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GST, bank balance sheet affected India’s growth: UN The goods and services tax as well as protracted issues of corporate and bank balance sheet problems pushed India’s economic growth downward in 2017, but a gradual recovery is expected and the economy is forecast to growth at 7.2% in 2018, according to a un report. According to estimates in the UN Economic and Social commission fo asia and the pacific's flagship publication Economic and Social survey of asia and pacific, india's GDP grew at 6.6% in 2017, down from 7.1%. The report said india's GDP is forecast to grow 7.2% in 2018   The Business Standard, New Delhi, 09th May 2018

Centre to release inflation index for 10 services as trial The Centre will come out with a Producers Price Index next month for 10 services, including telecom and railways on an experimental basis. The move will help track inflation in these services, which will also include ports, insurance banking and air travel The Business Standard, New Delhi, 09th May 2018

Now, ICAI members can have CA ANZ membership Chartered accountants’ apex body ICAI on Tuesday said it has entered into an arrangement with Chartered Accountants Australia & New Zealand whereby its members based in the two countries would be able to have membership of CA ANZ. The Business Standard, New Delhi, 09th May 2018

Govt to prepare sectoral action plan within next 2 days to boost exports Apart from the two departments making up the commerce and industry ministry, this will apply to Ministries of Electronics and IT, Agriculture, Textiles, Petroleum, among others Keen to take advantage of growing global demand and forecasts of faster rise in international trade in 2018-19, the government has decided to prepare sectoral action plan within the next two days to boost exports.On Tuesday, during the first inter-ministerial meeting on sectoral export promotion strategy, Commerce and Industry Minister Suresh Prabhu asked officials from across ministries to prepare separate action plan on boosting exports of products being handled by their respective ministries and send it to the Department of Commerce within the next fortnight. The action plan will focus on short-term targets to boost outbound shipment of products, which are achievable within the next two months.Apart from the two departments makin

GSTN to rope in private entities for tax payer profiling, fraud analytics GST Network has invited bids from private entities for "360-degree" profiling of taxpayers for early detection of fraud as it seeks to transform into an end-to-end platform for checking GST evasion, from being just a tax collection portal. The analytics company to be roped in will have the mandate for designing and developing a Fraud Analytics System. GST Network has however barred Infosys from bidding for the project to avoid conflict of interest. The system will take about an year to be operational and leverage existing data pertaining to GST registration, return filing and e-way bill, along with the information from other external sources such as Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU), Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT), banks and state tax departments. According to the eligibility criteria, the interested bidder will need to have a turnover of Rs 300 crore and should have posted profit in the p

SEBI writes to govt urging tax parity between cash and derivatives Differentiating tax structure incentivising participation in the derivatives segment, Sebi tells government The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) intends to have tax parity in the futures and options (F&O) segment. Sebi is of the view that the differentiating tax structure, particularly the securities transaction tax (STT), is incentivising participation in the derivatives segment.The market regulator has written to the government—which sets the tax rate for the capital market—on bringing tax parity between the cash and the derivatives segment. Currently, a STT between 0.1 per cent and 0.125 per cent is levied on F&O transactions. Within the derivatives segment, STT on sale of options—the most-popular segment—is just 0.05 per cent (if the contract is not exercised). On the other hand, STT is charged at a much higher rate of 0.1 per cent for delivery-based trades in the cash segment “Sebi ha

RBI rushes in to prop up falling rupee India’s central bank reportedly intervened in the currency markets on Monday to prevent a further slide in the local unit, which breached the 67 mark to a dollar for the first time in 15 months amid a widening trade gap and runaway import bills fuelled by high crude-oil prices. Some state-owned banks were seen selling dollars aggressively, interventions that market dealers attributed to the central bank’s strategy to stem the decline of the Indian rupee against the US currency. The rupee is the worst performing among a dozen Asian monetary units in the past three months. It lost 4.25 per cent to the dollar during the period, show data from Bloomberg. On Monday, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is said to have sold about Rs 800 million collectively on the spot and exchange traded futures markets, dealers said. An email sent to RBI remained unanswered until the publication of this report. The currency market has seen such a strong central ban