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The process typically begins with gathering credit data to identify geographies with credit-active households, commercial density and visible signs of economic activity.

A 34.7% on-year surge in petroleum exports helped India’s goods exports rise 13.8% on-year in April to $43.6 billion (vs a 7.4% contraction in March). Core1 exports were resilient, rising 10.4% on-year to $31.6 billion, albeit on a low base.

India’s crude oil trade deficit has been under the pump historically because of having to meet over 85% of its annual requirement from imports.

Our May view takes into account several factors that could drive the 10-year benchmark government security (G-sec) yield, including the US Treasury yields, crude oil prices, dollar movement, geopolitical developments, and the risk sentiment of investors. Policy moves by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and the US Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), as well as inflation and liquidity dynamics, are some of the other factors considered.

The dichotomy between inflation based on WPI and CPI is not new. CPI inflation has always been in the positive zone unlike WPI, which tends to swing between inflation and deflation, causing divergence between the two. Data for the past 15 fiscals shows divergence in 2015-16 and 2020 on account of the pandemic

Financial conditions remained under pressure in April, with the Crisil Financial Conditions Index (FCI) standing at -1.2, a slight improvement from March’s -1.4. A negative FCI value, particularly one that falls outside the comfort band of one standard deviation, indicates financial conditions are significantly tighter than the long-period average (measured since April 2010), while a higher FCI value indicates easier conditions compared with the previous month.