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Frankfurt  - The European Central Bank (ECB) cut rates for the fifth time in six months Thursday, lowering borrowing costs to an historic low and signalling further reductions in the coming months after it slashed its growth and inflation forecasts.

Thursday's hefty 50-basis-point reduction brought the ECB's benchmark refinancing rate down to 1.5 per cent and followed an announcement in London that the Bank of England (BoE) monetary policy committee had also trimmed the cost of money by 50 basis points.

State-owned banks trim interest rates on fresh bout of liquidity, but private banks unrelenting to follow suit

Raghu Nair recently pre-paid his home loan with a leading private bank and switched over to a public sector bank (PSB) which charged him a much lower interest rate. The 32 year-old businessman is making a neat saving of approximately Rs 3,000 on his EMI’s every month with the switchover.

In a bid to transform and enhance the use of cutting edge technology across all its branches, YES Bank launched 'Branch of the Future' at its South Extension branch in the capital spread across 10,000 sq ft area. The bank would focus on optimum use of technology in the transaction process to offer highly reliable and efficient services to customers.

In an unexpected move, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Wednesday cut the repo and reverse repo rates by 50 basis points each. With that, the repo rate stands lowered to 5% and reverse repo to 3.5%, an all-time low and on a par with savings account rates.

The repo is the rate at which banks borrow funds from the RBI, while reverse repo is the rate at which banks park surplus funds with the central bank. Lower exports, falling industrial production and disappointing GDP numbers were reasons the central bank gave while urging banks to continue funding "creditworthy enterprises."

Stockholm - Swedish banking group SEB's share price was up some 7 per cent Wednesday after it detailed terms for its 15-billion- kronor (1.6 billion dollar) rights issue.

New shares were to sold for 10 kronor, offering a premium compared to Tuesday's closing price of 31 kronor. Owners of five old shares were to be offered 11 new shares.

The rights issue was announced a month ago when the group released its full-year 2008 report. SEB then said it would not pay a dividend. The two measures would raise the capital base to 19.5 billion kronor.