The risks from India’s rotten banks | World Defense

The risks from India’s rotten banks

Mangus Ortus Novem

THINK TANK: SENIOR
Joined
Sep 4, 2019
Messages
131
Reactions
984 17 0
Country
Pakistan
Location
Pakistan
The risks from India’s rotten banks

IMAGINE A CENTRAL bank tweeting that, yes, there are rumours of “certain” banks facing deposit runs but “there is no need to panic”. Would you feel reassured? That is the unenviable position Indians found themselves in last week as a financial storm rumbled on in the world’s fifth-biggest economy with no sign of the authorities getting a firm grip. In the latest fiasco a co-operative bank, PMC, is accused of fraud, prompting depositors to yank their cash out. Meanwhile shares in Yes Bank, a private lender, have collapsed by 40% in the past month as rumours swirl. These are not isolated incidents. Roughly a third of the financial system is on crutches or under suspicion. Dazed by the scale of the task, the government and the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) are dithering. Until they act, India’s economy will not perk up—and there is a danger of a full-blown crisis.

The origins of this mess go back to 2005. In the first phase conventional banks, which control about four-fifths of the system’s assets and are mostly state-run, lent too freely to infrastructure and industrial projects, sometimes ones backed by well-connected tycoons. The plight today is a continuation of the second phase: a boom-and-bust in lightly regulated shadow banks, which control the remaining fifth of the system. The danger grew in 2016 when the government temporarily abolished large banknotes, leading many people to deposit money in banks and mutual funds. These, in turn, used the windfall to make loans to shadow banks, which went on their own lending binge, often using the money to finance property projects.

Today the financial system is stuffed with bad debts. Perhaps a tenth of loans are dud, maybe more. The shadow banks are vulnerable because they use short-term debt (rather than ordinary deposits, which they are mostly restricted from raising) to fund long-term loans of their own. There is also an undercurrent of fraud and bogus accounting. In 2018 Punjab National Bank said that a diamond dealer had stolen $2bn from it. Later that year IL&FS, a big shadow bank with government links, collapsed. Credit-rating agencies have been giving high ratings to flaky firms. With suspicion rife, a handful of shadow banks face a severe funding squeeze, and the entire financial sector is wary of lending. As a result credit is growing at near its slowest pace in 20 years. The ripple effect has stalled building projects, starved wholesalers of loans to buy inventory and prevented farmers from borrowing to buy tractors and motorbikes.

20191012_LDC879.png

The response of Narendra Modi’s government and the RBI has so far been halting. The government has repeatedly but belatedly pumped inadequate sums of capital into the state banks, and promised to merge some of them. On September 20th it slashed corporate taxes to try to revive animal spirits. The RBI, meanwhile, has cut interest rates five times this year. Presumably they hope that this will be enough to boost the economy, while the big state banks slowly regain their strength and the remaining well-run private banks, such as HDFC and Kotak, lend more freely.

The crisis, however, cannot be compartmentalised. Shadow banks have borrowed from bad banks which may have borrowed from good ones. Another collapse in one corner could easily cause panic elsewhere. Because the banks are in poor shape, the RBI’s interest-rate cuts are not being passed on to consumers and firms. Another lurch down in the economy threatens a new series of bad debts at the recuperating state banks. And there is a palpable sense that governance is broken. Bank boards, auditors, rating agencies and the RBI have all failed to stop the rot.

India needs a two-pronged clean up. In the short term the RBI should do another “stress test” of the banks, and test the shadow banks, too. The results should be made public. If state banks need capital they should get it. Some shadow banks will fail and should be wound up. The approach taken with IL&FS offers a template. It was put into a form of administration and creditors face a big haircut (although the process could be quicker). In the longer run, India should privatise its state banks so that they can escape control by politicians. Shadow lenders, meanwhile, should face the same prudential rules as banks. The RBI needs to overhaul its system of ongoing supervision. It used to be widely admired, but is starting to look like part of the problem.

This ought to be India’s moment. It has a big domestic economy and lots of entrepreneurs, oil prices are fairly low—helpful for a big importer—and multinationals are keen to shift their factories out of China. Cleaning up the financial system is a gigantic task. But until it is done India will not thrive.

@Khafee if you recall I did say in private conversation that you should wait for investments.... and can pick up assets penny to dollar.... StrategicPatience


@Shazam @Signalian @BATMAN @TomCat @I.R.A


 

TomCat

SENIOR MEMBER
Joined
Oct 11, 2019
Messages
1,688
Reactions
4,796 153 0
Country
Pakistan
Location
Pakistan
Why do i get a feeling this diamond dealer is not a diamond dealer.\_/)

Modi maybe hailed by bakhts but i have seen businessmen hating him the most. It’s similar to the June 30 amnesty hate fbr recieved throughout Pakistan
 

TomCat

SENIOR MEMBER
Joined
Oct 11, 2019
Messages
1,688
Reactions
4,796 153 0
Country
Pakistan
Location
Pakistan
@Khafee if you recall I did say in private conversation that you should wait for investments.... and can pick up assets penny to dollar.... StrategicPatience


@Shazam @Signalian @BATMAN @TomCat @I.R.A


Where do you see PKR heading to by 2024-2025 given that things go on as they are going, and no major conflict happens? CPEC proceeds as it is or maybe a bit fast paced. I know my question has lots of, lots of factors missing. IMF programmes, Trade in Yuan, Foreign reserves, looted money coming back.

Do you see any possible scheme for introduction of possibly new 5000 and 1000 notes? If that happens, one can only imagine how much havoc it will cause to many people here. Amnesty declaration is over, any note change policy, will bring in a lot if people who will then have to face NAB
 

Counter-Errorist

THINK TANK
Joined
Oct 1, 2019
Messages
1,105
Reactions
2,855 149 0
Country
Pakistan
Location
Pakistan
Social media is a more dangerous attack vector than people realize. A single ill thought-out tweet sent people on a bank run, dropped shares by 40%.
A competitor can hack a twitter account and do the same, decimating their competition very cheaply.

Imagine if world leaders ended up with hacked accounts. Trump suddenly declares war on Germany. Or urges white nationalists to start shooting black people. People would actually believe him.
 

Mangus Ortus Novem

THINK TANK: SENIOR
Joined
Sep 4, 2019
Messages
131
Reactions
984 17 0
Country
Pakistan
Location
Pakistan
Where do you see PKR heading to by 2024-2025 given that things go on as they are going, and no major conflict happens? CPEC proceeds as it is or maybe a bit fast paced. I know my question has lots of, lots of factors missing. IMF programmes, Trade in Yuan, Foreign reserves, looted money coming back.

Do you see any possible scheme for introduction of possibly new 5000 and 1000 notes? If that happens, one can only imagine how much havoc it will cause to many people here. Amnesty declaration is over, any note change policy, will bring in a lot if people who will then have to face NAB


2 years of Financial Discipline.. economy moving upwards... then around 5% growth.... gaining momentum after that... however, this all depends how we deal with coming global recession.... which might be nastier than 2008.

Growth would come from Chinese Consumption and further public spending.. including Pakistan SEZs...

We do need a double digit growth for at least a decade to move towards middle income journey... already lost 4 decades.

Bigger challenge is documentation of economy... the atucal size of Pak economy would be much more.

I do agree on the design change of PKR and however we need to invest in FinTech to cater to broader needs of rural areas... ecommerce is another venue.

In any case we need to create a balanced economy... with built in curbs on imports.
 

TomCat

SENIOR MEMBER
Joined
Oct 11, 2019
Messages
1,688
Reactions
4,796 153 0
Country
Pakistan
Location
Pakistan
Hi

this is a critical time for pakistan. An india in an economic crisis would be more prone to starting a war
Assuming that your thoughts are based on the saying “Jahan satyanas wahan sawa satyanas”, translating in this scenerio to india being economically unstable so it has given up all hopes, see no future, start a war, take down your neighbour along with you? I would not agree to that. Economic ups and downs are part of everyday life situation. Just because one is facing bad time (which is just bad NOT WORST) , doesn’t mean they aren’t planning or taking steps to improvise it. State banks are not for nothing.
What you are suggesting can be right only in the worst case scenerio where everything is almost crumbled, 0 hope, bleak future, country becoming bankrupt. India is no where near that situation. Your points to prove the hypothesis sir?
 

Gorgin Khan

NEW RECRUIT
Joined
Sep 25, 2019
Messages
5
Reactions
7 0 0
Country
Pakistan
Location
Denmark
Assuming that your thoughts are based on the saying “Jahan satyanas wahan sawa satyanas”, translating in this scenerio to india being economically unstable so it has given up all hopes, see no future, start a war, take down your neighbour along with you? I would not agree to that. Economic ups and downs are part of everyday life situation. Just because one is facing bad time (which is just bad NOT WORST) , doesn’t mean they aren’t planning or taking steps to improvise it. State banks are not for nothing.
What you are suggesting can be right only in the worst case scenerio where everything is almost crumbled, 0 hope, bleak future, country becoming bankrupt. India is no where near that situation. Your points to prove the hypothesis sir?

Politics;)
 

Shazam

MEMBER
Joined
Aug 22, 2019
Messages
88
Reactions
356 10 0
Country
Pakistan
Location
Pakistan
Assuming that your thoughts are based on the saying “Jahan satyanas wahan sawa satyanas”, translating in this scenerio to india being economically unstable so it has given up all hopes, see no future, start a war, take down your neighbour along with you? I would not agree to that. Economic ups and downs are part of everyday life situation. Just because one is facing bad time (which is just bad NOT WORST) , doesn’t mean they aren’t planning or taking steps to improvise it. State banks are not for nothing.
What you are suggesting can be right only in the worst case scenerio where everything is almost crumbled, 0 hope, bleak future, country becoming bankrupt. India is no where near that situation. Your points to prove the hypothesis sir?
Aoa and hi there, I think he sits a little deeper in his chair than we take him for.

What @mastan means, as far as my two cents are concerned reading his posts for a decade or so, are that Modi's Rabid BJP mindset might trigger him to contemplate starting a limited war, if a crises looms, to divert attention from economic turmoil in hopes that his government shall then get enough political room to ride out the economic crises.
 

TomCat

SENIOR MEMBER
Joined
Oct 11, 2019
Messages
1,688
Reactions
4,796 153 0
Country
Pakistan
Location
Pakistan
Aoa and hi there, I think he sits a little deeper in his chair than we take him for.

What @mastan means, as far as my two cents are concerned reading his posts for a decade or so, are that Modi's Rabid BJP mindset might trigger him to contemplate starting a limited war, if a crises looms, to divert attention from economic turmoil in hopes that his government shall then get enough political room to ride out the economic crises.
I truely admire and respect Sir @Mastankhan , he is unique, uses the other part of the brain which i seldom see people using, brings out perspectives from different angle almost everytime, a rare quality which i believe is required in many different organizations specially in investigations/detectives. I would suggest you to watch Sherlock
 
Top