Current Affairs Update – 12th June, 2015

• The Reserve Bank on Friday issued final guidelines for the
  6-year and 13-year cash settled interest rate futures (IRF).
• “The final guidelines for introduction of the 6-year
  and the 13-year cash settled IRF on government securities with residual
  maturity of 4-8 years and 11-15 years, respectively have been issued,” RBI
  said in a statement.
• For the 6-year cash settled IRF contracts, the underlying
  shall be a coupon bearing government security of face value of Rs. 100 and
  residual maturity between 4 and 8 years on the expiry of futures contract.
• Another option for the 6-year IRF is that the underlying
  shall be coupon bearing notional 6-year government security with a face value
  of Rs. 100.
• “For each contract, there shall be a basket of
  government securities, with residual maturity between 4 and 8 years on the day
  of expiry of futures contract, with appropriate weight assigned to each security
  in the basket,” RBI said.
• For the 13-year cash settled IRF contracts, the underlying
  can be a coupon bearing government security of face value of Rs. 100 and
  residual maturity between 11 and 15 years on the expiry of futures contract.
• “The underlying shall be the coupon bearing notional
  13-year government security with a face value of Rs. 100. For each contract,
  there shall be a basket of government securities, with residual maturity
  between 11 and 15 years on the day of expiry of futures contract, with
  appropriate weight assigned to each security in the basket,” RBI said as
  the second option for the 13-year cash settled IRF.
• Among other requirements for cash settled 6-year, 10-year
  and 13-year IRF contracts shall cash-settled in the rupees.
• The RBI has also expanded the residual maturity for the
  existing 10-year cash settled IRF from 9-11 years to 8-11 years to
  “provide market participants greater choice and flexibility to hedge their
  interest rate risk across different tenors.”

• Tamil Nadu Government and Adani Power Ltd in the second week
  of June signed a Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) to set up a 200 MW solar power
  plant in Ramanathapuram district.
• The plant will be constructed with an investment of nearly
  1400 crore rupees.
• The district was chosen by the group because of the fact
  that it is one of the two districts along with Thoothukudi that receive highest
  solar radiation in the state.
• In March 2015, Adani Power Ltd applied to Tamil Nadu
  Generation and Distribution Corporation (TANGDECO) for a load flow study to
  establish 1000 MW solar plant at Kamuthi in the district.

• The US government has opened an investigation against two of
  the biggest Indian outsourcing companies for possible violations of H1-B visa
  rules, according to a media report.
• The power company had recently laid off more than 500
  technology workers amid claims that many of those laid off were made to train
  their replacements who were immigrants on the temporary work visas brought in
  by the Indian firms Senators Richard Durbin of Illinois and Jeff Sessions of
  Alabama announced the investigation after they were notified by the department,
  the report said.
• The move by the Labour Department comes days after the NYT
  had reported that hundreds of employees at entertainment giant Walt Disney were
  laid off and replaced with Indians holding H1-B visas.
• About 250 Disney employees were told in late October last
  year that they would be laid off and many of their jobs were transferred to
  immigrants on H1-B visas brought in by an outsourcing firm based in India, the
  report had said.

• Zimbabweans will start exchanging “quadrillions” of local
  dollars for a few U.S. dollars next week, as President Robert Mugabe’s
  government discards its virtually worthless national currency, the central bank
  said on Thursday.
• The southern African country started using foreign
  currencies like the U.S. dollar and the South African rand in 2009 after the
  Zimbabwean dollar was ruined by hyper-inflation, which hit 500 billion per cent
  in 2008.
• At the height of Zimbabwe’s economic crisis in 2008,
  Zimbabweans had to carry plastic bags bulging with bank notes to buy basic
  goods like bread and milk. Prices were rising at least twice a day.
• From June 15, 2015, customers who held Zimbabwean dollar
  accounts before March 2009 can approach their banks to convert their Zimbabwean
  dollar balance into dollars, Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe Governor John Mangudya
  said in a statement.
• The process will legally end the local currency. Zimbabweans
  have until September to turn in their old bank notes, which some people sell as
  souvenirs to tourists.
• Bank accounts with balances of up to 175 quadrillion
  Zimbabwean dollars will be paid $5. Those with balances above 175 quadrillion
  dollars will be paid at an exchange rate of $1 to 35 quadrillion Zimbabwean
  dollars.

• Matt Prior, the English cricketer, on 11 June 2015 retired
  from all forms of cricket. The 33-year-old, wicketkeeper-batsman helped England
  to win three Ashes series between 2009 and 2013.
• He was the first English wicketkeeper to score a century on
  debut match against West Indies in 2007. He scored an unbeaten 126 at Lord’s. 
• He played his One Day International (ODI) debut match against Zimbabwe at
  Bulawayo on 5 December 2004.
• Matt Prior played his last test match against India at
  Lord’s from 17 to 21 July 2014 and his last ODI match was against Sri Lanka at
  Colombo (RPS), on 26 March 2011.

• Forbes on 10 June 2015 released the list of 2015 World’s 100
  Highest-Paid Athletes. The list has been topped by Floyd Mayweather and the
  only Indian to figure in the list is Mahendra Singh Dhoni.
• The earnings were calculated based on athletes’ salaries,
  bonuses, prize money, appearance fees, as well as licensing and endorsement
  income between 1 June 2014 and 1 June 2015.
• The list only includes athletes active during the given
  period.

• Prof Sanghmitra Bandyopadhayay was on 10 June 2015 appointed
  as the Director of Indian Statistical Institute (ISI) by the Union Ministry of
  Statistics and Programme Implementation (MOSPI).
• She is the first woman to lead the institute and replaced Dr
  Bimal K Roy who was removed on charges of indiscipline.
• Earlier on 8 June 2015, she was appointed as
  director-designate of the institute and was set to assume the office on 1
  August 2015 on Roy’s superannuation.
• She is a computer scientist specializing in computational
  biology. Her research is mainly in the areas of evolutionary computation,
  pattern recognition, machine learning and bioinformatics.
• She obtained a master’s degree in computer science from the
  Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur (IIT KGP) and pursued Ph. D. at the
  ISI.

• The World Day Against Child Labour was on 12 June 2015
  observed globally with the theme NO to child labour – YES to quality education!
  The day is the United Nations observance to bring awareness against child
  labour.

• Free, compulsory and quality education for all children at
  least to the minimum age for admission to employment and action to reach those
  presently in child labour;
•  New efforts to ensure
  that national policies on child labour and education are consistent and
  effective;
• Policies that ensure access to quality education and
  investment in the teaching profession.

Regards

Team ExamPundit

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