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By Kevin Buckland

TOKYO (Reuters) - The dollar hung near a three-week low to major peers on Monday as markets continued to wager that the Federal Reserve has less tightening to do with the U.S. economy at risk of recession.

The dollar index, which measures the currency against six counterparts, edged 0.1% lower to 105.89, slipping back toward Friday's low of 105.53, a level not seen since July 5.

Data at the end of last week tossed the greenback in both directions, rising initially after the personal consumption expenditures (PCE) price index showed the fastest inflation since 2005, only to sink after the final University of Michigan report - closely watched by Fed policymakers - showed slipping consumer inflation expectations.

The big economic focus for this week will be the monthly U.S. jobs report on Friday.

Traders currently price about 31% probability that the Fed will keep its current 75 basis-point pace of rate hikes at its next meeting on Sept. 21, with 69% odds for a smaller half point increase.

"Markets look to be betting the Fed has done the lion's share of its task on inflation and will be receptive to slowing activity data," Taylor Nugent, a markets economist at NAB in Sydney, wrote in a client note.

The dollar slipped 0.22% to 132.925 yen, heading back toward the six-week low of 132.505 reached on Friday.

The currency pair is extremely sensitive to changes in U.S. long-term Treasury yields, with the benchmark 10-year hovering around 2.67% after sliding to the lowest since early April at 2.618% at the end of last week.

The euro, however, edged 0.07% lower to $1.0218, continuing its consolidation near the middle of its range over the past week and a half.

Sterling was about flat at $1.2186, after hitting the highest since June 28 at $1.2245 on Friday. Markets are laying 67% odds for a half-point rate hike on Thursday, compared to 33% probability of a quarter-point increase.

The Reserve Bank of Australia sets policy on Tuesday, and is expected to deliver another half point increase, with traders seeing just a 16% chance of a smaller quarter point tightening.

The Aussie dollar slipped 0.19% to $0.69775 on Monday, but after touching a six-week high of $0.7032 in the previous session.

"Should the market continue to hear what it wants from the Fed, the Aussie can readily spend more time above $0.70," NAB's Nugent said.

"But $0.65-0.70 is still seen containing most of the price action in coming months."

Insignia Ventures Partners has raised $516 million for its latest funds as the Southeast Asia-focused early stage tech venture fund doubles down on the region's digital economy.

"We could have raised a much higher amount but we have learned that smaller, tighter funds do better," Insignia's founding managing partner Yinglan Tan said in a statement on Monday.

The fundraising includes $388 million for Insignia's third fund, $28 million for an entrepreneurs' pool that invests alongside the main fund and an Annex Fund I at $100 million, said the five-year-old firm that has backed more than 70 companies.

Venture capital firms have been ramping up investments in Southeast Asia as rising consumer adoption of digital platforms since the COVID-19 pandemic fuels startups across many sectors.

Insignia said investors for its third fund, which was oversubscribed, included sovereign wealth funds, university endowments and family offices from Asia, Europe and North America.

"We see a once-in-a-decade opportunity to capture outlier returns, as the winners become very obvious when the tide goes out," said Tan, referring to the weak market environment.

Like global peers, Southeast Asian tech firms have seen sharp declines in their share prices from late last year as investors baulk at higher valuations and slowing economies.

Insignia's portfolio companies include Southeast Asian car marketplace Carro, Indonesia's biggest tech firm GoTo, and Indonesian digital investment platform Ajaib.

India collected Rs 1.49 lakh crore as Goods and Services  Tax (GST) in July, posting an increase of 28 percent from the same month last year, the finance ministry said on August 1.

Compared to the money collected in June, the July GST mop-up was 3 percent higher.

"For five months in a row now, the monthly GST revenues have been more than Rs 1.4 lakh core, showing a steady increase every month," the finance ministry said in a statement.

Of the total GST collections, Central GST was Rs 25,751 crore, while State GST was Rs 32,807 crore. Integrated GST was Rs 79,518 crore and cess was Rs 10,920 crore.

The government settled Rs 32,365 crore to Central GST and Rs 26,774 crore to State GST from Integrated GST. As such, post settlement, the total revenue of the Centre and the States in July was Rs 58,116 crore and Rs 59,581 crore, respectively.

On the fourth day of the ongoing spectrum auction, the government earned an incremental revenue of Rs 232 crore. The bidding continues as telcos are engaged in a race for spectrum in the 1800 MHz band in just one circle: Uttar Pradesh (East). The 1800 MHz band is meant mostly for 4G services.

After 23 bidding rounds, with seven on Friday, the government’s total revenue from the auction has touched Rs 149,855 crore. The bidding will resume on Saturday.

The price of the spectrum increased by more than 44.8 per cent over the base price of Rs 18.65 crore per block (each block of 0.2 MHz). And the demand continued to be in excess of supply, like it was on Thursday, with telcos collectively bidding for 75 blocks while the availability remains at 54.

While the government was able to rustle up a final bid amount of Rs 145,000 crore on day one in four rounds, it added only Rs 4,855 crore in the next three days after additional 19 rounds. In the last two days, the revenue has gone up by just Rs 401 crore.

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Analysts say that the war will end if one of the players blinks. The telcos have made a total demand for 15 MHz of spectrum. This is much more than what is available (10.8 MHz). The excess demand is for 4.2 MHz, based on the numbers.

With 16 MHz of spectrum in 1800 MHz band in the UP (East) circle, Bharti Airtel is clearly looking to hit the 20 MHz mark, say analysts. They point out that Reliance Jio, with 10 MHz, might be wanting to double its spectrum. Even Vodafone Idea, with 10 MHz, may be in the race for the same in this circle.

Despite the auction hitting the fifth day, the price of the 1800 band in UP (East) at Rs 135.09 crore per MHz is still cheaper than the reserve price in the 2021 auction, experts explain. It was at Rs 153 crore a MHz then. So there may be a lot of action still left.

From the operators’ perspective, UP (East) for Bharti accounts for a substantial 10.2 per cent of its total subscriber market share. Bharti is ahead of Reliance Jio in the circle. However, it accounts for 7.6 per cent of Bharti’s overall revenue share. In the case of Jio, which is number two in the circle, it accounts for 8 per cent of its overall subscriber base and 7.19 per cent share of its revenues. For Vodafone Idea, however, it accounts for 7.82 per cent of its overall subscriber base but only 4 per cent of its overall revenues.

Except in UP (East), the base price in these auctions is equivalent to the market price, prompting industry stakeholders and analysts to point at a ‘’faulty’’ structure. This is mainly due to the steep base price

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on July 16 urged the judiciary to speed up the release of undertrials languishing in various jails awaiting legal aid. Addressing the first All India District Legal Services Authorities Meet here, he also said that ease of justice was as important as ease of doing business and ease of living.

"There are several undertrials in jails awaiting legal aid. Our District Legal Services Authorities can take up the responsibility of providing legal assistance to undertrials," the prime minister said.

Modi urged district judges attending the conference to speed up the release of undertrials using their offices as chairpersons of district-level undertrial review committees.

State-owned Punjab National Bank has raised its asset quality guidance and seeks to lower net non-performing assets (NPA) to 3.5 per cent by March 2023-end from 4.28 per cent on June 30, 2022.

The Delhi-based lender had earlier projected lowering net NPA to sub-4 per cent level by end of the current fiscal.

“...On account of actions taken by the bank, net NPA is going to be reduced to 3.5 per cent definitely by March 2023. I’m confident of achieving this number," PNB managing director Atul Kumar Goel said at the post-earnings press conference.

In April-June, PNB’s net NPAs declined to 4.28 per cent from 5.84 per cent a year ago and 4.8 per cent in January-March 2022. In absolute terms, the net NPA of the banks stood at Rs 31,744 crore on June 2022, versus Rs 38,581 crore in June 2021.

The lender’s gross NPAs reduced to 11.27 per cent in April-June from 14.33 per cent a year ago. Gross NPAs, in absolute terms, stood at Rs 90,167 crore on June 2022 as compared to Rs 1.04 trillion in June 2021. PNB seeks to bring down gross NPAs to single digits by the end of the current financial year, Goel said.

The bank has formed a team of about 300 officials who monitor all NPA accounts, Goel said. It is attempting to improve recoveries from bad loans and is monitoring all accounts including those on which Sarfaesi or NCLT proceedings are underway, he added.

Goel said the bank has made recoveries of over Rs 7,000 crore in April-June, and it expects to recover Rs 8,000-9,000 crore every quarter. It wants to ensure that its recoveries are higher than slippages, he added.

The lender has identified eight accounts worth Rs 2,486 crore that will be transferred to the National Asset Reconstruction Company Ltd (NARCL). All banks collectively are expected to transfer bad loans of Rs 50,000 crore to NARCL, Goel said, who is also chairman of Indian Banks Association, and is spearheading the rollout of the government-backed asset reconstruction company.

On Friday, the bank reported a 70 per cent decline in net profit to Rs 308.4 crore in April-June. Goel said the dip was caused by a fall in treasury profit due to a rise in interest rates and mark-to-market losses. Treasury profit dropped from Rs 1,118 crore in June 2021 quarter to Rs 573 crore in April-June 2022, Goel said.

In April-June 2022, PNB took a hit of Rs 1,409 crore in MTM losses while in the June 2021 quarter, there was a reversal of MTM of about Rs 301 crore, he added.

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India has received its highest ever FDI inflow of Rs 6,31,050 crores in financial year 2021-22," an official release noted.

Further, FDI equity inflow in manufacturing sectors has increased to Rs 1,58,332 crore in FY22 from Rs 89,766 crore in FY21, marking an increase of 76 percent.

In 2020-21, the inflow stood at USD 81.97 billion, it added.

“India is rapidly emerging as a preferred country for foreign investments in the manufacturing sector,” the ministry said.

“India has recorded highest ever annual FDI inflow of USD 83.57 billion in the Financial Year 2021-22,” it noted.

FDI equity inflow in manufacturing sectors has increased by 76 per cent in 2021-22 (USD 21.34 billion) compared to 2020-21 (USD 12.09 billion).

In terms of top investor countries, Singapore is at the top with 27 per cent followed by the US (18 per cent) and Mauritius (16 per cent) during the last fiscal.

Among sectors, computer software and hardware attracted maximum inflows. It was followed by the services sector and automobile industry, the ministry said.

To further liberalise and simplify FDI policy for providing ease of doing business and attract investments, reforms have been undertaken recently across sectors, such as coal mining, contract manufacturing, digital media, single-brand retail trading, civil aviation, defence, insurance and telecom.

India is set to get more channels to buy cheap Russian oil, with a new wave of smaller, international traders muscling into its vast market by offering barrels shunned by rivals after the invasion of Ukraine.

State-run refiners such as Indian Oil Corp. are warming to the idea of buying from the lesser-known traders. Refinery officials said they’ve found it easier to work with them, rather than directly with Russian producers, as there’s less bureaucracy that slows negotiations with firms such as Rosneft PJSC.

Nobody replied to emails sent to IOC, Wellbred and Montfort, and Rosneft did not respond to a request for comment. Traders and shipbrokers said they didn’t know much about the firms, except they handled fuels from time to time.

Trading houses often serve the function of middlemen by bridging differences between sellers and buyers. In theory, some companies can continue to work with Russian entities that’ve been sanctioned under certain jurisdictions, help with financing and logistics, and even offer different payment terms to assist in the movement of funds. Sri Lanka received Russian crude onboard a vessel chartered by Coral Energy in May and has since bought more from the trader.

“Indian refiners are willing to take the risk of dealing with these new, little-known traders because the discounts must be too good to pass up,” said Vandana Hari, founder of Vanda Insights. “We know the Indian refiners want the Russian cargoes on a delivered basis. So as long as the new traders are fulfilling that need, it works,” she added.

The new crop of merchants was recently offering supplies of Russian Urals crude at discounts of about $8 a barrel, according to officials. They are also beefing up staffing, they said. Wellbred’s employees include former individuals from larger companies such as Glencore Plc and Gunvor Group.

Some traders are offering payment options in alternative currencies such as United Arab Emirates dirhams, according to officials. Separately, India’s central bank has announced a plan to settle international trade in the local currency.

As the shift plays out, Indian Oil, the nation’s biggest processor, has been importing Russian oil at a record-breaking pace and overtaking its private peers, according to analytics firm Kpler. Inflows have averaged 450,000 barrels a day in July -- up 44% from last month -- while India’s overall purchases of Russian barrels rose 3% to about 1 million barrels a day, Kpler data show.

India’s traditionally more agile private oil processors, such as Reliance Industries Ltd. and Rosneft-backed Nayara Energy Ltd., had already doubled down on purchases from the smaller firms even before the world’s largest oil traders scaled back handling Russian crude exports in May.

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