Mumbai: Reserve Bank Governor Raghuram Rajan on Tuesday left all key rates unchanged citing increased risks to inflation and difficult external situation especially on the geopolitical front.
This is the fourth consecutive time that the RBI has kept key interest rates unchanged despite clamours from the industry to cut rates to boost economy. The short-term lending rate (repo) rate now stands at 8 percent, and the cash reserve requirement of banks at 4 percent. The statutory liquidity ratio (SLR) has also been retained at 22 percent.
The future policy stance will be influenced by the RBI’s projections of inflation relative to the medium term objective of 6 percent by January 2016, while being contingent on incoming data,” Rajan said.
The RBI also retained the growth projection for the current fiscal at 5.5 percent. The apex bank sees FY16 growth at 6.3 percent. Stock markets remained flat with BSE Sensex at 26,626 points.
Bureau Report
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