7 January 1988 Reuters News English (c) 1988 Reuters Limited MANILA, Jan 7 – The Philippine government will issue treasury bills and notes totalling 29.8 billion pesos in 1988 and depend mainly on domestic resources to finance its projected budget deficit of 27.1 billion pesos, Finance Undersecretary Victor Macalincag said. The government planned to float…
19 February 1988 Reuters News (c) 1988 Reuters Limited English MANILA, Feb 19 – The Philippines plans to speed up its sluggish debt/equity swap program, Central Bank Governor Jose Fernandez said. “Our policy is to get rid of the large backlog,” he told a news conference. “We think the people who have applied deserve to…
19 February 1988 Reuters News English (c) 1988 Reuters Limited MANILA, Feb 19 – The Philippines’ 27.8 billion dollar foreign debt makes it a bit player in attempts to find solutions to the debt crisis and Manila prefers to let large debtors take the initiative, Central Bank Governor Jose Fernandez said. “I think anybody who…
18 March 1988 Reuters News English (c) 1988 Reuters Limited MANILA, March 18, Reuter – Volatile penny oil stocks have raised trading on Manila’s two exchanges to fever pitch this year, and analysts said the trend seemed likely to continue. “Rumours are the heart and soul of the (oils) market. It’s a casino,” Noel De…
4 April 1988 Reuters News English (c) 1988 Reuters Limited MANILA, April 4, Reuter – The Philippines’ gross national product (GNP) is expected to expand by 6.1 pct in 1988 after 5.1 pct growth in 1987, the Central Bank said in its annual report. Key sectors such as manufacturing, agriculture, mining, construction and services are…
20 April 1988 Reuters News English (c) 1988 Reuters Limited MANILA, April 20, Reuter – Japan’s attempt to use the Asian Development Bank (ADB) to recycle part of its 30 billion dollar private-sector surplus is not meeting with much success, banking officials and diplomats said. Japan, with 15 pct of the 47-member ADB’s 22.8…
22 May 1997 Reuters News English (c) 1997 Reuters Limited KATHMANDU, May 22 (Reuter) – Nepal’s coalition government plans to grant the Himalayan kingdom’s central bank full independence, the finance minister said on Wednesday. The Nepal Rastra Bank is currently under the supervision of the finance ministry. “We are considering that the central bank should…
28 July 1988 Reuters News English (c) 1988 Reuters Limited MANILA, July 28, Reuter – The Philippines plans to approach its creditor banks for a new-money loan package and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for a new funding program this autumn, central bank governor Jose Fernandez said on Thursday. He told a news conference that…
3 August 1988 Reuters News English (c) 1988 Reuters Limited MANILA, Aug 3, Reuter – The Philippines has told its commercial bank creditors they must help bridge a 1.8 billion dollar financing gap in 1989, a senior official close to talks held in New York last month told Reuters. The official said Philippine officials had…
29 August 1992 Los Angeles Daily News Valley The Japanese government Friday approved an $87 billion spending package – the nation’s largest since World War II – in a bid to jolt the dormant economy back to life. During a late-evening meeting, government ministers rubber-stamped the growth-boosting package totaling 10.7 trillion yen. The massive package was in line…
14 September 1993 Reuters News English (c) 1993 Reuters Limited TOKYO, Sept 14 (Reuter) – Japan’s sickly economy has been contracting as its stubborn trade surplus balloons, government figures showed on Tuesday. Gross national product (GNP) shrank 0.5 percent in the April/June quarter from the previous quarter after adjustment for inflation, the government’s Economic Planning…
29 August 1997 Reuters News English (c) 1997 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, Aug 29 (Reuters) – Indian Finance Minister P. Chidambaram said the rupee’s volatility had subsided and the policy of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) was to intervene to prevent volatility and speculative activity in the market. “The value of the rupee will be…
16 September 1997 Reuters News English (c) 1997 Reuters Limited NEW DELHI, Sept 16 (Reuter) – India’s government, clearly alarmed by a fiscal deficit that was threatening to soar out of control, moved on Tuesday to boost revenues with a host of steps including a jump in import tariffs and a cut in federal spending. …
Despite the crisis, a clear message must be sent to the investor community that India is open for business. There was an initial spurt of excitement after the new Reserve Bank of India governor was announced. Professor (Raghuram) Rajan is obviously highly accomplished. But there is only a very limited amount the central bank can…
India’s economy is barrelling along at a growth rate of over 9 per cent, savings rates are up, investments are up, more jobs are being created, and inflation appears to be under control. So have we hit our stride? Have we chanced upon the right development model for the huge, tumultuous democracy that we are?…
They say nothing sharpens our minds as much as high danger or a threat to our survival. We are prepared to stand and fight when we are cornered. Twenty-two years ago, when we were staring into the abyss, we pulled a reformist rabbit out of our socialist hat. But it took just about five years…
From the Editor Once every year, we pay obeisance to the best and strongest companies in India. It is not grudging admiration. Our corporate icons deserve every bit of their applause. No management school, or case study, or how-to hardback that you pick up at an airport bookstore can teach you how to plot a…
From the Editor We need to place the AgustaWestland helicopter “kerfuffle”- as a former defence minister put it- in context. The 12 AW101s were headed for the Indian Air Force’s Communication Squadron, which flies VVIPs around. to replace its ageing Mi-8 fleet. The new helicopters are strictly not combat craft-they are personnel carriers and can…
From the Editor I have a confession to make. Many moons ago, I studied to be an accountant and despite one of the world’s toughest entry barriers with single-digit-pass rates in the chartered accountancy examinations-dreamt of crunching numbers while boning up on ‘double-entry bookkeeping’ and the mysteries of profit and loss. But the world of…
A laughter club in Mumbai is forced to “zip it” because a humourless neighbour is disturbed, not long after a 63-year-old cartoon unleashes a cleansing of school textbooks that would warm a tin-pot dictator’s heart. In the same “cosmopolitan” city, a woman is arrested for possessing liquor that she was using to make chocolates, and…
The economy is whirling around in a populist spiral Pranab Mukherjee is starting to look worryingly like a feckless heir squandering his generous inheritance while his fretful guardian in the person of Duvvuri Subbarao tries to board up the door and keep the wolves at bay with a nail here and a nail there. The…
Of all the functions of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), there is one routine task crucial to the health of the economy: incinerating the mounds of soiled currency notes well past their prime and providing the commercial banks with mint-fresh replacements. Last month, in an effort to clear the backlog of ‘non-issuable notes’-inevitable when…
Pranab Mukherjee’s first budget, at first glance so redolent of status quo, is peppered with little booby traps. Two paragraphs in his speech have caused heartburn amidst tyre manufacturers—who are dismayed about a stiff excise hike—and soft drink bottlers, who are cut up because Mukherjee has cracked down on soft drink franchises’ excise exemptions. The…
V. Vaidyanathan takes wing with a $17 million stake in a star NBFC. By Chaitanya Kalbag The next time you are flying somewhere, do not bury your nose in a book or plug in your earphones. Take a good look around. And if you happen to be sitting next to Vembu Vaidyanathan, a wiry, fast-talking…
What lies ahead? A messy GST rollout could be one shock too many after demonetisation… Finance Ministers take on a certain air when they think things are going swimmingly and nothing can rock the economy when it is cruising along. Even if all the lookouts are calling out to them to mind the shoals, they…
We need our institutions as much as we need our democracy Narendra Modi’s first term in office will be bracketed by malodorous stand-offs with two governors of the Reserve Bank of India. The bad blood between the central bank and the finance ministry is just one of the stains blotting the government’s copy-book as it…
The only antidotes to fake news are truth and commonsense Start exercise your smartphone thumb, because the next big election will be fought on our mobiles. The latest Internet and Mobile Association of India survey says 86.5 per cent of users access the Internet via mobiles and smartphones. That works out to over 430 million…