-PTI “Repercussions from the currency exchange initiative will likely persist through the first quarter of 2017.” Washington: India’s demonetisation led to huge cash shortages that have “adversely affected” consumption and like a “vacuum cleaner” it sucked in cash and then was slowly replacing the currency, a senior IMF official has said. “You’ve heard about so-called ‘helicopter drops’ of money with unconventional monetary policies, so one way to characterise this demonetisation initiative is as...

-Livemint.com While there have been some positives, including the reforms on political funding, the real test of the budget was the ability to manage spending to revive the economy This was the fourth budget of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government. Coming at a time when the world around is full of uncertainties, more was expected from the budget than what has been delivered. The domestic uncertainty is certainly the outcome of demonetisation....

-The Hindu The primary aim of the demonetisation exercise was to tap black money. To mark the last day for depositing the demonetised notes, on December 31, 2016, the Prime Minister, in his address to the nation, fully acknowledged the great hardship suffered by common people due to the serious delay in making the new currency notes available in the banks, ATMs and rural areas, and thanked them for the faith...

-The Hindu The ongoing repercussions of the government’s decision to demonetise high-value currency notes are being felt in particular by cash-intensive sectors such as the microfinance industry, according to microfinance company Satin Creditcare. “It’s been a pretty tough time (post demonetisation),” H.P. Singh, chairman and managing director of Satin Creditcare, said in an interview. “The cash supply position has been very bad in the northern states of Uttar Pradesh, Punjab… in both...

-The Financial Express Thiruvananthapuram: Ration shops in Kerala are readying to go the ATM way soon. As many as 14,500 ration retail shops in Kerala will soon be equipped with electronic point of sale (ePoS) machines, which would work as micro-ATMs. The Kerala State IT Mission has been asked to hasten a connectivity survey in rural areas to ensure uninterrupted internet connection, before introducing micro-ATM facility at all fair-price shops. Although the...