by admin | May 25, 2021 | Banking, Business, Economy, Finance, Investing, Markets, News, Retirement Plans, SMEs
Chennai : In an effort to expand its bancassurance channel, non-life insurer SBI General Insurance Company Ltd is in talks with state-run as well as privately-held banks for distributing its products, said a senior official on Thursday.
Currently, a major chunk of the insurer’s premium is obtained from its bancassurance partners like the parent State Bank of India (SBI)) and others.
“We are in discussions with public and private sector banks. Since the talks are still in progress, it will be too soon to discuss,” Lisa Jeffery, Deputy CEO, told IANS.
During the first half of the current fiscal year to March, SBI General earned Rs 2,064.4 crore premium income.
Out of that, about Rs 763 crore is from its bancassurance partners.
Queried about IAG International increasing its stake to the legally permitted 49 per cent in SBI General Insurance, Jeffery said: “IAG and SBI are in talks with respect to stake increase. However, this conversation is between the parent companies and we have no updates on the same.”
The non-life insurer is a joint venture between SBI and IAG International. IAG International holds 26 per cent share in SBI General Insurance.
In September, SBI sold a four per cent stake in SBI General at Rs 482 crore to Axis New Opportunities Fund (1.65 per cent) and Premji Invest (2.35 per cent), valuing the company at about Rs 12,000 crore.
After the deal, SBI holds a 70 per cent stake in SBI General Insurance.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Banking, Business, Corporate, Corporate finance, Economy, Markets, News
By Quaid Najmi,
Mumbai, Ahmedabad : The National Bank for Agriculture & Rural Development (NABARD) on Friday attributed the country’s highest deposits of Rs 745.59 crore in banned currencies at the Ahmedabad District Cooperative Bank (ADCB) to the latter’s massive size and performance.
After a political storm over the IANS report on RTI revelations about ADCB, in which Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) President Amit Shah is a director, the NABARD came out in strong defence of the Ahmedabad-based bank.
“NABARD conducted 100 per cent verification in ADCB which revealed that the bank had complied with all the KYC guidelines of the RBI while accepting the demonetised notes,” it said in a statement here.
“During the period when the banks were permitted to accept deposits, 1.6 lakh customers of the bank deposite/exchanged the demonetised notes aggregating to Rs 746 crore, which was only about 15 percent of the total deposits of the bank,” NABARD said.
Confirming the figure of deposits of the banned Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 currency notes worth Rs 745.59 crore, NABARD said the ADCB has 16 lakh accounts spread across 194 branches, making it Gujarat’s biggest DCCB.
It said of the 16 lakhs accounts, barely 1.6 lakh customers or 9.37 percent exchanged or deposited the old notes.
Of these less than Rs 2.5 lakhs were deposited in 98.66 percent of the accounts in which deposits/ exchanges were made.
NABARD also said of the total number of accounts with ADCB, only 0.09 percent comprised accounts with deposits of more than Rs 2.5 lakh.
“The average deposit amount in ADCB was Rs 46,795, which was lower than average per depositor in 18 DCCBs of Gujarat,” it added.
In contrast, the NABARD said that the DCCBs in Maharashtra and Kerala had deposits that were higher than the DCCBs in Gujarat.
Our Gujarat Correspondent, Darshan Desai adds: ADC Bank chairman Ajay Patel says there was “nothing unusual” about the bank receiving as much as Rs 746 crore deposits in the first five days of demonetisation announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on November 2016.
Asked how could the bank staff managed to handle so much money in just five days when making deposits after demonetisation required a detailed procedure, Patel told IANS, “We have 194 branches across Gujarat, not just one.”
“So it is no big deal. And for any other clarification about the deposits in our bank, the NABARD has issued a detailed press release. You can refer that,” he added, speaking in Gujarati.
The NABARD statatement lauded the ADCB, saying the bank had total business levels of over Rs 9,000-crore, is one of the top 10 DCCBs in the country, and was recently awarded for best performance by the Federatoin of Cooperative Banks, and its deposit base of Rs 5,330-crore is the highest among all the Gujarat banks.
Moreover, calling it a “farmer friendly bank”, it said the bank has adopted technology to the core to enhance ease of doing banking to farmers, is among the first few DCCBs in India to offer modern mobile banking and limited Internet banking facilities to its customers.
IANS on Thursday highlighted how the ADCB became the most sought-after bank for deposits of the Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 currencies which were abruptly demonetised by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on November 8, 2016.
The issue created a controversy with several opposition parties, including Congress President Rahul Gandhi and the CPI-M targeting the BJP on the issue.
Mumbai Youth Congress President Ganesh Yadav has announced a protest on Saturday to demand a CBI probe against Shah on all the charges against him, suspension of the Rajkot DCCB Chairman Jayesh V. Radadiya who is a cabinet minister in Chief Minister Vijay Rupani’s government, and stringent action against both the banks and its officials.
Earlier in the day, the AICC issued a hard hitting statement detailing the other DCCBs in Gujarat which are controlled by the ruling BJP.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Corporate, Corporate Governance, News, Politics
By Quaid Najmi,
Mumbai : A district cooperative bank, which has Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) President Amit Shah as a director, netted the highest deposits among such banks of old Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes that were abruptly demonetised on November 8, 2016, according to RTI replies received by a Mumbai activist.
The Ahmedabad District Cooperative Bank (ADCB) secured deposits of Rs 745.59 crore of the spiked notes — in just five days after Prime Minister Narendra Modi made the demonetisation announcement. All the district cooperative banks were banned from accepting deposits of the banned currency notes from the public after November 14, 2016, — five days after demonetisation — on fears that black money would be laundered through this route.
According to the bank’s website, Shah continues to be a director with the bank and has been in that position for several years. He was also the bank’s chairman in 2000. ADCB’s total deposits on March 31, 2017, were Rs 5,050 crore and its net profit for 2016-17 was Rs 14.31 crore.
Right behind ADCB, is the Rajkot District Cooperative Bank, whose chairman Jayeshbhai Vitthalbhai Radadiya is a cabinet minister in Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani’s government. It got deposits of old currencies worth Rs 693.19 crore.
Interestingly, Rajkot is the hub of Gujarat BJP politics — Prime Minister Modi was first elected from there as a legislator in 2001.
Incidentally, the figures of Ahmedabad-Rajkot DCCBs are much higher than the apex Gujarat State Cooperative Bank Ltd, which got deposits of a mere Rs 1.11 crore.
“The amount of deposits made in the State Cooperative Banks (SCBs) and District Central Cooperative Banks (DCCBs) — revealed under RTI for first time since demonetisation — are astounding,” Manoranjan S. Roy, the RTI activist who made the effort to get the information, told IANS.
The RTI information was given by the Chief General Manager and Appellate Authority, S. Saravanavel, of the National Bank for Agriculture & Rural Development (NABARD).
It has also come to light, through the RTI queries, that only seven public sector banks (PSBs), 32 SCBs, 370 DCCBs, and a little over three-dozen post offices across India collected Rs 7.91 lakh crore — more than half (52 per cent) of the total amount of old currencies of Rs 15.28 lakh crore deposited with the RBI.
The break-up of Rs 7.91 lakh crore mentioned in the RTI replies shows that the value of spiked notes deposited with the RBI by the seven PSBs was Rs 7.57 lakh crore, the 32 SCBs gave in Rs 6,407 crore and the 370 DCCBs brought in Rs 22,271 crore. Old notes deposited by 39 post offices were worth Rs 4,408 crore.
Information from all the SCBs and DCCBs across India were received through the replies. The seven PSBs account for around 29,000 branches — out of the over 92,500 branches of the 21 PSBs in India — according to data published by the RBI. The 14 other PSBs declined to gave information on one ground or the other. There are around 155,000 post offices in the country.
Fifteen months after demonetisation, the government had announced that Rs 15.28 Lakh crore — or 99 per cent of the cancelled notes worth Rs 15.44 lakh crore — were returned to the RBI treasury.
Roy said it was a serious matter if only a few banks and their branches and a handful post offices, apart from SCBs and DCCBs, accounted for over half the old currency notes.
“At this rate, serious questions arise about the actual collection of spiked notes through the remaining 14 mega-PSBs, besides rural-urban banks, private banks (like ICICI, HDFC and others), local cooperatives, Jankalyan Banks and credit cooperatives and other entities with banking licenses, the figures of which are not made available under RTI,” he said.
The SCBs were allowed to exchange or take deposits of banned notes till December 30, 2016 — for a little over seven weeks, in contrast to district cooperative banks which were allowed only five days of transactions.
The prime minister during his demonetisation speech had said that Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes could be deposited in bank or post office accounts from November 10 till close of banking hours on December 30, 2016, without any limit. “Thus you will have 50 days to deposit your notes and there is no need for panic,” he had said.
After an uproar, mostly from BJP allies, the government also opened a small window in mid-2017, during the presidential elections, allowing the 32 SCBs and 370 DCCBs — largely owned, managed or controlled by politicians of various parties — to deposit their stocks of the spiked notes with the RBI. The move was strongly criticised by the Congress and other major Opposition parties.
Among the SCBs, the Maharashtra State Cooperative Bank topped the list of depositors with Rs 1,128 crore from 55 branches and the smallest share of Rs 5.94 crore came from just five branches of Jharkhand State Cooperative Bank, according to the replies.
Surprisingly, the Andaman & Nicobar State Cooperative Bank’s share (from 29 branches) was Rs 85.76 crore.
While Maharashtra has a population of 12 crore, Jharkhand’s population is 3.6 crore. Andaman & Nicobar Islands have less than four lakh residents.
The poorest of all the cooperative banks in the country is Banki Central Cooperative Bank Ltd in Odisha, which admitted to receiving zero deposits of the spiked currency.
Of the total 21 PSBs, State Bank of India, Bank of Baroda, Bank of Maharashtra, Central Bank of India, Dena Bank, Indian Overseas Bank, Punjab & Sindh Bank, Vijaya Bank, Andhra Bank, Syndicate Bank, UCO Bank, United Bank of India, Oriental Bank of Commerce, and IDBI Bank (14 banks) — with over 63,500 branches amongst them — did not give any information on deposits.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Banking, Corporate, Corporate Buzz, Economy, Markets, News
Chennai : Over 10 lakh bankers in government and private banks will go on a 48-hour strike starting on May 30, said an All India Bank Employees Association (AIBEA) leader.
The United Forum of Bank Unions (UFBU) proposed the strike beginning 6 a.m. on May 30, till 6 a.m. on June 1, demanding early revision of wages. The wage revision has been due since November 1, 2017.
“The strike notice has been served to Indian Banks Association (IBA) representing the bank management and the Chief Labour Commissioner (Central), New Delhi,” C.H. Venkatachalam, General Secretary, AIBEA, told IANS.
The UFBU is an umbrella body of nine unions in the banking sector representing staff and officers. Wage revision talks between UFBU and IBA held in Mumbai on May 5 had ended in a failure.
Venkatachalam said the IBA offered an increase of 2 per cent over the total wage bill of the banks as on March 31, 2017.
In the last 10th Bipartite Wage Settlement that was made effective from November 1, 2012, the IBA had agreed to a hike of 15 per cent over the total wage bill.
The unions had rejected the IBA offer, Venkatachalam said.
While the government had asked the IBA to conclude the wage revision settlement before November 1, 2017, the latter has been delaying, he said.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Banking, Corporate, Corporate Buzz, News, Politics
New Delhi : In light of the massive Rs 11,300 crore ($1.8 billion) scam allegedly involving jeweller Nirav Modi that has hit state-run Punjab National Bank (PNB), industry chamber Assocham said on Sunday that the government should surrender its majority control of banks, which should be allowed to function like private sector lenders.
In a regulatory filing earlier this week, PNB said it had detected the gigantic fraud in one of its Mumbai branches, putting the quantum of fraudulent transactions at $1,771.69 million. The amount is equivalent to eight times the bank’s net income of about Rs 1,320 crore ($206 million).
“The PNB’s fraudulent transactions worth Rs 11,300 crore should act as a strong trigger for the government for reducing its stake to less than 50 per cent in the banks which should then be allowed to work on the lines of private sector lenders with a full sense of accountability to their shareholders protecting interest of depositors,” Assocham said in a statement here.
“The public sector banks (PSBs), ironically, are slipping from one crisis to the other and there is a limit the government can keep bailing them out at the cost of taxpayers’ money, even if it is the principal shareholder in these lenders,” it said.
The industry body said PSB senior managements spend bulk of their time “receiving and implementing directions from the bureaucrats even for innocuous issues.”
“In the process, the core banking functions, including all important risk mitigation and management, take a back seat.”
“The problem has become more grave with banks adopting new technologies which can prove both boon and bane,” it added.
In this connection, a Special CBI Court in Mumbai on Saturday remanded to police custody till March 3 three accused persons in the case.
The three includes a retired PNB Deputy Manager Gokulnath Shetty, Single Window Operator Manoj Kharat and an authorised signatory of the prime accused Nirav Modi’s group companies.
Besides these, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has named 10 other directors and officials as accused in the scam.
“Once the government equity in the banks is reduced below 50 per cent, there would be much more autonomy along with accountability and responsibility of the senior management,” Assocham said.
“The boards should then be truly taking the policy decisions while the CEOs would run the banks with full authority, coupled with the commensurate responsibility, instead of looking towards the bureaucrats for directions,” it added.
Assocham Secretary General D.S. Rawat in a statement urged the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to take the lead to “engage with the industry in finding ways to do clean business in the entire financial sector, be it the public sector or private sector banks or even the non-banking finance companies.”
In this regard, Chief Economic Advisor (CEA) Arvind Subramaniam has also advocated more private participation in public sector banks.
Speaking at an event in Chennai on Saturday, Subramaniam said while the government was going for recapitalisation of public sector banks, the scrutiny, monitoring and disciplined deployment must be ensured only through greater private participation in banks.
According to him, there should be less public lending to private sector and the mode to achieve that is to have higher private participation in the banking sector.
He said more privatisation could be the way forward since there was no guarantee that better governance recommendations of banks, instead of privatisation, would be implemented effectively.
—IANS
