Covid-19 impact: HDFC, ICICI urge customers to use digital banking services

HDFC Bank has urged people to use cheque drop boxes to help reduce crowding in branches.

Private sector banks HDFC and ICICI have asked customers to use digital means for transactions and said they have reduced their staff in office as a precautionary measure against the spread of coronavirus. HDFC Bank has changed its working hours and will function from 10 am to 2 pm till March 31, except on Saturday.
The private sector lender has also temporarily suspended passbook update and foreign currency purchase services.

"In the interest of public health and safety, we will be withdrawing the following services temporarily of passbook updates and foreign currency purchase," it said in a communication sent to its customers on Sunday.

ALSO READ: Coronavirus: Banks to ensure cash withdrawals, remittances at branches

ICICI Bank informed its customers through SMS that "our branches shall remain open with required hygiene steps and reduced staff".

"For the same reason, our contact centre will also function with reduced staff. We urge you to stay safe and bank from home using iMobile/Internet Banking for all essential banking services," it said in the communication.

HDFC Bank has urged people to use cheque drop boxes to help reduce crowding in branches.

However, customers can go digital to avail passbook updation and forex card reload, it said. NEFT, RTGS, IMPS and UPI services are among the digital transactional modes. It said customers can pay for their utility bills through UPI and PayZapp platforms.

According to Indian Banks Association (IBA) Chief Executive Sunil Mehta, during the lockdown in several states to contain the spread of Covid-19, banks will ensure at least four essential services — cash deposits and withdrawals, cheque deposition, remittances, and government transactions — at their branches from Monday.

For the rest, depending on the situation in each branch, the banks may suspend other services.

Coronavirus impact: Fitch cuts India growth forecast to 5.1% for FY21

The difficulties facing the Indian economy have been exacerbated by Yes Bank failure, it said.

Fitch Ratings on Friday cut India's growth forecast to 5.1 per cent for FY 2020-21, saying the coronavirus outbreak is likely to hit business investment and exports.

Fitch had in December 2019 projected India's growth at 5.6 per cent for 2020-21 and 6.5 per cent in the following year.

In its Global Economic Outlook 2020, Fitch said the number of people affected by coronavirus will keep rising in the coming weeks but that the outbreak will remain contained. However, there are downside risks to this scenario.

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"Supply-chain disruptions are expected to hit business investment and exports. We see GDP growth to remain broadly steady at 5.1 per cent in the fiscal year 2020-2021 following growth of 5.0 per cent in 2019-2020," Fitch said.

For 2021-22, Fitch projected India's growth to be 6.4 per cent.

"The outbreak of the virus is hitting sentiment, while local governments have rolled out measures to contain the spread of the virus, such as closing schools, cinemas and theatres. While India's linkages with China (e.g. trade and tourism) are modest, manufacturers in India are heavily reliant on key Chinese intermediate inputs especially of electronics and machinery and equipment," Fitch said.

The WHO has declared coronavirus pandemic. Over 2 lakh people have been infected globally and the disease caused by it COVID-19 has claimed over 9,000 lives. In India, there are about 195 positive cases and 4 deaths so far from the deadly virus.

Covid-19: Centre asks banks to delay declaring companies' accounts as NPAs

FIEO President Sharad Kumar Saraf said that the spread of Covid-19 to over 144 countries points to the most challenging times for the exports sector.

Centre should ask banks to delay declaring companies' accounts as NPAs for one year due to the economic fallout of COVID-19, the Federation of Indian Export Organisations (FIEO) said.

FIEO President Sharad Kumar Saraf said that the spread of Covid-19 to over 144 countries points to the most challenging times for the exports sector.

"Banks may be asked to delay the declaring companies' accounts as NPA for 1 year as the lack of business coupled with fixed cost will make many accounts NPAs," he said in a statement.

"The existing working credit limits of exporters with the banks may be automatically enhanced by 25 per cent, if so desired... All existing Export Promotion Schemes must continue till March 31, 2021 at least."

He said that as per current trend, MSMEs particularly in employment intensive sectors like carpets, handicrafts, apparels, footwear, gems and jewellery, marine and perishable, with their major market in Europe and the US are likely to be worst affected particularly in first quarter of FY 2020-2021.

Now, pvt labs to also test for coronavirus infections as Centre gives nod

Around 50-60 accredited private labs to test for coronavirus infection.

When the coronavirus (Covid-19) episode is giving no indications of easing back down, the Center has chosen to permit the utilization of certify private labs for testing the infection. 

Indian Council of Medical Research executive general Balram Bhargava affirmed to The Times of India, on Monday, that around 50-60 private labs, certify by the National Accreditation Board for Laboratories, can continue with testing for Covid-19.

The coronavirus pandemic has internationally hit 182,547, with 7,164 announced passings across 157 nations.

The episode in India has now arrived at the eastern province of Odisha also with first instance of Covid-19 contamination revealed yesterday, taking the all out national tally to 124.

Follow full inclusion of Coronavirus here

At present, just government-claimed labs are allowed to test the coronavirus.

Here's how a lot of testing for coronavirus will cost you:

Individuals testing positive for coronavirus contamination can be tried for nothing in government research facilities. The administration bears this cost which extents to around Rs 6,000 - Rs 1,500 for screening and Rs 4,500 for re-affirmation.

Notwithstanding, patients testing in a private lab should shell more cash. As indicated by Times of India, testing at private labs may cost between Rs 9,000 and Rs 12,000. The administration may need to choose whether private players will charge according to their costing model or at financed rates.

As Bengaluru battles COVID-19, tech platforms come handy for IT workforce

The city has so far reported four positive coronavirus cases.

With the coronavirus reaching tech parks, campuses of multinational companies and even schools and colleges in Bengaluru, the IT city is gearing up to shoot the trouble with the help of technology. The city has so far reported four positive coronavirus cases.

As more employees opt for work from home in this time of crisis, start-ups are launching a suite of products to support collaboration and communication among workers. Ozonetel, a city-based start-up, for example, has rolled out a cloud-based solution for call centre companies to switch to work-from-home, in order to contain the spread of the virus. Using the solution, a company can route calls to mobile phones or even landlines, instead of them taking calls via desktop.

Human resource management software start-up Kredily has started providing its attendance management app for free to companies. Unlike a contact-based biometric system, the web-based authentication system rules out the possibility of spreading the virus through human contact, said the company.

“This restricts attendance to a specific location and comes in handy for companies where work-from-home is not being practised,” said Devendra Khandegar, founder & CEO of the start-up.

Chennai-based company Zoho which has clients such as Ola, MedLife and OnePlus in Bengaluru, has decided to offer its newly-launched remote work toolkit ‘Remotely’ for free to everyone. Remotely includes 10 applications that create a comprehensive communication system including virtual meetings, showtime for conferences, and online file management. “Our CEO (Sridhar Vembu) has been working from a remote farm in Tenkasi, a village in Tamil Nadu, and encouraging employees to go back to their home towns if they have internet connectivity,” said the company.

IndiGo gives profit warning following dip in bookings over Coronavirus

Flight occupancy dropped on domestic routes as individuals and companies canceled events and postponed travel.

IndiGo expects the coronavirus (COVID-19) crisis and depreciation of the rupee to hit profit in the fourth quarter. IndiGo, the largest domestic airline by market share, has issued the profit warning following a dip in bookings because of the spread of COVID-19 in the country.

“We cancelled our flights to China and Hong Kong and reduced frequency to certain other Southeast Asian markets. This capacity was redeployed in other markets without having a material impact on our revenues. Over the past few days, however, week-on-week, we have seen a 15-20 per cent decline in our daily bookings. We expect our quarterly earnings to be materially impacted because of these factors,” the airline said in a stock exchange notification on Wednesday.

It added that sharp depreciation in rupee, too, would have an adverse impact on its dollar-denominated liabilities, primarily on account of capitalised operating leases.

ALSO READ: Coronavirus outbreak: It's safe to travel, SpiceJet, GoAir tell customers

Flight occupancy dropped on domestic routes as individuals and companies canceled events and postponed travel. Last-minute fares, too, have declined 20-25 per cent on key metro routes over a dip in demand. While the plunge in crude oil price benefits the airline, the relief could be limited thanks to sluggish demand.

InterGlobe Aviation, which runs IndiGo, had reported a threefold increase in its pre-tax profit to Rs 556 crore in the third quarter of financial year 2019-20 (FY20) on strong revenue growth. In an investor conference call after the results, it had said modification of its Airbus A320neo engines would be completed by May, but indicated a challenging fourth quarter because of lean season and COVID-19 threat.

How badly may Covid-19 hurt India's trade? Could wipe out $348 mn, says UN

The most affected sectors include precision instruments, machinery, automotive and communication equipment.

The trade impact of the coronavirus epidemic for India is estimated to be about $348 million and the country figures among the top 15 economies most affected as slowdown of manufacturing in China disrupts world trade, according to a UN report.

Estimates published by United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) Wednesday said that the slowdown of manufacturing in China due to the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak is disrupting world trade and could result in a 50 billion dollar decrease in exports across global value chains.

The most affected sectors include precision instruments, machinery, automotive and communication equipment.

Among the most affected economies are the European Union ($15.6 billion), the United States ($5.8 billion), Japan ($5.2 billion), South Korea ($3.8 billion), Taiwan Province of China ($2.6 billion) and Vietnam ($2.3 billion).

India is among the 15 most affected economies due to the coronavirus epidemic and slow down in production in China, with a trade impact of 348 million dollars.

The trade impact for India is less as compared to other economies such as EU, the US, Japan and South Korea. Trade impact for Indonesia is 312 million dollars.

For India, the trade impact is estimated to be the most for the chemicals sector at 129 million dollars, textiles and apparel at 64 million dollars, automotive sector at 34 million dollars, electrical machinery at 12 million dollars, leather products at 13 million dollars, metals and metal products at 27 million dollars and wood products and furniture at 15 million dollars.

“Besides its worrying effects on human life, the novel strain of coronavirus (COVID-19) has the potential to significantly slowdown not only the Chinese economy but also the global economy. China has become the central manufacturing hub of many global business operations. Any disruption of China's output is expected to have repercussions elsewhere through regional and global value chains,” UNCTAD said.

There are reasons to be a buyer in current market scenario amid virus scare

Our experience with earlier epidemics such as SARS, EBOLA and ZICA does suggest that medical science will find out a solution sooner than later.

Coronavirus scare has acted as a catalyst for global equity meltdown and India is not an exception to this. It is difficult to call when the coronavirus scare will come under control. Our experience with earlier epidemics such as SARS, EBOLA and ZICA does suggest that medical science will find out a solution sooner than later.

India obviously has short-term pain to endure from global growth slowdown and equity meltdown.

However, there are few benefits from Coronavirus scare.

- Oil prices have crashed from $68 a barrel to $50 a barrel and are likely to remain subdued for some time.

- India runs official trade deficit of $58 billion with China. Due to coronavirus-led supply chain disruption, this deficit can come down significantly. This, in turn, will encourage local manufacturing.

- Many global companies would like to diversify their supply chain from China due to increasing cost and heavy concentration. If India can invite all those companies and become part of global supply chain management, then growth will get a big boost.

Foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) have been heavy sellers in last week as they scaled back risk. This might continue until there is a solution for coronavirus. However, this volatility will provide an opportunity for long-term investors to buy, if our experience of SARS, EBOLA is an indicator.

There was a lot of panic during SARS and EBOLA outbreak. However, medical science found a cure and the world continued moving forward. From the lows of SARS, the Nifty50 index has gained 10-fold by now. That said, it is difficult to predict how much the market will go down from current levels, as it will be dependent upon how soon and effectively coronavirus gets controlled.

Coronavirus: Facebook cancels conference, Microsoft withdraws from another

Microsoft now has plans to hold a digital-only event from March 16-18. Facebook has earlier pulled out of the Game Developers Conference set to be held in San Francisco.

(Reuters) - Facebook Inc said on Thursday it would cancel its annual developer conference due to fears over the coronavirus outbreak and Microsoft Corp followed suit by withdrawing from a gaming conference scheduled for next month.

"In place of the in-person F8 event, we're planning other ways for our community to get together through a combo of locally hosted events, videos and live streamed content," said Konstantinos Papamiltiadis, Facebook's director of platform partnership.

The conference, which attracted 5,000 people from around the world last year, was scheduled to be held on May 5 and 6 in San Jose, California.

Microsoft now has plans to hold a digital-only event from March 16-18. Facebook has earlier pulled out of the Game Developers Conference set to be held in San Francisco.

In California, a person was detected with coronavirus infection on Wednesday, bringing the total number of cases in the United States to 15, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The agency has warned of the possibility of a community spread of the coronavirus in the country.

Earlier this month, The Mobile World Congress (MWC), the annual telecoms industry gathering, was called off after a mass exodus by exhibitors due to fears over the coronavirus outbreak.

AT&T Inc , Verizon Communications Inc and International Business Machines Corp had earlier withdrawn from the RSA cyber security conference, set for Feb. 24 to 28 in San Francisco, due to coronavirus-related concerns.

Alphabet Inc's Google said its developer conference is still planned for May 12 to 14 as it monitors coronavirus developments.

Coronavirus scare looms over US mega toy show; China pavilion cancelled

The Chinese industry itself is normally a major presence at the show, with dozens of booths that are typically cloistered together.

There is no China Pavilion at this year's Toy Fair owing to the new coronavirus outbreak, and the travails of the world's second-biggest economy hang over the giant trade show.

Output in China -- by far the world's biggest maker of toys -- has slowed to a trickle as the country reels from a public health crisis that has already claimed nearly 2,600 lives and spread to dozens of countries, raising fears of a global pandemic.

As some 25,000 toy industry officials gather this week in New York for the largest toy show in the Americas held amongst a sea of stuffed animals, electronics and action figures, attendees are grappling with a considerably less cheerful topic: a deadly health crisis and its effect on the world's leading maker of consumer goods.

The hit has been mitigated somewhat for toys because it is taking place during a seasonal lull and not closer to the holiday shopping period, toy executives say.

Still, there is widespread worry and talk of item shortages as soon as this summer.

China manufactures about 85 percent of US toys, according to industry officials.

The virus "is going to have a major, major effect worldwide," said Isaac Larian, chief executive of MGA Entertainment, adding that he is currently drawing from about two months of inventory for his company's best-selling "LOL Surprise" dolls.

MGA depends on China for more than 85 percent of its production. The company's factories in the country are operating at only about 20 percent capacity, with many workers still away and other activity stymied by shortages of raw materials or transportation bottlenecks, Larian said.

Coronavirus pain for Chinese mobile handset makers may be Samsung's gain

With manufacturing suspended in China and supply of key components and handset models in jeopardy, Chinese firms are feeling the heat.

As China reels from the coronavirus epidemic, Korean mobile phone maker Samsung seems to be recovering some of the lost ground.

While the outbreak has forced most leading brands like Apple, Xiaomi, Oppo, Vivo, and Realme to rework their launch dates and pricing strategies, Samsung, which struggled to maintain its hold over the market last year, has taken the lead.

The data from the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) shows that the local unit of the Korean major has lined up nine new handset models for launch in early 2020. Among major brands, only Redmi (from Xiaomi) and LG have registered two models each since January 1 with the national standards body, followed by Motorola and Coolpad (one each).

Delhi-based local brand Cellecor, which has a presence in the entry-level segment, tops the chart with 15 models registered since January 1. Hitech, another Indian brand, holds the third spot with eight models registered over this period.

According to Faisal Kawoosa, lead analyst at TechArc, the trend clearly indicates that “major OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) are delaying their launches. Typically, after the BIS registration, models are launched in 4-6 weeks”.

ALSO READ: Are Indian imports worth $70.4 bn from China at risk due to coronavirus?

He said, “As of now it gives advantage to Samsung among major OEMs as it can procure from Korea and other countries, resulting in low impact on its supply chain.”

With manufacturing suspended in China and supply of key components and handset models in jeopardy, Chinese firms are feeling the heat. Though many of them have set up facilities in India, they continue to depend heavily on supplies from China.

Coronavirus outbreak delays job offers in Asia's biggest financial hubs

Recruiting has become less of a priority as firms including DBS Group Holdings Ltd. have highlighted the revenue impact of worsening business conditions.

Financial firms operating in Singapore and Hong Kong are delaying hiring as the coronavirus outbreak disrupts their businesses.

Both domestic and foreign institutions have slowed recruitment, according to headhunters in the financial hubs. They’ve been impacted by quarantines, restrictions on travel to and from China, remote working arrangements and decisions not to conduct face-to-face interviews.

It’s another aspect of the fallout from the virus, which has also caused factory closures, disrupted supply chains and initiated the world’s largest work-from-home experiment. Recruiting has become less of a priority as firms including DBS Group Holdings Ltd. have highlighted the revenue impact of worsening business conditions.

“Everybody is distracted,” said Gurj Sandhu, a managing director at Morgan McKinley Group Ltd. in Singapore. Hiring is falling down the “pecking order,” he said, while adding that nobody is canceling roles yet.

Bloomberg spoke with six recruitment firms, all of which confirmed the slowdown. Hiring processes and relocation plans are taking longer at most companies because of logistical difficulties. While some financial firms are conducting interviews by video conference or phone, closing the deal is more problematic, especially at investment banks and wealth-management units.

Bankers are “big-ticket items,” said Hubert Tam, a managing partner at Sirius Partners Ltd. in Hong Kong. Private banks and investment banks are holding off on hiring until they can meet candidates in person, “even if they performed well last year,” he said.

What’s more, many private bankers covering China would have to travel to the country to meet clients and “get their blessings” before they move banks, according to Amod Jain, a Morgan McKinley consultant in Singapore. “Not everything can be done by phone.”