Posts tagged rbi
RBI: Rates, Banks and Inflation
There could not have been a more opportune time for me to write this article. With every passing day since the last year, Dr Subbarao’s job is getting increasingly tougher. With inflation still keeping up against RBI and absence of significant structural actions on Government’s part to control inflation, options for policy actions with RBI have been reducing. With the whole onus of managing inflation falling on RBI, I think it is apt to rename RBI as suggested in the title of the article.
Case for a 50 basis points on May 3??
“Sakhi saiyan to khub hi kamat hai…..mehngai daayan maare jaat hai….” goes a number from a popular bollywood flick and rightly so atleast for RBI.
Since the last 15 months or so…RBI has been trying to battle the rising inflation by raising rates (What are policy rates?) eight times since March last year. However inflation, now it seems, is getting out of RBI’s control. Over the last one year, there have been many a concerns over structural bottlenecks in the economy which have been causing inflation. Well this might be true, I am not arguing against that. But even if Government decisively acts against structural cause of inflation, it would be some time before anything (like improving storage warehouses, improving transportation facilities, improving public distribution system etc) can be done and it impacts the mighty inflation. More >
September inflation edges upto 8.6%
The WPI for the month of September 2010 stood at 8.62% compared to 8.5% in the previous month. The figure was almost in line with the market expectations which were pegged at around 8.5%. The central bank is sure to take the cues from these high figures in its monetary policy meeting scheduled on 2nd November and is likely to take actions keeping inflation control as its primary agenda. RBI has already raised policy rates by 125 basis points in five equal hikes this calendar year and was expected to pause, but sticky inflation could force it to continue with monetary tightening.
- The sub-group of primary articles rose by 17.45% y-o-y against 10.63% in Sep’09 while it rose marginally by 1.5%% on m-o-m basis mainly due to lower prices of fruits, vegetables, condiments and spices. However, the prices of pulses, cereals and eggs declined putting a cap on further rise in the food prices
- In the same sub-group, the non-food articles increased by 18.2% y-o-y due to higher prices of raw silk, raw cotton, copra, flowers and fodder. However, in comparison to last month, prices of raw jute and certain varieties of oil-seeds declined. The index for minerals jumped by leaps and bounds to register a growth of 28.48% m-o-m due to increase in the prices of crude, barites, etc
- The second sub-group of fuel, power, lights and lubricants increased to 11.06% y-o-y from -8.09% in Sep’09, continuing the uptrend since past few months. Ironically, it registered a degrowth of 0.27% m-o-m due to lower prices of turbine fuel, bitumen and naphtha
- The third sub-group of manufactured products increased marginally to around 5% y-o-y compared to the last month’s growth. It registered a growth of 0.31% m-o-m mainly because of increase in the prices of textiles, rubber related products, rubber related products etc.
- Food products rose by 0.72% m-o-m due to higher prices of oil-seed, oil-cake, vanaspati, vegetable seeds and copra. Sugar prices declined by 2.30% together with a decrease in the prices of salt, ghee, and gur. Cotton textiles and man-made textiles showed a huge increase compared to the previous y-o-y figures, which can be accounted for an increase in the prices of their raw-materials.
Author:Rahul Sonthalia, Research Head, Kredent
July Inflation just under double digits @9.97%
The WPI for the month of July’10 stood at 9.97% compared to the previous month’s figure of 10.55%. It registered a growth of -0.54% in July’09 on a y-o-y basis . The inflation figures this month is the lowest in the past six months. They just managed to miss the double-digit by few marks. The figures were almost in line with the expectation
The benchmark indices were almost flat after the data release while there was also no major movement in INR. The RBI in its monetary policy review in mid-September now, is not expected to increase the interest-rate as it had said earlier that it would wait for the inflation figures to consider any further hike in the interest-rates
- The sub-group of primary articles rose by 14.94% y-o-y against 7.64% in July’09.It registered a growth of 1.85% m-o-m mainly because of high growth in the food articles, which increased by 0.90% m-o-m. Food articles increased more than last month due to rise in prices of mutton, fish milk, eggs, cereals and pulses
- In the same sub-group, the non-food articles increased by 0.80% m-o-m due to higher prices of fodder, oil-seeds, raw jute, rubber and silk and increase in the price of copra, etc. The index for minerals rose to 19.25% m-o-m which was due to higher prices of flluorite, magnesite, iron ore and steatite
- The second sub-group of fuel, power, lights and lubricants increased to 14.29% y-o-y from -10.37% in July’09 which was pretty high. It registered a growth of 3.21% m-o-m due to higher prices of LPG, high speed diesel oil, aviation turbine fuel and petrol
- The third sub-group of manufactured products jumped to 6.15% y-o-y from 0.10% in July’09. It registered a degrowth of -0.14% m-o-m mainly because of increase in the prices of edible oils, manmade textiles plastic products and machinery and machine tools
- Food products declined by 0.61% m-o-m due to lower prices of bran, butter, khansari, coffee powder and gur. Sugar prices declined by 2.55% while there was an increase of 1.27% in edible oils due to higher prices of oil-seeds. Cotton textiles and man-made textiles surged by 0.38% and 0.48% due to increase in the prices of raw cotton, jute, raw silk and fibres. Rubber and plastic products increased by 0.06% while machinery and machine tools increased by 0.22%
Author:Rahul Sonthalia, Research Head, Kredent
First quarterly review of monetary policy 2010-11
Highlights of the policy
RBI Governor, Dr D V Subbarao announced the first quarterly review of monetary policy today. The measures taken were quite on the expected lines (Read our article on monetary policy expectations).
- Benchmark Repo rates hiked by 25 bps to 5.75% with immediate effect.
- Benchmark Reverse Repo rates hiked by 50 bps to 4.50% with immediate effect.
- The interest rate corridor between the Repo and Reverse Repo window reduced to 125 bps from 150 bps.
- CRR, SLR and Bank rate kept unchanged at 6%, 25% and 6%, respectively.
- Baseline inflation projection for March 2010 increased to 6% from 5.5%.
- Baseline estimate for GDP growth for 2010-11 revised to 8.5% from 8%.
- Bank deposit growth target of 18% maintained for FY2010-11; Bank deposit growth stood at 15.0% year-on-year as on July 2, 2010.
- Bank credit growth target of 20% maintained for FY2010-11; Bank credit growth stood at 22.3% year-on-year as on July 2, 2010.
- RBI to undertake mid-quarter policy reviews starting September 2010.
Impact of monetary policy
- As expected, RBI has raised the policy rates. This is the fourth rate hike since March this year raising the Repo by a total of 100 bps and Reverse Repo by 125 bps. Moving differently from earlier moves, the quantum of change in the policy rates; repo and reverse repo is different (What are policy rates?). The Liquidity Adjustment Facility (LAF) corridor has been shrunk to 125 bps, a change first time since November’2008.
What this means?
Short term interest rates, particularly, interbank repo market rates hover in between the LAF corridor in order to prevent arbitrage opportunities for the banks. Because of tight liquidity conditions, short term rates have been quite volatile. This measure is aimed at containing this volatility in the rates.
- Since end-May, banks have been borrwoing from RBI through its LAF Repo window. Out of four rate hikes since March, two were effected when there was ample liquidity in th system. But the last two have come at a time when the liquidity conditions have tightened. Thus interest cost of banks will go up. Assuming that banks will borrow about Rs 50,000 cr for the year as whole from Repo, the combined efect of the last two hikes will shave off about Rs 250 cr from banking sector’s profits.
- What would also hurt banks’s profitability is that deposit rates have also risen. Thus lending rates, in general will go up in order to protect net interest margin (NIM).
- Inflationary expectations have driven RBI to raise the rates. Policy stance of RBI has shifted to “to containing inflation and anchoring inflationary expectations”. RBI has noted that inflationary expectations have firmed up. Accordingly, RBI has also raised the projection for end-March 2011 to 6%. RBI has commented that it will continue to take actions to counter inflationary expectation.
- Though RBI has not hinted at further rate hikes, but its strong concern for inflation implies that good growth prospect along with continued high inflation will in make it imperative fro RBI to increase rates.
Author:Praveen Bajaj
RBI likely to raise rates in todays monetary policy review
RBI is going to announce the First quarterly review of monetary policy in some time and unlike last time, expectations are quite clear this time. Last time, in April, analysts were divided in opinions about a 25 bps hike or a 50 bps hike or no action by RBI. But this time, analysts are almost certain that RBI would raise the policy rates by 25 bps taking the Repo rate to 5.75%.
Inflationary concerns
RBI has time and again stressed on its concerns on inflation. In the last policy announcement RBI had anticipated that inflation will come down in a gradual manner. But inflation is still reigning in double digits. For June, WPI increased by 10.6% over last June. Increasingly, it is seen that inflation has become more broad-based and manufacturing as well as fuel price inflation has also been rising. For food articles as well, though the growth rate is moderating, but is still at high levels and is not expected to go down substantially unless new crop comes in the market which would be only towards October. Thus inflationary concerns are quite strong and RBI would like to take some action to tame it.
Economic Growth
Economic activity has continued to grow at a good pace. GDP growth for the last quarter was above 8% and for the next year, the growth rate is expected to be higher than last year. IMF in its last World Economic Outlook (WEO) update has projected a growth rate of more than 9% for India in the current year. In recent months, IIP has moderated but is still growing by double digits and some sectors in IIP are showing very good growth. Monsoon has been good till now implying that agricultural growth will also be good and give a boost to the farm income and rural spending levels. This will support RBI’s decision to raise rates.
Liquidity and interest rates
Liquidity conditions have tightened significantly since the last policy announcement. Since May end, when telecom companies made 3G and Broadband wireless access (BWA) payments to the Govt, liquidity has dried up. Banks have been borrowing on an average above Rs 50,000 cr from RBI from its two repo windows on a daily basis. Short term rates (90 day Commercial paper, 90 day T-Bill, call rates) all have moved up. Long term yields, though had come down by about 50 bps from the levels seen in April, but after the July 2 hike in policy rates have hardened by about 20 bps.
In a short time, Dr D V Subbarao is going to announce the First quarterly review of monetary policy and he likely to increase the policy rates by 25 bps.
Author:Praveen Bajaj
Bond market/ G-Sec update
Yields on Government securities rose to the highest level in two weeks following the mid-term 25 bps rate hike by RBI on last Friday. Benchmark 10 year bond, 7.80% 2020 security rose 8 bps to 7.64% from 7.56% close of last week.
As expected, yields opened stronger on Monday, but later were dragged down due to buying in the securities. Due to reduced fiscal deficit, RBI had announced a reduced borrowing last week. Same was expected for the week as well. But RBI announced the issue of securities worth Rs 12,000 cr. Along with this, rally in US treasuries kept the sentiments up in bond market. Yields weakened till 7.57% on Wednesday.
Liquidity conditions eased slightly compared to the last week. Amount borrowed from RBI’s repo window averaged above Rs 50,000 cr for the week. Indian Financial Services Secretary R Gopalan commented that liquidity crunch in the Indian banking system was expected to ease in the next 10-15 days.
Benchmark 10 year bond daily movement
However, with the release of stronger weekly inflation figures, yields again started hardening. the primary articles index moved up by 1.4% marking a YoY inflation growth of 16.08% as compared to 14.75% observed a week earlier. The Fuel and power index rose steeply by 4.5% taking the inflation rate to 18.02% compared to 12.9% a week earlier. The index factored in higher prices of petrol, diesel, kerosene and LPG as announced by the Government on June 25th.
Markets clearly are factoring in another rate hike at the July 27 announcement of First quarter review of monetary policy. All fixed income market rates have hardened. While commercial paper rates were seen hardening since June beginning, G-sec rates have started hardening recently. Next week we have Index of Industrial Production (IIP) and WPI monthly release both of which would be important guiding factor for RBI to decide on interest rates.
To read earlier updates click here
Author:Praveen Bajaj
European Central Bank (ECB) in 2008 = RBI in 2010
I am sure that the subject of my article would be very confusing for some of you or may be strange for a lot of you. What I am trying to convey with this one is again some graduation level economics which I studied during my Macroeconomics paper in 2005, which I believe the world central bank’s heads are forgetting or trying to overlook over more complex understandings.
The core objective of any Central Bank is to do a through analysis of the forthcoming economic situation of an economy (growth and inflation) and accordingly adjust the liquidity flow into the system. It also involves taking into account any major local or global events that could shape up the economic situation in the country and hence being prepared for the same.
Thus, in nut shell I would say that the core objective of any monetary policy is to manage liquidity into the system so that the economy grows (with minimal inflation), but this decision should be based on ex-ante analysis and not ex-post analysis.
This precise mistake I believe ECB committed in July 2008. In July 2008, when the global credit crisis was almost about to reach its peak, the global growth outlook was bleak and most of the central bank’s around the world were either growing through rate cuts or on the verge of doing so, ECB announced a rate hike of 25 bps, which as per experts is one of the many important reasons of the current EU turmoils. The move as said by Mr. Trichet was” mainly on account of “heightened concerns at the ECB about inflation in Europe”.
The inflation which was just a temporary phenomenon in EU because of the high commodity prices, made ECB think beyond the US Sub-prime and Global credit crisis and took a rate hike decision, saying that “the crisis was one belonging to US and will not have impact on EU”. Thus in October when the US crisis started spreading wide the EU was down of out because of the decision in July.
The same is what RBI has done on Friday, going by its ex-post and probably present rate hike analogy has gone ahead with a rate hike. Its done probably at a time when the Indian banking system is already crunched for liquidity because of 3G and BWA auctions, can have a long repercussion. The RBI also said like EU said in 2008 that“Inflation is a bigger concern than EU Crisis”.
Thus going further, I strongly believe that if this EU crisis spreads more (which has high chances) Indian economic growth and more importantly the stock indices could see a blood bath. The Indian markets as of now is quite insulated from the global turmoil, but like EU in 2008 this move by RBI on Friday could lay the foundation for a big Index correction.
Author:Rahul Sonthalia, Research Head, Kredent
Bond market/ G-Sec update
After a hefty 8 bps points jump on Friday of last week due to decision to free up fuel price (read MB update here), G-sec markets opened the week on a strong note. Announcement by RBI that the borrowing amount for the week will be at the reduced levels kept the sentiments up. Yields on benchmark 10 year bond 7.80% 2020 fell 6 bps to 7.59%.
Following 3 days also witnessed buying and yields fell to 7.52% till Thursday. This was the lowest close on yields since June 9, 2010.
Benchmark bond daily movement
Positive sentiments in the bond market were also enhanced due to the rally in US treasuries. Primary articles’ inflation came in at a lower figure of 14.75% for the week ended 19 June compared to 17.6% for the earlier week. Fuel index also came in lower at 12.9% compared to 13.18% for the earlier week. This also kept the sentiments positive in bond market.
Friday however saw some correction with profit booking coming in at higher levels. Yields on benchmark bond increased 4 bps to 7.56% over Thursday. On a weekly basis, the yields have decreased 10 bps.
Govt sold bonds worth Rs 10,000 cr all which were fully subscribed and yields were at the expected level. Liquidity in the system remained tight with average volumes on Repo window stood at Rs 63,400 cr.
The rate hike of RBI (read MB update here) was announced after market hours and hence the weekly closing yield does not factor in the hike. It is expected that bonds will open on a weaker note on Monday and the sentiments would carry on for the week. Thus yields should trade with a positive bias for next week.
Author: Praveen Bajaj
July Could be Jittery For the Markets
The month of July can cause real jitters for the Indian stock market and the party could end. Most of the top economists and market gurus have started saying that the year 2010 could be a mixture of two halves, the first half ending on a positive note and the second half leading to a sell off and a economic downturn.
There are 4 big events in the month of July because of which I believe markets may end lower in the month of July
1. First which I had already discussed in my previous post is the $30 billion IPO, by the China AG bank,
which could suck the liquidity out of the emerging markets and thus leading to a fall
2. Second in July only, perhaps in the later half of the month the EU will come up with its bank stress test
results and without any plan so as to how it would provide any kind of support to the ill banks the results
may provide another reason to sell the financials and other related stocks around the world
3. Third, from 17th July, Nifty futures will be traded on CME and this move is taken in order to facilitate US
investors to take exposure in Indian markets without facing the hassles of cross border investing. This, I
believe might lead to a liquidity crunched Indian markets
4. On 27th July, is the RBI Q1 credit policy, with statements from the governor that inflation being the
bigger concern than the EU crisis, and the recent fuel price hike, I believe it sets a strong case for the
RBI to go for a rate hike (and I think it might come as a surprise well before the actual policy date). The
Indian banking system which is already liquidity crunched because of the 3G and BWA auctions could take
a serious hit if this happens. The Bank Nifty falling by around 3% on Friday just after the fuel price hike,
signals the market expectations of a rate hike.
Thus, I believe that the best one could do in July, is to avoid long position and traders can also use low IVs as a tool to go short using the put options.
Be Cautious & Happy Investing…!!!
Author name:Rahul Sonthalia, Research Head, Kredent
To see other posts by the same expert click here
