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[ad_1] Thich Nhat Hanh, poetic peace activist and master of mindfulness, dies at 95 [ad_2] Source link

[ad_1] Omicron Variant Cases and Deaths in India Live, Covid-19 Booster Vaccine Registration January 22 Live Update: In the last 24 hours, India recorded 3,37,704 new cases of COVID-19, as the country is amid a third wave of the pandemic. With this, the active caseload in India has reached 21,13,365. On the other hand, 488 people have died in the last 24 hours due to coronavirus, according to the data shared by the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. A total of 10,050 cases of Omicron have been detected in the country. However, the actual number of Omicron cases is suspected to be much more than that, since Omicron is the driving factor for this sudden surge in cases witnessed over the past one month. Once again, the country is witnessing more new cases than recoveries in a day, and even though the recovery rate in India currently stands at 93.31%, the active cases are at 5.43%, up from 5.23% on Friday morning. Amid this, Delhi will continue to have the weekend curfew and odd-even opening of shops in the market, after the LG rejected the Delhi government’s proposal to lift these restrictions. Meanwhile, the private offices would now be able to operate at 50% capacity, the capital has announced. The vaccination drive in India is also going at a fast pace with 161.16 cr vaccine doses having been administered till now. Financial Express Online brings you the latest updates on the coronavirus pandemic. [ad_2] Source link

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[ad_1] Union faults BP’s proposals in local refinery negotiations [ad_2] Source link

[ad_1] Bandhan Bank on Friday reported a 35.79% year-on-year jump in net profit to Rs 858.97 crore for the third quarter this fiscal year from Rs 632.59 crore in the same period last financial year as the lender’s non-interest income grew and provisions fell. The private sector lender had posted a whopping net loss of Rs 3008.59 crore for the second quarter in the current financial year on the back of Rs 5613.48-crore provisions as it had seen a huge surge in bad loans. Its non-performing assets (NPAs), in absolute terms, rose 7.74% quarter on quarter to `9441.57 crore in Q3FY22 as against Rs 8773.60 crore in Q2FY22. On a year-on-year basis, its NPAs soared tenfold from Rs 859.22 crore in the third quarter last fiscal. During the quarter under review, the bank’s gross NPAs, as a percentage of total loans, stood at 10.81% compared to 10.82% in the second quarter. Commenting on the results, Chandra Shekhar Ghosh, managing director and CEO, said, “Third quarter of this fiscal has been a very good one for the bank where we have witnessed growth across all parameters. After the challenging first half, we have seen growth bounced back strongly and things stabilise on the asset quality front with collection efficiency improving very strongly.” For the EEB segment (erstwhile microbanking segment), collection efficiency for December 2021 stood at 92% (including NPAs) against 86% in September 2021. And, it was 97% (excluding NPAs) for December versus 93% in September. “We have seen all round recovery during the quarter with improved collection and increase in disbursement. Q4 historically has been the best quarter for the bank and we are positive of our business going forward. With group loan share in total advances reduced to 52%, bank is on track to achieve the diversification strategy which it had laid down for FY25,” Ghosh said. Net interest income (NII) for the quarter stood at Rs 2124.70 crore as against Rs 2071.74 crore in the corresponding quarter of the previous year. The bank’s non-interest income grew 26.67% year on year to Rs 712.29 crore. Provisions during the quarter under review fell 25.25% YoY to Rs 805.71 crore from Rs 1077.83 crore in the year ago. The bank said share of full paying customers stood at 89% in December, up from 79% in September. Around 66% of NPA customers continued to make payments in a bid to regularise their overdue loan accounts at the earliest. Around 2/3rd of the bank’s restructured customers also continued to pay despite moratorium. [ad_2] Source link

[ad_1] When the terms “green” or “ESG” are broached in polite company, eyes have a tendency to roll. It’s natural for the mind to wander toward a parade of green branding campaigns that may be aspirational in messaging but rarely result in measurable climate-friendly or socially sustainable solutions in practice. Still, hidden among all that greenwashed coal may be a framework or two for manufacturing diamonds, according to some experts working to develop those investment standards. ESG securities such as bonds are backed by collateral, like mortgages, that can be defined as meeting environmentally sustainable, socially responsible, or good governance criteria. Digital mortgage platform MAXEX, backed by investment from financial-services giant JPMorgan, sees a bright future in the ESG market. The platform currently offers two ESG mortgage programs — one focused on green home loans, called MAXEX Sustainable; and the second, MAXEX Opportunity, serves minority, women and veteran-owned mortgage lenders and is focused on the socially responsible part of ESG. “MAXEX has been at the forefront of creating standardized ESG-compliant loan programs with investors paying up as much as 50 basis points for these loans,” states a market-update report published by MAXEX this past December. “Originator interest in the Opportunity and Sustainable programs helped ESG loans make up 26% of loan volume traded through the exchange in November.  “As the programs continue to gain traction and more ESG buyers are added to the platform, it is likely we will see the first true ESG-compliant RMBS issuance happen in 2022.” A Bloomberg Intelligence report published last year states that global ESG assets are expected to exceed $53 trillion by 2025, representing more than a third of all projected assets under management. On the agency front, Fannie Mae recently announced that its green multifamily mortgage-backed securities (MBS) issuance has topped $100 million, and its single-family green MBS program, launched in April 2020, has already reached $600 million in issuance.  Freddie Mac also recently announced that its single-family green bond program has issued some $600 million in mortgage-backed securities since it was launched in April of last year. In addition, issuance through the agency’s multifamily green bond program exceeds $4.5 billion. Still, concerns that the agencies’ green bond programs suffer from doses of “greenwashing” have surfaced in news reports.  The nonprofit publication Grist, which focuses on environmental coverage, in a report published this past summer found that in terms of energy use “about a fifth of the buildings enrolled [in Fannie’s multifamily green program] from 2016 through 2019 performed worse than the median U.S. building, even after fulfilling program requirements.” Part of that poor performance is due to the substandard energy-use conditions of many of the properties to begin with, the report explains, so even large gains in energy-use efficiencies won’t catch the properties up to the median scores. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission also has its eye on the ESG market. Last year, it stood up a “Climate and ESG Task Force” in its enforcement division to better police the emerging ESG market. “Proactively addressing emerging disclosure gaps that threaten investors and the market has always been core to the SEC’s mission,” said Acting Deputy Director of Enforcement Kelly Gibson, who heads the task force. “This task force brings together a broad array of experience and expertise, which will allow us to better police the market, pursue misconduct, and protect investors.”  Roelof Slump, managing director of U.S. RMBS at New York-based Fitch Ratings, said investors are very interested in ESG bonds, adding if “they’re paying up for something,” that will create interest on the issuer and originator side. “The general experience has been that if you’re able to successfully identify ESG tied to your loans, tied to your bonds, that does generate increased investor focus,” Slump explained. “Investors are very interested in ESG, so some are eagerly reaching out to rating agencies to better understand what are the various ways of thinking about ESG, and some investors are further along than others.” The lack of standardization in what constitutes an ESG loan or bond, however, is still an issue in the U.S., Slump added. “That’s been an obstacle,” he said. “But it’s still very early on here. Europe is much further along on these things.” Over time, tested frameworks, the market and credible regulation might lead us to more diamonds than coal in the ESG investing world. And some of that pilot work is already underway in the private-label residential mortgage-backed securities (RMBS) market. Robert McDonough, director of ESG and regulatory initiatives at Angel Oak Capital Advisors, part of non-QM lender Angel Oak Cos., said that the company’s borrowers are largely self-employed individuals who can’t get access to housing-finance programs through mainstream channels, such as banks, credit unions or traditional mortgage companies. “If you’re a self-employed individual, if you’re a sole proprietor, if you’re in the gig economy, if you’re an entrepreneur, it’s really hard to get a bank loan,” McDonough said. “And so that’s where non-QM lending comes into play.” Angel Oak, he added, wants to hold itself out to the marketplace as having a sustainable business model that is helping underserved borrowers and having a positive social impact in the process.  “But conveying that message is challenging [in the ESG space] because there are a lot of concerns about greenwashing in the capital market,” McDonough said. “So, we wanted to be able to align with some kind of standard that the marketplace has accepted in order for us to say we are issuing ESG bonds or issuing social bonds. “Starting in early 2021, we developed our social-bond framework, and we calibrated that against the ICMA[International Capital Market Association] social bond principles and engaged ISS ESG [the International Shareholder Services group] to provide a second-party opinion against those principles. They validated our framework against those principles without exception.” Angel Oak, through its affiliates, both originates and securitizes non-QM loans. Last year, the company brought eight non-QM private-label deals to market valued at nearly $3 billion, according to bond-rating reports.  Two of those private-label deals — the second and third securitizations valued in total at $534 million — were issued as social

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[ad_1] U.N. chief condemns deadly Saudi-led coalition strike in Yemen [ad_2] Source link

[ad_1] Inflows by Foreign Portfolio Investors (FPIs) in India are expected to be higher amid higher visibility of economic and earnings growth that India provides, compared to other emerging markets (EMs), says A Balasubramanian, managing director and chief executive officer, Aditya Birla Sun Life AMC, in an interview with Manish M Suvarna and Ruchit Purohit. Edited excerpts: Do you see RBI increasing repo rate or reverse repo rate, or a change in stance in this calendar year after normalisation of liquidity in last two policies? What is bond market’s view on RBI’s stance? RBI has been at the forefront in policy response to pandemic and they have done a remarkable job in supporting economy through the pandemic. We are witnessing that the worst impact of pandemic on economy is behind, and steady improvement in growth. Hence RBI has started the normalisation process and is absorbing excess liquidity via Variable Reverse Repo Rate auctions. Going ahead, we expect the process of monetary policy normalisation to continue in a calibrated manner without impacting the market sentiment. In our assessment, one could witness two repo rate hikes of 25bp each in this calendar year and normalisation of LAF corridor back to 25bps. Your take on the overall earnings growth and also on valuations of the markets — compared to the other markets? We believe the uptick in GDP growth around 6.50% to 7% to come back this year. This, in fact, will be driven by certain segments in the economy viz. consumption, investment and exports growing better than normal. As a result of this, we see significant turnaround in corporate profitability and, therefore, keeping the overall momentum in the market alive. Having said that, overall valuation is in fact at a premium of 15% to its long-term average. India is also trading at a premium to rest of the global market, however, China factor on one side and continuous reforms in India are driving the premium valuation. What is the strategy of mutual funds for IPOs given that some have tanked badly, will Aditya Birla MF look at launching an IPO Fund? The year 2021 was the best year for the Indian IPO market as it enabled many companies to raise capital. Many IPOs generated significant gains for investors, including mutual funds, in the form of listing gains. Most of the new-age businesses such as e-commerce oriented start-up companies, that have got long-term potential, managed to raise funds in a big way that India and the regulator can take pride in for enabling. The growing risk appetite from domestic investors is a good sign for building healthy long-term capital market. Listing gain or loss can be a function of various factors, hence, one must look at an overall basis on how companies are doing from the point of view of business objective and action. We, as a fund house, do not have any plans for launching an IPO fund at this stage. Considering the expected three rate hikes by the Fed in CY22, inflation on cards, and the third wave across the globe — how do you see the inflows of FPIs in debt and equity market in India in the near term? US policy tightening can lead to a reversal in flows to EM in 2022. And with the dollar expected to strengthen till mid-2022, FPI flows to EMs may remain under pressure. In contrast to most EMs, India has got strong FPI flows in equity over the past three years. Given the higher visibility to economic and earnings growth that India provides, FPIs are likely to find India to be relatively more attractive versus other EMs. Hence, while FPI flows in equity to EMs are expected to be muted in 2022, India is likely to do relatively better in the EM pack. Inflation is no longer being called transitory by other central banks, what are your views on that? And how you see inflation and growth in near term given the third wave of pandemic? We need to differentiate between inflation in advanced economies, particularly the US and to some extent Europe, from India. Inflation in advanced economies was a result of a very large stimulus creating excess demand, which was not satisfied by pandemic constrained global supply chains. The result has been multi-decade high inflation. While there are linkages via import channel and especially due to high commodity prices, but inflation in India, has largely stayed within the RBI’s inflation target zone. Omicron wave will likely affect both inflation and growth to some degree, but the impact is expected to be for a couple of months and much milder than what we saw in earlier waves given that restrictions have been far less, and economy is adapting to living with the virus. In January, crude oil prices have risen sharply, which could put pressure on inflation. Considering this, how you see movement of yield on government securities in near term or before monetary policy and budget? Yes, rising crude price can put pressure on inflation but the actual impact will depend on the final pass through of prices and the sustainability of the increase. Government had recently cut taxes on fuel prices, which had provided some cushion to the recent rise in prices. Yields on benchmark 10-year government securities have already increased by about 15bps since the beginning of the year in response to higher crude prices and US yields and also because of lower RBI support to government borrowing. While there are some upside risks to government bond yields, particularly from the upcoming FOMC meeting, we draw comfort from RBI’s commitment to see that bond yields do not go far away from the macro-fundamentals and, hence, we do not expect a sharp rise from current levels in the near term. [ad_2] Source link

[ad_1] The United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit ruled on Wednesday that borrowers can pursue a class action lawsuit against Carrington Mortgage Services regarding the fees it applied when collecting payments online or by phone. The plaintiffs – Ashly Alexander and Cedric Bishop – brought the case in September 2020, alleging that the mortgage servicer violated Maryland’s debt collection and consumer protection statutes by illegally charging $5 for monthly payments online or by phone. In an unanimous decision, the Fourth Circuit stated that Carrington’s fees qualified as an amount that could only be charged if it was expressly “authorized by the agreement creating the debt or permitted by law.” According to Hassan Zavareei, a partner at Tycko & Zavareei LLP who represents the plaintiffs, this is the first appellate court decision to address that mortgage servicers may not charge fees for payments made online or by phone. “If we prevail in this case, Carrington will no longer be able to turn payment processing into an illegal profit center,” Zavareei said to HousingWire. The attorney will return the case to the district court to begin the litigation. HousingWire sent a message seeking comment to Carrington, but it was not returned. Plaintiff Alexander took out a mortgage to purchase a property in Baltimore, Maryland, in 2005. It required all payments in “cash, check or money order” at a PO Box in Dallas, Texas, or a different place if required by the note holder. Carrington became the servicer in 2017. The other plaintiff, Bishop, refinanced his property in Gaithersburg, Maryland, in 2010, with the contract saying payments should be made at an address in Irvine, California, or other places as the lender designated in writing. Carrington started to retain Bishop’s loan payments in 2018. According to the lawsuit, the servicer gave borrowers the option to make payments free via mail – or online or by phone with a $5 convenience fee. Both borrowers opted to pay their bills online by pressing an “I Agree” button after reviewing terms and conditions on the company’s website. They each paid the fee at least nine times in 2018 and 2019. In December 2020, the United States District Court of Maryland dismissed borrowers’ claims because plaintiffs have failed to allege that Carrington is a debt collector. Instead, the company is a creditor who “step into the shoes of the original mortgagee,” according to the decision. The lower court said the borrowers’ argument that their deeds of trust did not expressly grant the servicer the right to collect such a fee does not mean such a fee is prohibited. Also, they mentioned the fact that borrowers agreed with the fee online. However, the Fourth Circuit rejected the company’s argument that fees were permitted by law when borrowers agreed with terms and conditions on their website. In their decision, the judges wrote debt collectors should not be able to modify the terms of a contract because “consumers have no say in choosing their debt collectors, and they may well be over a barrel at that later point in time.” The court mentioned an industry publication that found that the cost to debt collectors of accepting checks by mail was between $1 to $4, whereas online and phone transactions often cost just $0.50. Kristen Simplicio, another partner from Tycko & Zavareei LLP representing the plaintiffs, said the case involves only Maryland borrowers. Still, others are pending nationwide against Carrington (one in federal court in California, currently on appeal before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals) and other mortgage servicers. “We believe there are hundreds of thousands of borrowers trapped in arrangements with different loan servicers across the country, and who are forced to pay unlawful fees when they pay their mortgages over the internet or by phone.” The post Court authorizes class action against Carrington over servicing fees appeared first on HousingWire. [ad_2] Source link