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The Reserve Bank of India took further steps yesterday to tighten banking system liquidity and support the falling rupee, aggressively shrinking its daily borrowing window and ordering banks to set aside high cash reserves on a daily basis.
Just after a week of taking exceptional measures to stem the currency’s decline, the RBI made liquidity tighter and costlier for banks, which in turn is expected to increase demand for rupees and reduce volatility.
The RBI lowered the overall limit for borrowing under the daily liquidity adjustment facility (LAF) — which offers funds in exchange for collateral — for each bank to 0.5% of deposits from 1%.
The central bank also said banks needed to maintain 99% of their daily cash reserve ratio requirements — the deposits they must set aside — with the RBI, as against 70% now.
“These measures of trying to reduce domestic liquidity and making funding costs higher, may not be very effective to support the rupee,” said Siddhartha Sanyal, chief India economist at Barclays.
“There is a risk that capital inflows in the equity market can get dented as these steps put more pressure on growth in the medium term,” Sanyal said.
The rupee declined 0.1% in the spot market to 59.7650 per dollar in Mumbai yesterday, according to prices from local banks compiled by Bloomberg.
One-month implied volatility, a measure of expected moves in the exchange rate used to price options, fell 50 basis points, or 0.50 percentage point, to 10.91%, the lowest closing level since June 17.
Three-month onshore rupee forwards weakened 0.4% to 61.04 per dollar, data compiled by Bloomberg show. Offshore non-deliverable contracts fell 0.4% to 60.97.
The LAF adjustment is based on deposits outstanding as of the last Friday of the reporting cycle two weeks prior to the current one. The reserve requirement change takes effect from the two-weekly period starting July 27.
The rupee had steadied somewhat since the RBI took unprecedented steps last week to try to create demand for the currency by aggressively draining cash from money markets and sharply raising short-term interest rates. Some of the rupee’s fall — 12% since May and including a record low of 61.21 to the dollar on July 8 — reflects a broader selloff in emerging markets on signs the US is preparing to wind down its economic stimulus.
However, a record high current account deficit, concerns over a decade-low growth and now uncertainty over the central bank’s monetary policy stance, which had been on a easing path until May, have prompted foreign investors to remain persistent sellers of Indian debt since late May of $11.5bn.
The RBI also announced sale of Rs60bn of short end cash management bills to drain out more cash from the banking system.
“The redesign and tweaking of measures in quick succession shows the RBI’s serious resolve to check rupee weakness,” said Shubhada Rao, chief economist at Yes Bank in Mumbai. “It does not want any entrenchment of the view that rupee weakness will persist.”
The rupee has slumped 9% in the past three months versus the dollar, hurt by a record current-account deficit and reduced demand for emerging-market assets. The currency, which touched an all-time low of 61.2125 on July 8, declined 0.1% yesterday to 59.765 per dollar.
The recent moves by Reserve Bank Governor Duvvuri Subbarao contrast with his decisions to lower the benchmark repurchase rate by 25 basis points each in January, March and May to 7.25%, in a bid to fight the weakest economic growth in a decade. Subbarao left the repurchase rate unchanged in June and the central bank is next set to announce policy rates July 30.