIs i. The RBI has asked all Banks and Financial Institutions (FIs) to provide information and documents sought by the Special Investigation Team (SIT) set up to uncover black money. ii. The new Government at Centre recently constituted an SIT under the chairmanship of former Justice M.B. Shah in pursuance of a July 2011 Supreme Court judgment. 4. RBI simplifies KYC norms for opening bank account: Customers need to submit only one documentary proof of address — either current or permanent — while opening a bank account or while undergoing periodic updation, the Reserve Bank of India. “In case the address mentioned as per ‘proof of address’ undergoes a change, fresh proof of address may be submitted to the branch within six months,” the RBI said in a notification to banks. No proof is required to be submitted for such address for correspondence/local address,” the RBI added. However, this address may be verified by the bank through ‘positive confirmation’ such as acknowledgment of receipt of letter, cheque books, ATM cards; telephonic conversation; and visits. 5. Australia and New Zealand Banking Group (ANZ) has received in‐principle approval from the Reserve Bank to open two new branches. The new branches will come up Gurgaon, NCR, and outer Bangalore. 6. RBI directive on foreign currency accounts: The Reserve Bank of India has directed banks to: convert credit balances in any inoperative foreign currency (FC) denominated deposit into Indian rupee if the former remains not in use for three years from the date of maturity of deposit. 7. RBI eases gold import norms; nod for select trading houses to procure from abroad : Under this scheme, an importer has to ensure that at least 20 per cent of every lot of imported gold is exclusively made available for export purpose. 8. RBI nod for bank loan tenure upto 10 years to boost export industry. In a major boost for the export industry, the RBI has allowed banks to provide loans with tenures of up to 10 years.These loans will help exporters in ensuring capital flows to fulfill long‐term contracts. Existing norms allow banks to give loans for up to one year only. 9. The Reserve Bank of India said banks should make all new ATMs installed from July 1, 2014 as “talking ATMs” with Braille keypads. 10. Raghuram Rajan, the Governor of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) announced that plastic currency notes will be launched in 2015 after field trials. 11. RBI panel headed by ex‐Chairman of Axis Bank, P. J. Nayak recommend for diluting govt stake in public sector banks to below 50 %. The government should cut its holding in public sector banks to under 50 per cent, a Reserve Bank of India (RBI) panel report on Tuesday said, criticising the way in which the lenders are now being governed. 12. Reserve Bank of India granted banking licences to infrastructure financing firm IDFC and microfinance institution Bandhan from among 25 applicants that included corporate heavyweights ADAG Group, Aditya Birla Group and Bajaj Group. Note: The in‐principle approval granted (to the two entities) will be valid for a period of 18 months during which the applicants have to comply with the requirements under the guidelines and fulfil the other conditions as may be stipulated by the RBI. Chandra Shekhar Ghosh: CMD of Bandhan financial services Dr. Rajiv B. Lall: Chairman of IDFC – Infrastructure Finance Company. 13. Reserve Bank of India (RBI) issued the guidelines to allow the minors of age above 10 years to independently open and operate savings bank accounts and use other facilities like ATM and cheque books. 14. RBI extended the timeline for full implementation of Basel III norms 31 March 2019 instead of 31 March 2018. 15. RBI in consultation with Union Government on 1 April 2014 capped the Ways and Means Advances (WMA) limits for the first half of the new financial year 2014‐15 (April 2014‐Sep 2014) at 35000 crore rupees. Note: The interest rate on WMA/overdraft will be based on: a) WMA: Repo Rate. b) Overdraft: Two percent above the Repo Rate 16. RBI extends date of exchanging pre‐2005 notes to Jan 1, 2015 Note: The Reserve Bank has further clarified that the public can continue to freely use these notes for any transaction. RBI has said that people can unhesitatingly receive these notes in payment, as all such notes continue to remain legal tender. 17. Reserve Bank of India (RBI) hiked the trade related remittance limit from 2 lakh rupees to 5 lakh rupees per transaction with immediate effect. It also increased the number of transaction handled by exchange houses. 18. KC Chakrabarty, Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India, has quit three months ahead of completion of his term. 19. RBI pegged 2014‐15 GDP growth at a central estimate of 5.5 percent. 20. Economic growth for 2014‐15 expected at 5.5 pc. 21. CAD expected to come down to 2 pc of GDP in 2014‐15. 22. Retail inflation expected to be under 6 pc in 2014. 23. RBI panel headed by RBI Deputy Governor Anand Sinha has recommended bringing a benchmark floating interest rate, especially for home loans. Panel also suggested Indian Banks Base Rate (IBBR). 24. The deadline for switching to new format bank cheques under the Cheque Truncation System (CTS) ended on 30 April 2014. 25. RBI scraps 26% cap on interest rate for MFIs: (RBI) removed 26 per cent cap on the interest rate that can be charged by a microfinance company to its borrowers. MFI is allowed to charge interest rate equal to 2.75 times the average of the base rates of the top five commercial banks. 26. RBI permits 4 non‐bank entities to set up white label ATMs: The Reserve Bank has issued ‘certificate of authorisation’ to four non‐bank entities: (1) Tata Communications Payment Solutions (2) Muthoot Finance, (3) Prizm Payment Services and (4) Vakrangee Ltd. , to set up White Label ATMs (WLAs) in the country. Note: Most of the ATMs belong to banks, but the cash dispensing machines which are owned and operated by non‐banking companies are called White Label ATMs. 27. RBI permits Srei to roll out white label ATMs: Srei Infrastructure Finance is planning to start roll‐out of its while label ATMs (WLAs) between July and September starting with a pilot of 200 Tier‐III towns in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. 28. The expert committee headed by Urjit R. Patel, Deputy Governor of the Reserve Bank of India examine the current monetary policy framework of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has suggested that the apex bank should adopt the new CPI (consumer price index) as the measure of the nominal anchor for policy communication. The nominal anchor or the target for inflation should be set at 4 per cent with a band of +/‐ 2 per cent around it. https://facebook/govtonlineexam?ref=hl 29. Ex‐Chairman of Axis Bank, P. J. Nayak is the head of the expert panel to review bank boards’ governance. The panel will review the RBIs regulatory guidelines on ownership of banks and representation in their boards, among other things. https://facebook/govtonlineexam?ref=hl 30. The Reserve Bank of India has raised the Foreign Institutional Investors, FIIs investment limit in the Power Grid Corporation to 30 per cent of its paid up capital, under the Portfolio Investment Scheme. 31. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has doubled the sub‐limit for foreign investment in government securities, to USD 10 billion by long‐term investors. RBIs move is aimed to attract more foreign funds. Investors like sovereign wealth funds (SWFs), multilateral agencies, insurance funds, pension funds and foreign central banks are considered as long term investors. 32. RBI relaxes gold loan norms: The Reserve Bank of India has allowed Non‐Banking Financial Companies, NBFCs to lend up to 75 per cent of the value of gold. It was 60 per cent earlier. https://facebook/govtonlineexam?ref=hl 33. RBI panel (headed by banker Nachiket Mor) has suggested setting up of specialised banks to cater to low income households to ensure that all citizens have bank accounts by 2016. https://facebook/govtonlineexam?ref=hl 34. The RBI‐appointed committee on financial inclusion has recommended that the central bank should set up specialised banks called Payments Bank to provide payment services and deposit products to small businesses and low‐income households. The committee, headed by Nachiket Mor, said that since the new bank will be dealing with poor customers, such a bank must be allowed to accept a maximum deposit of not more than Rs 50,000. 35. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) had set up a panel under executive director Deepak Mohanty to review the current system of data collection, dissemination and data management processes in the central bank and improve the existing mechanism.
Posted on: Thu, 17 Jul 2014 04:21:34 +0000