DAILY CURRENT AFFAIRS: DECEMBER 31, 2018

Dear Aspirants,

Daily Current Affairs (December 31, 2018) like many other sections is inevitable and this also helps to score in the Banking awareness , Static GK and Financial Awareness sections. Remember, Banking Awareness and Static Awareness Questions are asked from the General Awareness section. This will also help you to ride your preparations for the forthcoming exams.

INTERNATIONAL

Pakistan set to issue ‘Panda bond’ in Chinese currency:

• Pakistan’s cabinet has approved the issuance of first-ever renminbi-denominated ‘Panda Bonds’ to raise loans from China’s capital markets, as the country moved a step forward to give the Chinese currency status at par with the US dollar.
• The Finance Ministry did not seek the Cabinet’s nod for the size of the bond, but it expects to raise $500 million to $1 billion in various tranches.
• The Philippines has also raised RMB1.46 billion through renminbi-denominated bonds.
• The ‘Panda Bonds’ was approved in a Cabinet meeting, led by Prime Minister Imran Khan.

BANKING & ECONOMY

Provision coverage ratio of PSU banks on the rise, crosses 66%

• The financial Services Secretary, Rajiv Kumar said that the Provision Coverage Ratio (PCR) of Public sector bank has gone up from 46.04 per cent as of March 2015 to 66.85 per cent as of September 2018, reflecting improvement in their financial health.
• The provision coverage ratio (PCR) gives an indication of the provision made against bad loans from the profit generated. Higher the PCR, lower is the unexposed part of the bad debts.

Government to infuse Rs 10,086 crore in Bank of India

• The government has decided to infuse Rs 10,086 crore in the bank as part of Rs 28,615 crore capital infusion to be done in about half a dozen public sector lenders.
• The capital infusion in the Bank of India’s equity will be done by way of preferential allotment of shares.
• The government has decided to pump Rs 28,615 crore into seven public sector banks (PSBs) through recapitalisation bonds in order to enhance the lending capacity of PSBs and help them come out of the Reserve Bank of India’s Prompt Corrective Action (PCA) framework.

STATIC:

Minister: Arun Jaitley

Minister of State: Shiv Pratap Shukla, Pon Radhakrishnan

Banks recovered Rs 40,400 crore from defaulters in 2017-18 : RBI report

• According to RBI report titled ‘Report on Trend and Progress of Banking in India 2017-18’, banks have recovered stressed assets helped by the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC) and amendments in the Securitisation and Reconstruction of Financial Assets and Enforcement of Security Interests (SARFAESI) Act.
• In the fiscal ended March 2018, banks recovered Rs 40,400 crore worth of bad loans as against Rs 38,500 crore recovered in FY17.
• The recovery was possible through various channels of:
• Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC), SARFAESI Act, debt recovery tribunals (DRTs) and Lok Adalats.

Arunachal touches record high revenue generation :

• The government has remarkably succeeded in increasing the state revenue generation in the past two years with the record revenue collection of Rs 1598.49 crore during the year 2017-18 which is a new high in the last 30 years.
• The revenue generation had crossed the Rs 1,000 cr mark for two consecutive years since Arunachal Pradesh attained statehood in 1987 as in 2016-17, the revenue generation was Rs 1,253.57 crore
• The improvement in result is believed to be achieved through the Team Arunachal mantra which has ignited minds of the employees to deliver goods to the people of the state.

STATIC :

Chief Minister: Pema Khandu

Governor: B. D. Mishra

Capital: Itanagar

AWARDS & HONOURS

Indian-American teenager Mahum Siddiqi wins Cornell University hackathon:

• A 17-year old Indian-American teenager, Mahum Siddiqi has won the inaugural “Digital Transformation Hackathon” at Cornell University, New York (USA) for designing a device which can detect the actual level of pain of a patient during a diagnosis.
• Mahum Siddiqi, a class 12 student at Vestal High School is the only non-graduate student competing at the hackathon.

APPOINTMENTS

Sheikh Hasina: Bangladesh PM Hasina wins third straight term :

• Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s alliance won Bangladesh’s election with a thumping majority, the country’s Election Commission announced. It gave her a third straight term following a vote that the opposition rejected as rigged.
• The win consolidated Hasina’s decade-long rule over Bangladesh. The alliance dominated by her Awami League, seen as close to regional power India, won 287 of the 298 seats for which results have been declared.

Y.K. Sailas Thangal concurrently accredited as the next Ambassador of India to the Republic of Liberia

• Mr. Y.K. Sailas Thangal who is the ambassador of the India to the Republic of Cote d’ Ivoire has been concurrently accredited as the next Ambassador of India to the Republic of Liberia with residence in Abidjan.

STATIC:

Currency: United States Dollar, Somali Shilling

Capital: Mogadishu

Sudhir Bhargava appointed new chief information commissioner: PTI

• The government has appointed Sudhir Bhargava as Chief Information Commissioner (CIC), along with four information commissioners. Mr. Bhargava was Information Commissioner in the CIC.
• Mr. Sinha is a 1981-batch Indian Foreign Service officer who was the High Commissioner of India in the United Kingdom.

SPORTS

India’s Smriti Mandhana named ICC women’s cricketer of the year :

• Smriti Mandhana was named winner of the Rachael Heyhoe Flint Award for the International Cricket Council (ICC) Women’s Cricketer of the Year.
• Smriti Mandhana signed off 2018 on a high as she was also named the player of the year in women’s One-day Internationals.
• The 22-year-old Smriti Mandhana, who has also been named in the ICC women’s ODI and T20I teams for 2018, scored 669 runs at an average of 66.90 in 12 ODIs and 622 runs at a strike-rate of 130.67 in 25 T20Is.