Business Current Affairs
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Business Current Affairs
- Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) of India has inaugurated “Digi Zone”, at Bandra Kurla Complex, Mumbai, as part of its effort to enhance its digital footprint. LIC’s Digi Zone can be used by the customers to purchase policies online, pay the premium and avail of other services. As a part of its efforts to become a tech-driven life insurer, LIC will offer information related to its products and services through kiosks installed on the Digi Zone premises.
- Tech Mahindra has approved a proposal for the acquisition of a 100 per cent stake in Allyis India and Green Investments, for a total consideration of up to USD 125 million. The acquisition will bolster Tech Mahindra’s capabilities in Digital Experience Solutions, Learning & Development, Marketing, Instructional Design; Engineering: Cloud & Automation, BI & Analytics, Technical support services.
- State-owned power generation company NTPC Ltd. is set to acquire a 5 per cent equity stake in Power Exchange of India Ltd (PXIL). It must be noted that the government is planning to expand the share of the spot power market in the total electricity supply in India to 25 per cent by 2023-24. At present, the size of short-term power trading is about 5 per cent.
- Nippon Life India Asset Management Limited, asset manager of Nippon India Mutual Fund (NIMF), has announced the launch of India’s First Auto sector ETF – Nippon India Nifty Auto ETF.
- Alphabet Inc-owned, Google has acquired Israeli cybersecurity startup Siemplify, in a deal worth $500 million. This acquisition will expand the U.S. tech giant’s security offerings in the country amid rising cyber-attacks. Siemplify will be integrated into Google Cloud’s Chronicle operation. As a part of Google Cloud’s security team, Siemplify will help companies better manage their threat response
- National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) and Reliance Jio have announced that UPI AUTOPAY has now been introduced for the telecom industry with Jio. Jio’s integration with UPI AUTOPAY has made it the first player in the telecom industry to go live with the unique emandate feature that was launched by NPCI.
- MobiKwik, one of India’s largest mobile wallets and Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) Fintech companies launched ‘ClickPay’ for its customers, in collaboration with NPCI Bharat BillPay Ltd. (NBBL). This feature enables MobiKwik customers to pay recurring online bills (such as mobile, gas, water, electricity, DTH, insurance, and loan EMIs) with ease by eliminating the need to remember individual bill details and due dates.
Urjit Patel Appointed Vice President of Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank
Mr. Patel will serve a three-year tenure as one of the multilateral development bank's five vice presidents, succeeding former Gujarat Chief Secretary D.J. Pandian, who led the AIIB's investment perations as well as all sovereign and non-sovereign loans in South and Southeast Asia as Vice President.
Highlights:
- Since its establishment in Beijing in 2015, the AIIB has granted more loans for India than any other member. China is the company's largest stakeholder, followed by India. Its 104 members do not include the United States or Japan.
- The AIIB has invested $6.7 billion in 28 projects in India.
- Apart from infrastructure, it has recently emphasised green projects and assisting public health activities during the COVID-19 pandemic. Under the ADB's Asia Pacific Vaccine Access Facility (APVAX) project, India asked for loans from the AIIB and the ADB in October to purchase 667 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines, with the ADB likely to lend $1.5 billion and the AIIB roughly $500 million.
Indian GDP Growth ICRA Forecast
ICRA, a rating agency, recently revised its estimate of India's GDP growth.
Highlights:
- According to ICRA, there was a 7.9% increase in the second quarter of the fiscal year 2021-22.
- The second-quarter GDP growth estimate was upgraded due to an increase in government spending in September.
- The real GDP growth rate for July-September was 7.7%, according to an earlier estimate.
- Because of a low base, India's GDP increased by more than 20% in the first quarter as the first wave of the covid-19 pandemic raged.
- According to the agency, growth in the industry, services, and agriculture, and forestry and fishing for the same quarter was 8.5 percent, 7.9 percent, and 3 percent, respectively.
- The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has forecasted a 9.5 percent growth rate for the full fiscal year 2021-22.