CAD will reduce below $70 billion: Rangarajan

Business

oi-Staff

By Super

Published: Tuesday, October 22, 2013, 9:56 [IST]

Chennai: Stating that there has been improvement in the trade account, Chairman of the Economic Advisory Council to Prime Minister C Rangarajan on Monday said the Current Account Deficit (CAD) will go down well below USD 70 billion.

Pointing out that in August and September, India's exports showed a double digit growth rate, Rangarajan said at an event here that India's trade deficit in the first half of this year was USD 80 billion as compared to 92 billion USD in the previous year.

If the present trend in exports and imports continue, the overall CAD will reduce even lower than USD 70 billion. Noting that the Indian rupee over the last few weeks had remained stable at around 61-62 against the US dollar, he said the rupee was well corrected for inflation differential.

Referring to the USA's indication of tapering on May 22 and the resultant fall in capital flows, he said this affected capital inflows not only to India but to all the emerging economies including Brazil as investments were moved to the USA.

However, now, there has been a change and investments flows have turned positive, he said.

PTI