Following a 3-day meeting, the Reserve Bank of India announced the monetary policy.The three-day policy review meeting of the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) headed by RBI Governor Urjit Patel began in Mumbai on Monday.
This is for the second time in a row that the interest rates have not been tinkered by RBI. For the layman, this means that home loan and car loan rates will remain the same.
The resolution by MPC stated,” The decision of the MPC is consistent with the stance of calibrated tightening of monetary policy in consonance with the objective of achieving the medium-term target for consumer price index (CPI) inflation of 4 per cent within a band of +/- 2 per cent, while supporting growth.”
Important Takeaways-
- Repo rate remains unchanged at 6.5%
- MPC keeps stance at ‘calibrated tightening’
- MPC votes 6-0 to keep repo rate on hold
- MPC voted 5-1 to keep stance at ‘calibrated tightening’; Dholakia voted for neutral stance
- H2 FY19 inflation forecast has been cut to 2.7-3.2 percent from 3.9-4.5 percent earlier
- H1 FY20 inflation fixed at 3.8-4.2 percent
- FY19 GDP growth projection retained at 7.4 percent
- Linking of floating rate loans to external benchmark has been approved.
- SLR cut by 25 basis points starting from January 2019 quarter