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The Reserve Bank of India's monetary policy committee kept interest rates steady at record lows on Friday, as widely predicted, but traders were awaiting its commentary about liquidity normalisation for clues on its next policy move.

The RBI held the repo rate, its key lending rate, at 4% and kept the reverse repo rate, the borrowing rate, unchanged at 3.35%.

All 61 economists polled by Reuters late last month had said they see no change in the repo rate which has been steady at 4% since May last year.

COMMENTARY

RADHIKA RAO, ECONOMIST, DBS BANK, SINGAPORE

"The MPC (Monetary Policy Committee) retained its state-based guidance i.e. implicitly committing to support growth and retain policy flexibility, as optimism on stronger incoming data was tempered by risks of a third Covid wave. The upward revision in inflation forecast was along expected lines, with the calibrated increase in the Variable Reveres Repo Rate (VRRR) auction size, underscoring the central bank's intent to lay the ground for eventual policy normalisation down the line."

KUNAL KUNDU, INDIA ECONOMIST, SOCIETE GENERALE, BENGALURU

"Announcement of an unchanged policy rate, on expected lines, is not what the market participants were keeping an eye on. Who eventually gets the precedence in growth versus inflation trade-off is where the interest veered on."

"As of now, it seems growth has won the day with assertion of continuation of accommodative stance as long as necessary to support growth (with continued belief in transitoriness of inflation) with the central bank convinced that monetary policy can do all the heavy lifting to support growth without relevant fiscal intervention or even the lack of intention to cut taxes on petrol and diesel to keep a leash on inflation."

"For the time being, it seems the RBI is using the entire band of 2%-6% as target range (rather than the median of 4%) to continue to remain accommodative. Inflation may have peaked but with the RBI raising FY22 inflation forecast to 5.7% (quite in line with our expectation of 5.6%) from 5.1% earlier is clear indication of underlying price pressure that too needs to be addressed in order to prevent a potential stagflation situation going forward."

VIVEK KUMAR, ECONOMIST, QUANTECO RESEARCH, MUMBAI

"The overall stance continues to remain accommodative, with continued emphasis on nurturing growth impulses while also mitigating downside economic risks from the spread of COVID-19."

"However, basis the upward revision in average FY22 CPI inflation forecast to 5.7% from 5.1% and expecting GDP growth recovery to remain intact (with unchanged FY22 forecast of 9.5%), the RBI took calibrated action to modulate liquidity conditions by increasing the size of the current VRRR auctions... This should nudge short-term money market rates to firmly above the Reverse Repo Rate."

"While this would be neutral for core liquidity in the system, it nevertheless portends the intention to gradually move towards monetary policy normalisation. We continue to expect the RBI to take rate action by restoring the width of the LAF corridor to 25 bps from 65 bps currently between December, 2021 and February 2022 by upward adjustment in RRR from 3.35% currently to 3.75%... followed by a 25 bps hike in the repo rate in April 2022."

PRITHVIRAJ SRINIVAS, CHIEF ECONOMIST, AXIS CAPITAL, MUMBAI

"The MPC has kept policy rates on hold as expected. The only major move was an increase in VRRR limits, which was widely expected. However, the governor was quick to point out that VRRR increase does not indicate a change in monetary policy stance."

"We expect the timing of first policy rate increase in the future to coincide with confidence that vaccinations provide adequate protection against a relapse."

GARIMA KAPOOR, ECONOMIST - INSTITUTIONAL EQUITIES, ELARA CAPITAL, MUMBAI

"Amid fears regarding another wave of coronavirus and to sustain the incipient economic recovery, the RBI continued to prioritise growth despite inflation remaining sticky and closer to upper band of the target."

"While the RBI enhanced the quantum of VRRR rate auctions to suck out a part of ballooning systemic surplus liquidity, policy rate normalisation is still sometime away. We expect that the RBI will continue to maintain accommodative stance through this calendar year and embark a reverse repo rate hike in Q4FY22."

UPASNA BHARDWAJ, SENIOR ECONOMIST, KOTAK MAHINDRA BANK, MUMBAI

"Expectedly, the RBI maintained status quo, maintaining a fine balance between the risks to GDP and inflation. However, we believe that increasing risks to inflation and economic activity picking up pace has prompted the MPC into taking liquidity normalisation measures through additional VRRR. This would clearly help in anchoring inflation expectations."