INSURANCE behemoth, Life Insurance Corporation of India, has pumped around Rs 26,000 crore into the equities markets (April 2009-October 2009), according to a senior company official. In comparison, overseas funds during the same period have bought Indian stock worth about $16 billion. The largest insurer in the country, has also increased its investments in nonconvertible debentures (NCDs) of many blue-chip companies and has invested a little over Rs 17,000 crore in the same period. NCDs are structured debt product that cannot be converted into equity shares of the issuing company but carry a high interest rate. The life insurer has also disbursed close to Rs 5,000 crore towards various infrastructure projects including power, roads, airport and education in the current financial year.
As the name suggests, it's an electronic process through which money can be transferred from one bank account to another. According to RBI, this mode is usually used for regular payments and receipts, like distribution of dividend, interest, salary, pension etc. This mode is also used for collection of bills for telephone, electricity, water, various types of taxes, payment of EMIs , investments in mutual funds , payment of insurance premium etc. There are two types of ECS , like most other banking transactions, ECS credit and ECS debit. An ECS credit is used by a bank account holder , usually a large company or an institution for services like payment of dividend, in terest, salary, pension etc. If your mutual fund pays you dividend to your bank account, of all probability it is being paid through ECS credit.ECS debit, on the other hand, is used when a company or an institution is getting money from a large number of people. For example if you are investing in a mutual fund sc...
