Rupee gains
The rupee again moved up against the dollar, as traders were found squaring positions ahead of the end of the financial year. The domestic currency opened 43.63/65 against the dollar and closed at 43.47 against Thursday's 43.76/77.

Call rates: With the end of fiscal year 2006-07 a severe liquidity crunch hit the banks and call rates touched an intra-day high of 70-80 per cent. Call rates ended the day at 40-50 per cent against 10-11 per cent on Thursday. At the end of the day the Reserve Bank of India hiked the repo rate by a quarter percentage point to 7.75 per cent and increased the cash reserve ratio by 50 basis points to 6.50 per cent after market hours.

Reverse repo: On Friday, banks borrowed Rs30,650 crore from the RBI through the repo window at 7.5 per cent. The RBI also sucked out Rs1,765 crore through the reverse repo window.

Bonds: The cash squeeze pushed down bond prices.

G-secs: The 8.07 per cent-10 year-2017 paper opened at Rs100.85 (7.94 per cent YTM) and closed at Rs100.42 (8 per cent YTM), against Monday's close at Rs100.65 (7.97 per cent YTM).

The recently auctioned 6.65 per cent-2 year-2009 paper opened at Rs97.53 (8.01 per cent YTM) and closed at Rs97.50 (8.02 per cent YTM), against the previous close of Rs97.47 (8.03 per cent YTM).
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RBI hikes CRR by 50bps, repo by 25bps
Mumbai: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) again attacking inflation raised the cash reserve ratio (CRR) for third time since December 2006 by 50 basis points to 6.50 pc with effect from April 28 and also raised the repo rate by 25 basis points to 7.75 pc the rate at which it lends to banks against securities.
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Services receipts reduce current a/c gap
Chennai: The government was able to reduce its current account deficit for the third quarter of this fiscal on the back of a doubling of receipts due to services rendered by software companies, tourism earnings and remittances from Indians working abroad helped. Current account measures the quantum of both trade and services that the country has with the rest of the world.

According to statistics put out by the Reserve Bank of India, the current account deficit was at $3 billion for the third quarter ended December 31, 2006, compared with $4.7 billion in the corresponding period in the previous fiscal. For the nine-month period covering (April-December 2006), the current account deficit was at about $12 billion, at the same level as in the previous corresponding period.

However, the trade balance continued to be negative as India imported more goods than it exported. Imports during the quarter were worth $48 billion while the country exported goods worth $29 billion.
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Forex reserves rise $1.789 billion
Mumbai: The country's foreign exchange reserves surged by $1.789 billion to touch $197.746 billion in the week ended March 23, 2007.

The reserves have increased by over $3.3 billion in two consecutive weeks. During the week ended March 16, the reserves had touched $1.547 billion to $ 195.957 billion.

According to the RBI's Weekly Statistical Supplement, foreign currency assets increased by $1.789 billion to $190.392 billion. Gold reserves remained unchanged at $6.883 billion while SDRs were at $2 million. India's reserve position in the IMF remained the same at $469 million.
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FDI limit in credit info cos reduced to 49 pc
New Delhi: Concern related to protection of credit related information, has led the Government to reduce the foreign investment limit in credit information services companies from the existing 100 per cent to 49 per cent. It has also been decided that permission to set up credit information companies would require case-by-case approval from Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) and regulatory clearance from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). As of now credit information services is one of the 19 specified activities for non-banking finance companies (NBFCs) where 100 per cent foreign direct investment is allowed through the RBI's automatic approval route.

The guidelines for credit information companies (CICs) have been finalised by the Finance Ministry and have been sent to the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP). DIPP would formally notify the guidelines through a press note in April, sources said.

The new guidelines stipulate that foreign institutional investors (FIIs) would also be allowed to invest in CICs up to a limit of 24 per cent of the equity but only in those CICs that are listed on Indian stock exchanges. FII investments, would, however, be within the overall limit of 49 per cent for foreign investment.

It further states that no single FII would be allowed to hold, directly or indirectly, more than five per cent of the equity of any CIC. Secondly, any acquisition in excess of one per cent will have to be reported to the RBI.
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