Indian rupee to end year as Asia’s worst performing currency 

Islamabad, December 27, 2021 (PPI-OT):The Indian rupee has been described as Asia’s worst-performing emerging market currency by the New York-based financial and media company, Bloomberg, with its recent report also suggesting that foreign funds are fleeing the country’s stocks.

Analysts and experts said in a fourth consecutive year of losses, Indian rupee is likely to fall about 4 percent this year. They said, the recent damning report, that spurted social media trolling of Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi across India, says currency declined 1.9 per cent this quarter as global funds pulled $4.2 billion of capital out of the country’s stock market, the most among regional markets where data is available.

Foreigners sold Indian stocks as Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Nomura Holdings Inc. recently lowered their outlook for equities, citing lofty valuations, at a time when concerns about the omicron virus variant are roiling the global markets, they added.

They said bearish rupee calls are rising as India’s trade deficit widened to an all-time high of about $23 billion in November amid higher imports. The ample liquidity in the banking system, partly created by the RBI’s dollar purchases, may make it difficult for the central bank to intervene to the same extent in 2022 to curb rupee’s losses, they said.

B. Prasanna, head of global market in ICIC Bank in Mumbai said, the monetary policy divergence and widening current account gap have set depreciation in the rupee in the near term, they said. The analysts and experts said, the mayhems of first ill planned and sudden total lockdown by Modi still haunts Indian and multinational business giants, adding thousands of Indian migrant workers became jobless, shelter less and homeless due to the brutal lockdown.

They were of the opinion that the latest surge in Covid-19 and rising number of Omicron cases in India were being termed as the major reason for the sharp decline in FDI in India. India was in a state of paralysis as government miserably failed to handle the disaster and BJP was blaming Muslims and Sikhs as the cause of disease transmission, they maintained.

The analysts and experts said India unveiled itself to show its real face to the world, adding though Indian government is projecting a massive comeback in future to gain the confidence of world investors but the international economic experts are quite apprehensive because of Indian financial institution’s record of data manipulations and Indian worst track record of handling Covid-19 during first and second wave.

For more information, contact:
Kashmir Media Service
Phone: +92-51-4435548, +92-51-4435549
Fax: +92-51-4861736
Email: info@kmsnews.org
Website: www.kmsnews.org