India prepared to withstand taper effect: Finance Ministry

31 Jan 2014 Evaluate

In an attempt to soothe frayed nerves after US central bank decided on another $10-billion cut in bond purchases, finance ministry underscored that the economy was well prepared to withstand fallout from the decision. Finance Minister P Chidambaram averred that Fed’s decision was a widely anticipated one and should not surprise the markets and further highlighted that the amount of $65 billion for buyback of bonds was not a smaller one.

The ministry declared that the government and RBI were both vigilant and would take all the required steps to ensure financial stability. Further, it also noted that the country added to its foreign exchange reserves, which now stand at $295 billion.

After a two-day meeting, the last to be headed by outgoing chairman Ben Bernanke, the Fed announced a $10 billion cut to its $75 billion-a-month bond-buying programme, known as quantitative easing (QE). The federal open market committee highlighted the cut in bond purchases were because labour indicators showed "further improvement" and US economic growth had picked up in recent quarters. Reacting to this, Indian Rupee depreciated past ‘62.50/$’ level, while local equities shed over 3/4th of a percent.

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