Vysya Bank is one of India’s top private sector banks. Foreign banks with Indian presence are not allowed to pick up a stake in a local bank.

The Foreign Investments Promotion Board, has deferred its decision, following a government request.
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Honda gets FIPB approval
New Delhi: Japan's Honda Motor has received permission from the Foreign Investments Promotion Board for setting up a fully-owned subsidiary to manufacture scooters and motorcycles.

Honda will also manufacture and market spare parts, and components, and export its products. The investment in India will be around Rs.183 crore. The FIPB's approval came after the Kinetic and Hero Honda groups gave their no-objection certificates.

Other investments approved by the FIPB include the Tech Pacific proposal to buy out the 51 per cent stake of Godrej and Boyce in their joint venture, and proposals by Motorola, GE India, and BMG Crescendo. The proposal of Entry Line Holdings to buy out the stake in Usha Beltron, held by the Indian associates was also passed.

The total value of investment proposals approved by the FIPB on Monday was Rs.425 crore.
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Ficci seeks delinking IDBI and Sidbi
New Delhi: The Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) has sought the delinking of IDBI and Sidbi, and bring the latter under the purview of the Reserve Bank of India. This, it feels, would give greater autonomy to Sidbi.

FICCI quoted a recent survey which showed that this move was favoured by small-scale units. The survey also indicated that the credit evaluation of small-scale industries has to done using different criteria.
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Operators pay licence fee to DoT
New Delhi: All basic and cellular operators, barring Essar Commvision, have paid their 15 per cent outstanding licence fee to the department of telecommunications, thereby accepting the shift to the new telecom policy. Essar Commvision holds the licence for the Punjab circle.

DoT received Rs.159 crore as licence fees and Rs.63 crore as damages.

These operators will now work under a revenue sharing system, compared to the earlier one of fixed licence fees. They will have to pay 100 per cent of the amount to DoT by 30 January 2000.
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State Bank plans network
Mumbai: The State Bank of India is planning to enter internet banking and network 2,500 of its computerised branches and all its automatic teller machines by March 2000.

The bank will seek advise on the issue from global or local consultants, four to five of whom will soon be shortlisted for the task. G G Vaidya, SBI chairman, expects the blueprint to be ready in the next six to eight months.
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9999 – is it going to be a jinxed date?
Singapore: As a precursor to the Y2K problem, 090999 or 9 September 1999, will be read as 9999 by some of the older computer systems throughout the world. This may cause some computers to potentially destroy data, as it will be interpreted in a different manner. This happens with mainframes where Cobol programs are written.

The Asian region is expected to be affected to a lesser extent since it computerised a little late.

Cobol interprets 9999 as infinity, and this will put computers into a never ending sleep or even destroy data. It will be interesting to watch what happens on the bigger trouble that is expected from ‘big brother’, ‘1100’- in other words Y2K.
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BCCI’s ambitious claims
London: The shattered Bank of Credit and Commerce International is claiming more than $1.5 billion from two Arabs. One of them is the Sheikh of Sharjah, Sultan bin Mohammed al Qasimi, who is being sued for $500 million. The other is a retired Saudi offical, Abdul Rauf Khalil, who is being sued for $1 billion.

The bank's liquidators, Deloitte & Touche, feel they can make substantial recovery, while creditors of the bank do not.

BCCI was closed by the Bank of England in July 1991, after it incurred $13 billion of losses. The fraud is the biggest in the international banking history.
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Amex’s new credit card
Tokyo: American Express Bank will launch a new credit card product aimed at Japan’s small business.

The bank’s chief, Kenneth Chenault, said that he sees a recovery in the offing in Japan as whole, and in particular in the small business sector.

The new card is aimed at 4.6 million small businesses, where a small business is defined as one having less than or equal to 200 employees.
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