ICICI cuts interest rates on loans, bonds
Mumbai: ICICI has cut interest rates on its loans as well as its latest Safety Bond offering. The prime lending rate has been cut by half a percentage point to 12.5 per cent and the yield on five-year Safety Bonds has been cut by one whole percentage point to 10 per cent.

The decision follows the government’s move to cut the benchmark interest rate on small saving schemes and public provident fund scheme by 1.00-1.5-percentage points and the RBI decision to cut the Bank Rate in two stages.

ICICI’s short-term prime rate now stands at 12.5 per cent. The STPLR is applicable for loans of a variable maturity and is re-set annually. The medium term PLR, applicable for loans up to three years and long-term prime lending rate also stand at 12.5 per cent.
The ICICI’s decision to unify all three lending rates comes at a time when leading banks have introduced variable interest rates for short and long-term loans.
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Relief bonds rates down to 8.5 per cent
New Delhi: The ministry of finance (MoF) has announced reduction of interest rates on relief bonds by 0.5 per cent to 8.5 per cent. Besides, rates on loans to government employees for purchase of houses, vehicles and computers have come down by 1 per cent. The rates on relief bonds have been reduced from 9 to 8.5 per cent from March 15. The 1 per cent reduction on the loans to government employees will be effective from April 1.

The rates have been slashed in the face of reduction in interest rates on general provident funds, special deposit schemes and other small savings scheme.
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RBI opts for fresh valuation on UTI Bank-GTB merger
Mumbai: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has sought a second valuation exercise for the UTI Bank-Global Trust Bank (GTB) merger, following the controversy over alleged price manipulation in the GTB stock. The new valuation will now factor in the alleged price manipulation. UTI Bank too is reportedly in favour of a second opinion on valuation, which is now expected in about a week's time from Deloitte, Haskins & Sells.

The initial valuation had taken into account four factors - market value, book value, earnings per share and maintainable profits. The earlier swap ratio was four shares of GTB for every nine UTI Bank shares held, and some circles found it to be loaded in GTB's favour. Now Deloitte has been given complete freedom by the two banks to decide on the ratio based on whatever parameters it deems fit.
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Government relaxes crude import norms
New Delhi: The government has decided to liberalise crude import norms, thereby enabling Indian PSUs to buy crude from MNCs like Shell, BP-Amoco and Exxon-Mobil, on term contracts. The decision, aimed at taking advantage of competitive prices worldwide, also ends the monopoly of Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), which till now had the manadate for worldwide crude shopping on behalf of other PSUs.

The government move comes in the wake of scheduled dismantling of all controls on the oil sector by April 2002. India was expected to import up to 90 million tonnes of crude during 2001-02. The government has also enlarged the scope of imports by permitting term contracts, even with those national oil companies of producing nations that were not offering crude on official selling prices.
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