Borrowings by Indian firms declined: RBI data
According to the Reserve Bank (RBI) data released on Tuesday, borrowings by Indian firms declined by over 3 % from a year ago to $ 1.89 billion in June 2014. During June 2013, India Inc. had raised $ 1.95 billion from overseas markets by way of external commercial borrowings (ECBs).
Of the total companies raising money abroad during June, 55 firms borrowed $ 1.30 billion through automatic route and 14 raised $ 583.7 million from approval route.
In approval route category, HPCL-Mittal Pipelines Limited raised $ 262.5 million in two separate tranches for refinancing of their earlier ECB.
State-owned carrier Air India raised $ 149.5 million in two tranches for the import of capital goods and SCI Forbes Limited raised $ 35.25 million to refinance their earlier ECB.
In the automatic route, India Oil Corporation Ltd raised $ 650 million to refinance earlier ECB, Reliance Industries borrowed $ 238.02 million for import of capital goods and construction major Larsen & Toubro Ltd raised $ 100 million for rupee expenditure.
However owing to the economic downturn, the companies had slowed down the pace of borrowing as they did not want to pay the interests during the times of liquidity crunch. Since the industrial growth had slowed down, the Indian firms decided to wait for the market revival before increasing their manufacturing as they did not want their products to bite dust sitting in the warehouses.
Source- The Hindu Business Line
Air India raised $ 149.5 million, External Commercial Borrowings, HPCL-Mittal Pipelines Limited, Larsen & Toubro Ltd, Reserve Bank of India
