© 2019 JETIR June 2019, Volume 6, Issue 6 www.jetir.

org (ISSN-2349-5162)

Analyzing Punjab National Bank Scam

Ashutosh Kolte*
Assistant Professor,
Department of Management Sciences, (PUMBA),
Savitribai Phule Pune University

Paresh Wagh
Tata AIG General insurance Company, Pune.

Abstract:

The Punjab National Bank (PNB) lost $1.77 billion in Nirav Modi case. The magnitude of the scam is very
huge. This puts serious questions regarding how the scam took place either due to combination of external
&internal processes or some other reasons, the technicalities behind the scam related to SWIFT, CBS,
auditing etc. and the extent of scam impact as whole have been found out in this paper. The RBI is facing
questions from the public regarding why it did not able to detect the banking scam during the auditing. The
causes of this big scam with technical base and the scam impact have been found out. Now, this is the time
where all Public Sector Banks (PSBs) should learn from such types of happenings. In this paper, the
identification of the scam & its analysis is carried out. This paper also focuses on the failure of the audit and
internal processes and practices that caused the scam.

Keywords: PNB Scam; Nirav Modi; Banking Scam; India; Nationalized Banks; RBI Regulations.

1. Introduction

World credit market had adverse impact due to financial crisis which caused Lehman brothers and other
financial institutions go bankrupt with huge credit crunch. (Mathiason, 2008) (Sanches, 2014). The recession
was huge and was the one, which created history. Right after this recession only, the credit system got
hampered. It had harsh impact on global economy where Indian Banking sector was also included.

On Feb 14th2018, the Punjab National Bank which was the second largest Public sector banks reportedto
stock exchanges, Central Bureau of Investigation and Reserve Bank of India regarding exceptional
transactions of approximate value$1.77 billion tending to be fraudulent (Bandopadhyay, 2018). The other
PSBs were also in bad condition during that period. This bank fraud added in the anxiety level. 11 banks out
of 21 listed banks came under RBI’s eagle eye view due to their condition of severe condition of capital,
assets return and loans. During the government planning of bank capital infusion, the scam at PNB stood like
a huge demon (Raghavan, 2018).

Through this paper, our aim would be of comprehensive analysis of the PNB scam. Through this analysis, we
will see various internal as well as external factors causing this scam. The technical concepts related to scam
will be analyzed and the reasons behind the conversion to scam will be found out.

JETIR1907386 Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (JETIR) www.jetir.org 585
© 2019 JETIR June 2019, Volume 6, Issue 6 www.jetir.org (ISSN-2349-5162)

2. Focused Literature Review:

Indian banking system has already been hampered with growth in NPAs (Assocham, 2014) (Saraswat &
Srivastava, 2018) Deputy Governor of Reserve Bank of India, K.C. Chakrabarty noted in his speech that
according to the number of frauds, private & foreign banks are at the top, but according to amount of money
lost, public sector banks are the top rankers. (Chakrabarty, 2013)

RBI further, for classification of frauds chose 2 parameters- types, provisions of the Indian penal code and
reporting guidelines set by RBI. For monitoring & preventive action for the banks internal process as well as
audit, a circular was issued by RBI (RBI, 2015) to the banks to set up a committee to plan preventive action
with the implementation of that action.

The 2008 recession had severe impact on banking system globally but at that time depositors were not
rushing to withdraw deposits. In this PNB case, exactly opposite was happening.

The committee under the chairmanship of P.J. Nayak reported the findings that contain the asset quality
stress and marginal capitalization faced by PSBs and suggested necessary recommendations. The autonomy
was given to PSB was more as compared to the earlier in raising funds from the market as well as good
governance practices were also recommended by RBI. (Nayak, 2014)

Before these decisions, the apex bank had strict regulations regarding fund raising, but further it made
changes in the regulations and kept itself strict on the working principles of banks. Basic principles
(Gandhi, 2014)in preventing fraud, there is need to know customer, partners & the most important
employees as fault of PNB employees only caused this mishap. He also found out the importance of appraisal
mechanism but at the same time concurrent monitoring.

The credibility of senior manager needs to be the point of focus. The accurate track of the activities done by
each employee of the bank. The accountability of the senior managers should be on high priority of the
scrutiny. (Pandya, 2018)

Lack of scrutiny, auditing, regular checking the transactions were some of the major reasons behind this
fraud. (Dora, Hanumantu, & Worlikar)

The individual depositor has trust because of which he deposits money in the bank. Keeping the same thing
in mind bank must have transparency towards its work. The fraud happening hampers the trust of the
common man and only some big businessman enjoy by having loans & guarantees. (Verma & Ravi)

Loose strategies, improper risk management practices, fraudulent practices led to this crisis.

We would like to find out answers to following questions:

i. How the PNB scam took place?

ii. Why one of the banking processes (issuing LOU) got converted to scam?
iii. What was the impact of scam?

JETIR1907386 Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (JETIR) www.jetir.org 586
© 2019 JETIR June 2019, Volume 6, Issue 6 www.jetir.org (ISSN-2349-5162)

3. Analysis of Data & Discussion

PNB filed the complaint on 29th Jan 2018 with CBI telling the fraudulent transaction with Nirav Modi’s firm
along-with related bank official.Further, on 04th Feb 2018, CBI issued lookout notice against Nirav Modi.
PNB informed stock exchanges on 05th Feb 2018 regarding the fraud and its magnitudewhich is $ 1.77 billion
on 14th Feb 2018. (Gayathri & Mangaiyarkarasi, 2018) The fraudulent transactions were “for the benefit
of a few select account holders” The note had not mentioned the name of the Fugitive Diamond merchant but
media found out the name and the place which was the Mumbai branch of PNB where the branch had
allegedly issued LOUs for raising the buyer’s credit for this diamond trader (Bandopadhyay, 2018) The
fraudulent transactions or LOU issuance had been taken place at Mid Corporate Branch Brady House,
Mumbai. (Krishna, 2018) (PTI, 2019)

3.1 PNB scam:

PNB employees (54 officials) issued the fake Letter of Undertakings (LOU) which could lead to fund
NOSTRO account of PNB by the Axis and Allahabad bank (Hongkong branches). Where this NOSTRO
account of PNB could fund to overseas parties including that of Nirav Modi. (Roy , Kalra, & Rocha, 2018)
The two employees of PNB directly used SWIFT and while doing it, they did not pay attention on the core
banking system (CBS).The FIR contained the details like those two PNB employees were issuing LOUs in
unauthorized way from last 7 years. Afterwards, one of them retired and the new employee came on his
designation. In January, when the officials of firm demanded fresh LOUs from PNB, the new PNB officer
asked for the collateral security. The officials of firm mentioned that this had been never askedby the PNB
manager in the last 7 years. Now the bank got signal that something wrong has been taken place.The new
Bank officer got doubt on the past 7 years LOU issuance and he looked into the concerned matter in detail.
After detail investigation, it found near about 100 LOUs issued to these firms without asking for collateral
security. PNB became the victim of the fraud. It faced the problem amounting to about 11,400 crores. The
PNB reported to the RBI and CBI.

Modi needed money to import pearls & diamonds. He wanted to have foreign currency loan and his earning
through exporting was in foreign currency. The most important thing is that he wanted to borrow without his
loan account. Hence, he arranged LOU from the PNB to get cheap buyer’s credit in foreign currency, which
is for a short term.

Ideally, Modi should have exported the pearls, diamonds & use the earnings for settling the due amount of
LOU as & when demanded by the bank according to its standard procedure. Further, PNB need to have paid
back the loan it has raised in its NOSTRO account from the overseas banks. But he utilized the money for
other purposes without paying it to the bank. These activities were happening from last 7 years. Rather Modi
used to pay back the principal & interest on old LOU by new one. The total LoUs taken by Nirav Modi &
Mehul Choksi stood out at 293 according investigating agencies detail. In this way the cycle of fraud was
repeating. Mr. Gopalnath Shetty, who was been working at foreign exchange department of the PNB branch
in Mumbai since 31 March 2010, and his colleagues were allegedly using SWIFT system and no other

JETIR1907386 Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (JETIR) www.jetir.org 587
© 2019 JETIR June 2019, Volume 6, Issue 6 www.jetir.org (ISSN-2349-5162)

Employees had attention on it. There was no linkage of SWIFT to CORE system. (Bandopadhyay, 2018)
According to the FIR, SWIFT messages were issued to Allahabad bank and Axis Bank in Hongkong.
(Krishna, 2018) Nirav Modi was a diamond jewelry designer. According to Forbes, his rank was 57th among
the billionaire list of 2017. He was the Founder of chain of diamond jewelry retail stores. (Lall, 2019).

3.2 Why and how one of the banking processes got converted to scam?

LOU is the form of bank guarantee under which bank can borrow money from the bank branch of overseas
Indian bank. Due to this, its customer is getting money from another Indian bank’s foreign branch in the form
of buyer’s credit.

This was a case of operational risk. It was the fault of the PNB employees who wanted to make faulty
procedure of issuing LOUs for their own benefit. The SWIFT had bypassed the CBS. There was no internal
coordination and also no proper monitoring which resulted in operation. Majorly, the internal banking system
was exposed to fraudulent activities. It is must to use the standard operating system for prompt and clean
banking.

It was the responsibility of external as well as internal auditor to trace the transaction also contingent liability
figure or the other question arises whether those auditors were also involved or not.Concurrent auditors
whose job is of transaction verification. They couldn’t notice the case at that time was big question. Hence,
all auditors like concurrent, internal and statutory were failed in finding out the problem.

Linking CBS with SWIFT wasn’t made mandatory by Reserve Bank of India. Hence, many banks until now
were no linking between two. Same case happened in case of Nirav Modi.
But if the company wants to take on some currency risk, it can reduce its interest rate risk. So, the company
demands bank guarantee to the bank of its relation in its home-country (in this case-India)and it goes to
offshore branch of another Indian bank and borrows loan at lower interest by showing those bank guarantees.
For the company, it was getting cheap and prompt credit. For overseas Indian bank, it would get low risk
payment by Indian guarantee issuing bank while for Indian bank, it gets fees for such issuance of LOUs.The
most important factor of operational risk was that one of the employees who had got access to SWIFT was
the main person behind the fraud. He used the system in wrongful way. The credit quality of the borrower is
also important but, in many cases, due to trust factor on local bank, the overseas Indian banks loans provides
buyer credit without much scrutiny of the credit quality of the borrower. (Dugal, 2018)

The first SWIFT message was MT799 which was delivered to the overseas branches of Indian banks. The
LOU issuing bank has NOSTRO account (account in the foreign currency) with the overseas bank branch.
When they got SWIFT message, they promptly deposited foreign currency amount in the NOSTRO account
of PNB.

JETIR1907386 Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (JETIR) www.jetir.org 588
© 2019 JETIR June 2019, Volume 6, Issue 6 www.jetir.org (ISSN-2349-5162)

There were no linkage or integration of SWIFT with CBS, due to which unauthorized or fraudulent messages
on the SWIFT remain undetected. The problem inside PNB’s case was that these officials had not only
hacked into the SWIFT but had also shared confidential SWIFT passwords with the senior managers of Nirav
Modi’s company.

3.3 Impact of scam:

On stock market NIFTY and SENSEX are majorly influenced by banking sector. Due to these type of scam,
investors loose confidence in investing and he doubts about the transparency of the business in the country.
The overall perception of the investor towards financial sector of the country changed. Strict norms and
actions by the Indian banking sector after such incidences also hamper on trade financing (How will the PNB
fiasco impact the equity markets?)

This fraud impacted on the customer as the customers wanted to know the position of their deposited money
while the bank was instilling confidence among them that it will be honoring its commitments. (Tiwari,
2018)

The scam had also impacted banks. Out of the 39 banks which are listed one, 34 listed bank’s share price fell
between February 12 and February 15, 2018 while benchmark BSE index lost 1.2 per cent. There are five
banks like Union Bank of India, SBI, UCO bank, Axis Bank, Allahabad Bank. that have been directly
affected by the scam as they had offered short term buyer’s credit to PNB. (Sarkar, 2018)

Table 1: Credit Risk Exposure of Public Sector Banks

Sr. No. PSBs Exposure in INR crores
1 Union Bank of India 1920
2 SBI 1360
3 UCO bank 2635
4 Axis Bank 200
5 Allahabad Bank 2400
Source-BloombergQuint, Compiled by the authors

From the Table 1, Union Bank's exposure in the fraud was Rs 1920 crores. The bank suffered a net loss in
quarter 3 and its gross NPA also rose. In case of State Bank of India (SBI), Erosion in market cap was 8329
crore. From the Table 1, Bank's exposure in the scam was 1360 crore and the bank suffered a net loss-2416
crore. Axis Bank lost -3.4 % while it’s erosion in market cap was 4800 crore. From the Table 1, Bank's
exposure in PNB fraud-200 crore. There were rise in Gross NPAs. Allahabad Bank lost 9.9 per cent. Erosion
in market cap was at 484 crores. From the Table 1, Bank's exposure in scam- INR 2400 crores. The bank
dived into a net loss 1263.79 crores. Its Gross NPA rose. (Bharadwaj, 2018). Also, the scam in Allahabad
bank was due to internal employees only as they misused the SWIFT technique and never linked the
transactions on SWIFT with CBS. (Upadhyay, 2018)

The fraud had its impact on Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) and which was thesingle biggest investor & it
lost Rs 1,400 crore over the last three trading sessions.

The fraud has severe impact on buyer credit to the SMEs as SMEs require the credit for its growth but due to
banning of Letter of Undertakings (LOUs) and Letter of Comfort (LCs) and the other credit options like
JETIR1907386 Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (JETIR) www.jetir.org 589
© 2019 JETIR June 2019, Volume 6, Issue 6 www.jetir.org (ISSN-2349-5162)

Letter of Credit are expensive option, the SMEs are falling short of credit because of the move by the
regulator and strict autonomous opinion of the individual banks. In this way, SMEs have severe impact of the
scam by the billionaire. (Our Bureau, 2018)

After the scam details were made public, the stock of the bank went down by 10%. PNB’s gross NPAs rose
to18.26% of advances as on June 30, 2018 as against 13.66% in the same quarter a year ago. Net NPAs rose
to 10.58% against 8.67%. By the second quarter of the fiscal (2017-18), the bad loans of the PSBs had
reached INR 7.34 lakh crore (compared with the INR 1.03 lakh crore of the private sector banks) (Saraswat
& Srivastava, 2018)

Also, this bank crisis had impact on the currency exchange rate as PNB scam led out to fall in the exchange
rate. (Singh, Goyal, Patel, & Warrier, 2018)

To jewelry sector-The fraud has led to drop the bank finance to the jewelry sector by 10% while bank finance
is the most important factor in the jewelry sector. As the small businessman in this sector are not able to get
the bank credit, there is fall in the export level also. Its serious implications seen in 2019 also. (PTI, 2018),
(Layak, Ghosal, & Sachitananda, 2018)

Global credit rating agencies have reviewed the ratings of PNB and the continuous updated revision of rating
shows downgrading. Moody’s and Fitch have placed the Punjab National Bank under rating scrutiny.

Moody's Investors Service has put under review the foreign currency issuer rating BAA3. Moody’s in a
report mentioned that the fraudulent transactions were the major reason behind downgrading the rating.
(Press Trust of India, 2018) (Das, 2018) Rating by CRISIL was AAA which means the LOUs issued were
with highest safety. Afterwards CRISIL revised the bank’s rating during revision of outlook on PSBs where
PNB’s rating was provided as stable from negative on January 25 mentioned support from the government’s
capital infusion. Rating by CARE was AA+. It has stated that SEBI guidelines need to be updated. Ratings
by India Ratings was AAA and Ratings by ICRA as AA+

Hence, the rating agencies are trying to gauge the severe impact of the PNB scam and accordingly they are
constantly keeping the rating watch on the bank transactions.

4. Findings &Conclusion

The collateral free SWIFT transactions were happening not for a year but since last 7 years & these
transactions were unidentified. Why the SWIFT bypassed the CBS was also the question of utmost
importance. The SWIFT messaging system was unmonitored. Few employees including Gopalnath Shetty in
mutual agreement with the client led to such big fraud hence the honesty of these officials came under
question.

It is important to investigate how the operational risk raised and the process got dirty. There was no planning
in the risk management system. The system was loose. There were rise in operational risk without any
identification of its gradual growth itself suggests that focus on risk management was necessary. The RBI’s
JETIR1907386 Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (JETIR) www.jetir.org 590
© 2019 JETIR June 2019, Volume 6, Issue 6 www.jetir.org (ISSN-2349-5162)

role was also under question. Why did not RBI provide attention during auditing of the transactions. Where it
went wrong while assessing those transaction. Later on RBI took necessary improved steps that were
welcome but the fault in the past made the loss which is unforgettable & difficult to recovery.

The scam impacted the economy in adverse way. Now, there is rise in the need of taking new decisions, new
reforms, autonomy to the banks but at the same time whether the banks are using that autonomy honestly or
not, this watch needs to be kept by RBI.

Bibliography
Assocham, P. a. (2014). Growing NPAs in Banks: Efficacy of Credit Rating Agencies.
Bandopadhyay, T. (2018, Feb 19). The Anatomy of PNB fraud. Retrieved May 25, 2019, from www.livemint.com:
https://www.livemint.com/Opinion/oiMKS98wBunYNviWCVq6hJ/The-anatomy-of-the-PNB-fraud.html
Bharadwaj, S. (2018, March 22). Nirav Modi case: PNB fraud affects stocks of Union Bank, Allahabad Bank, SBI, Axis
Bank. Retrieved May 26, 2019, from www.businesstoday.in: https://www.businesstoday.in/markets/stocks/nirav-
modi-case-pnb-fraud-affects-stocks-of-union-bank-allahabad-bank-sbi-axis-bank/story/270786.html
Chakrabarty, K. C. (2013). Fraud in the banking sector-causes,concerns and cures. National Conference on Financial
Fraud (pp. 3-8). New Delhi: BIS Central Banker Speeches.
Das, S. (2018, Feb 20). Fitch,Moody's place PNB under review for downgrade. Economic Times Bureau .
Dora, S., Hanumantu, K. U., & Worlikar, V. Examining the impact of political relations in corporate world: the case of
PNB. (2018).
Dugal, I. (2018, February 24). PNB-Nirav Modi Fraud: Understanding The Deceptively Low Risk World Of Buyer’s Credit.
Retrieved May 28, 2019, from www.bloombergquint.com.
Gandhi, R. (2014). Growing NPAs in Banks: Efficacy of Ratings Accountability & Transperency of Credit Rating
Agencies., (pp. 2-6).
Gayathri , S., & Mangaiyarkarasi, T. (2018). A Critical Analysis of the Punjab National. International Journal of Pure and
Applied Mathematics , 119 (12), 14857.
How PNB Scam Can Impact The Health Of India’s Economy. (2019, March 25). Retrieved May 29, 2019, from
www.eresearchnmarkets.com: https://www.eresearchnmarkets.com/blog/how-pnb-scam-can-impact-the-health-of-
indias-economy.php
How will the PNB fiasco impact the equity markets? (n.d.). Retrieved May 29, 2019, from www.motilaloswal.com:
https://www.motilaloswal.com/article.aspx/1665/How-will-the-PNB-fiasco-impact-the-equity-markets
Iyer, S. (2018, March 21). Nine ways in which the PNB scam will affect India’s economy. Retrieved May 29, 2019, from
www.qz.com: https://qz.com/india/1233666/goldman-sach-says-the-pnb-fraud-will-make-indias-economy-sputter/
Jain, R. (2018, February 26). Effects of Nirav Modi Scam on Indian Economy. Retrieved May 30, 2019, from
www.investxp.in: https://www.investxp.in/effects-of-nirav-modi-scam-on-indian-economy/
Krishna, N. (2018, February 17). All you need to know about Nirav Modi and the $1.77 billion PNB fraud. Retrieved May
30, 2019, from www.thehindu.com: https://www.thehindu.com/business/Industry/all-you-need-to-know-about-nirav-
modi-and-the-177-billion-pnb-fraud/article22753973.ece
Lall, P. (2019, March 31). Meet Nirav's A-Team that may have helped him pull off Rs 14,000-cr scam. Retrieved May 31,
2019, from www.business-standard.com: https://www.business-standard.com/article/current-affairs/meet-nirav-s-a-
team-that-may-have-helped-him-pull-off-rs-14-000-cr-scam-119033000804_1.html
Layak, S., Ghosal, S., & Sachitananda, R. (2018, February 18). How the Nirav Modi scandal will affect diamantaires.
Retrieved May 26, 2019, from economictimes.indiatimes.com: https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/industry/cons-

JETIR1907386 Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (JETIR) www.jetir.org 591
International Journal of Pure and Applied Mathematics Special Issue

TABLE 1: 5W2H OF THE PNB SCAM

What? What happened? On 14 February, state-owned Punjab National Bank (PNB)
disclosed that it has discovered $ 1.77-billion (around Rs 11,400
crore) worth of fraudulent transactions at one of its Mumbai
branches. In a complaint to the Central Bureau of Investigation, the
bank had named the firms and people associated with billionaire
jeweler Nirav Modi to have caused this massive fraud using the
bank officials.
What is the PNB employees issued fake LoUs(In international banking
problem? system, Letter of Undertaking (LOU) is a provision of bank
guarantee, under which a bank allows its customer to raise money
from another Indian bank's foreign branch in the form of a short
term credit. The LOU serves the purpose of a bank guarantee), on
the back of which foreign branches of a few Indian banks —
including Axis and Allahabad Bank — gave dollar loans to PNB.
These foreign currency loans were used to fund PNB’s Nostro
accounts and from these accounts funds moved to certain overseas
parties. A Nostro account is the account an Indian bank (here, PNB)
has with an overseas bank.
What is the scope 1. PNB is left holding bank guarantees worth Rs 11,400 crore
of the problem? which it has to pay to, among others, State Bank of India,
Allahabad Bank and Union Bank. These payments are due over the
next few months.
2. This has affected the banking sector, jewellery sector and the
insurance sector.
3. This also questions the credibility of the Public Sector Banks, the
role of regulators namely RBI and SEBI
When? When did it PNB filed a fraud complaint against Modi group firms with RBI on
happen? 29/01/18.
O4/02/18 :CBI issues lookout notice against NiravModi
05/02/18 : PNB informs stock exchanges about the Rs 281 crore
fraud involving the Modi group
14/02/18: PNB informs the stock exchanges of the magnitude of the
fraud
When did it start? According to the FIR, two junior employees of PNB had been
When did it stop? sending these unauthorised guarantees for seven years.
Then one of them retired. In January, when representatives of Modi
firms asked for a fresh guarantee, the new PNB employee in that
position asked for collateral security. On being told that this was
never asked for in the past, the bank started investigating and found
hundreds of guarantees relating to these firms.
Is it continuous This problem had been happening for the past seven years with
problem? respect to NiravModi case.
Intermittent? PNB had also been affected by the Winsome Diamond group scam
in 2013.
When it comes to scams, it is not new to the banking sector as it has
witnessed different levels of frauds at different times. Hence this is
a continuous problem.
Is it linked to a The PNB scam as such is linked to
specific customer Nirav Modi, the billionaire in the middle of this controversy, is a

14857
International Journal of Pure and Applied Mathematics Special Issue

usage? luxury diamond jewellery designer who was ranked #57 in the
Forbes list of India's billionaires in 2017. He is the founder and
creative director of the Nirav Modi chain of diamond jewellery
retail stores, and is the Chairman of Firestar International, the
parent of the Nirav Modi chain, which has stores in key markets
across the globe.
The firms have Nirav Modi, his brother Nishal Modi, Mr. Nirav's
wife Ami Nirav Modi, and Mehul Chinubhai Chokshi as partners.
Who? Who faced the PNB has faced the problem amounting to 11,400 crores. According
problem? to banking circles, PNB will have to make good the lost money
even though technically Allahabad Bank and Axis Bank took the
exposure.

Who reported the The problem was detected and reported by PNB to RBI and CBI.
problem?
Who is the
customer? Who is
the final
customer?
Who are the Customers of the Bank
stakeholders? Employees
Board of Directors
Auditors
Creditors
Regulators : RBI,SEBI
The Government of India
Who are the Former employees of the Bank who issued the money Nirav Modi
parties involved? Allahabad and Axis bank who honoured the payment
Where? Where did it It had happened within the operating environment of PNB.
happen?
Is it in-house or at It could be termed as in house because the swift transaction on
customer? request was cleared by the PNB officials. Hence we have a question
on the authenticity of the system for Letter of Credits at PNB.
Where is the The two employees of PNB directly used SWIFT - the global
stakeholder’s financial messaging service used to move millions of dollars across
location? borders every hour — and bypassed the core banking system (CBS)
which processes daily banking transactions and posts updates.

Which other The information exchange between CBS and Swift transactions has
location should be to be reviewed.
considered?
How How many parts Letter of credit
many? were involved? Letter of Undertakings(which were faked)
Swift Network
How much is the 12,000 crore
loss
How? How did it Operational risk (OR) indicates a failure in any of the banking
happen?(step by systems, processes or people.

14858
International Journal of Pure and Applied Mathematics Special Issue

step explanation) A major operational risk had occurred at PNB.

Two bank officials of PNB had been issuing Letter of Credits for a
long period to Nirav Modi without any collateral, which amounted
to a fraud of Rs.11,400 crores.The swift messaging system had
bypassed the core banking system and operated. There is neither
proper internal coordination nor any internal control or monitoring
process. This has resulted in the operational risk.

Can we reproduce
it?
Why? Why is it a The internal banking system is not systematic and is prone to
problem? fraudulent activities.
PNB is now responsible for the fraud amount. The customers are
panicked that their money in the bank may be under risk while the
bank has assured to honor all its bona fide commitments.
Is it a must or nice It is mandatory to have the standard operating system of
to have? responsible and responsive banking.

5. Impact on Stock Market

There are thirty nine listed banks in India. Share prices of the thirty-four listed
banks fell between February 12 and February 15. The sudden volatility in the
prices eroded the market cap of these Thirty four stocks by over Rs 36,380
crores. Benchmark BSE Bankex lost 1.2 per cent. PNB eroded investor’s wealth
worth Rs 8,077 crores and its stock tanked 20.6 per cent between February 12
and February 15 2018.
A. Impact on banks

The value of PNBs fraudulent transactions are nearly 50 times the bank's
Q3FY18 net profit of Rs 230.11 crores. There are five banks that have been
directly affected by the fraudulent transactions [19] as they have offered credit
based on the LoUs issued by PNB. These banks are UCO bank, Allahabad
Bank, Axis Bank, Union Bank of India, and SBI. Table 1 shows the bank’s
exposure to the PNB scam in crores [19].

Table 2: Credit Risk Exposure Of Public Sector Banks

14859