Crisis-hit India’s Yes Bank

The government of India arrested chief of the private Yes Bank over allegations of money laundering. Rana Kapoor was arrested days after the country’s central bank seized control of the lender. Mr Kapoor was produced in a court in the western city of Mumbai and remanded to police custody until 11 March. The country’s federal financial agency has claimed that Mr Kapoor’s crime amounts to around $581million.Mr Kapoor has denied all charges against him. The Enforcement Directorate has complained that the founder had declined to cooperate with the investigation. The bank has been accused of bad loans and has unsuccessfully tried to raise capital to meet its regulatory requirements. The Reserve Bank of India stated that Yes Bank’s diminished its status was particularly due to inability of the bank to raise capital to address possible loan losses and aftermath downgrades. Concerned customers queued up outside Yes Bank branches to withdraw money after the RBI said it would take over the troubled lender. Depositors can at presently only withdraw about $630 during a one-month pause. The RBI stated that it wanted to speedily restore depositors trust in the bank. During this period the RBI will work on a save plan for India’s fifth biggest private bank. Yes Bank has a projected $28billion in deposits but had been finding new capital to boost its finances before it was captured by the central bank. Indian government passed in 2016 a law on recovering bad debts that placed more on all banks to more quickly to detect and report long-standing troubled loans and poor monitoring, which have acted as a significant movement on fresh lending. Private lenders for example Yes Bank were in the beginning welcomed as bringing new technologies and new approaching s to the state controlling banking sector. What was most threatening was that the digital platform’s just closedown. Neither the mobile nor internet banking was working. Yes Bank shares nosedived as much as 80 percent as the central bank stated it was trying to work out a rescue plan to prevent any orderly risk to the economy. The only alternative now is for another bank to engage it. The RBI has asked State Bank of India, the country’s largest state-owned bank, to assist with a revival plan for Yes Bank. The RBI has been not willing to meddle in private financial institutions but it had to in this case to prevent a run on the bank, as well as to control the possible broader consequence due to Yes Bank’s inter-relationship with other institutions.
Bad loans valued Rs 20,000 crores granted on Rana Kapoor’s direction. The ED suspects that loans worth Rs20, 000 crores were offered by Yes Bank to a few NBFCs and corporate companies after sidestepping the standard procedures and guidelines of the RBI. The total revelation of Yes Bank could be above 2.25 lakh crore but of that, the non-performing assets are around Rs 42,000 crore. In accordance with officials of the Enforcement Directorate questioning Yes Bank founder Rana Kapoor, of these Rs 42,000 crore loans that turned into NPAs, Rs 20,000 crore were presumably offered to some corporate companies and Non-Banking Financial Companies on Kapoor’s instructions. The details rose after the ED officials asked for files of the Cox and Kings Group, DHFL Group, Sahana Group, Radius Group among others. After studying the files, which were brought to the ED from the bank bureaucrats doubt that these loans were offered after adopting the standard procedures and guidelines of the RBI which finally resulted in monetary loss. Some shell companies which were supposedly established by Kapoor have also come under the scanner. As based on ED officials, the central agency is also inquiring the role of the Yes Bank founder in connection with the payment of loans to some corporate entities and consequently presumed kickbacks received in his wife’s accounts. The case with ED and CBI is linked with transactions of about 4,300 crore. As reported by ED officials, Yes Bank bought debentures from Diwan Housing Finance Ltd valued Rs 3,700 crores while DHFL gave loan to a company owned by Kapoor’s daughters valued Rs 600 crores .Both the business were doubtful as the company owned by Kapoor’s daughters did not have any substantial businesses or assets and also the mortgage shown for the loan was only a property worth about Rs 40 crore. The property mortgaged was an agricultural land depicted as residential land and with its worth enlarged.
The investigation against Kapoor was initiated as ED began its investigation into alleged irregularities in the alleged Employees’ Provident Fund fraud in Uttar Pradesh Power Corporation Limited. The CBI recently took over the investigation into the Rs 2,267-crore EPF fraud in Uttar Pradesh, where savings of power sector employees were invested in DHFL. While probing Kapil Wadhawan, an accused in the same case, ED officials discovered the two suspicious transactions. ED raided Kapoor’s residence, his offices, his daughters’ residences and other properties. Rana Kapoor was arrested after a second day of interrogation by the ED at the agency’s Ballard Estate office in Mumbai. Kapoor refused to sign the arrest memo and challenged it in the court. ED officials later placed Kapoor under arrest under the provision of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act. Rana was questioned by the ED sleuths for over 20 hours. The case against Kapoor is linked to the scam-hit DHFL as the loans given by the bank to the company allegedly turned non-performing assets NPAs.
The Reserve Bank of India has released a draft revival plan for the crisis-hit Yes Bank. RBI’s draft revival plan calls for the state-run State Bank of India to invest in Yes Bank. RBI’s draft plan restructures Yes Bank’s share capital. The Reserve Bank of India has released a draft revival plan for the crisis-hit Yes Bank, which was placed under moratorium. The RBI’s draft revival plan calls for the state-run State Bank of India to invest in Yes Bank and own 49 per cent of the cash-starved bank. SBI cannot reduce its ownership to less than 26 per cent for the next three years. The Reserve Bank of India’s plan to revive Yes Bank, it has been struggling to raise capital, is in a draft stage right now. The RBI has called for comments and suggestions on the draft plan from the public at large and, most important, the State Bank of India. Under the plan is supposed to make large cash infusion and own 49 per cent of the restructure bank. SBI might lead a consortium of banks with the state-run Life Insurance Corporation of India to invest in Yes Bank. Yes Bank customers will be protected.