The talk was led by Biju Karnath from CCIL
19 September, 2022, Bengaluru: The Centre for Capital Markets and Risk Management (CCMRM) at IIM Bangalore hosted a webinar on ‘How to Invest in Government Bonds’ led by Biju Karnath from CCIL on 16th September 2022 (Friday).
Background of talk: The RBI’s Retail Direct Scheme was launched on 12th November 2021. The scheme was announced by RBI in its monetary policy of February 2021. It is a one-stop solution to facilitate investment in government securities by individual investors. The objective of the webinar was to create awareness that there was a safe, secure and direct platform for investors to deal with government securities.
The topics discussed included: the reason why one should invest in government securities; the method to register for a GILT account; the charges to open the Gilt account; the minimum and maximum amount for investing in the scheme; how to manage the liquidity risk in investing through the Retail Direct Scheme, and more.
The talk was followed by a Q&A session. Responding to a query on why RBI went the direct way and not via the brokerages, Biju Karnath explained that RBI was forced to do so as brokers and banks were not ready. “RBI is open for partnerships in future,” he added. About the liquidity risk in government securities, he said, “Sometime, the investor may not be able to find a buyer at the same time of selling and there could be some delay before selling the bonds.” He also explained how the returns compared to FDs and how to manoeuvre through the portal.