New Delhi: India has slipped to the 75th position in terms of money held by citizens with Swiss banks after it fell by nearly one-third to a record low of Rs 8,392 crore last month. Meanwhile, UK has managed to remain on top of the list.
India was placed at 61st place last year, while it used to be among top 50 countries in terms of holdings in Swiss banks till 2007. The country was ranked at the 37th place in 2004.
As per the latest annual update on Swiss banks, released by the Swiss National Bank (SNB), Switzerland's central bank, the total money held there by foreign clients from across the world fell nearly 4 per cent to 1.42 trillion Swiss francs (about Rs 98 lakh crore) at the end of 2015.
In terms of individual countries, the UK accounted for the largest chunk at about 350 billion Swiss francs (CHF) or almost 25 per cent of the total foreign money with Swiss banks.
The US came second with nearly CHF 196 billion or about 14 per cent. No other country accounted for a double-digit percentage share, while others in the top ten included West Indies, Germany, Bahamas, France, Guernsey, Luxembourg, Hong Kongand Panama.
India was ranked 75th with CHF 1.2 billion (about Rs 8,392 crore), which is not even 0.1 per cent of the total foreign money in Swiss banks and is the lowest for the country in at least two decades or since 1996 - the first year for which full comparable data is available.
Pakistan was placed higher at 69th place with CHF 1.5 billion - a shade better than 0.1 per cent of total foreign money parked with Swiss banks.
India was also lowest ranked among the BRICS nations - Russia was ranked 17th (CHF 17.6 billion), China 28th (CHF 7.4 billion), Brazil 37th (CHF 4.8 billion) and South Africa 60th (CHF 2.2 billion).
Others ranked higher than India included Mauritius, Kazakhstan, Iran, Chile, Angola, Philippines, Indonesia and Mexico, while a number of so-called tax havens were also placed above, including Jersey, Cayman Islands, Cyprus, Marshall Islands, Bermuda, Belize, Gibraltar, Isle of Man, Seychelles and St Vincent and the Grenadines.
All offshore financial centres together held CHF 378 billion in Swiss banks. The total for developing countries stood at CHF 207 billion, while the same for the developed countries was much higher at CHF 833 million.
India was ranked in top 50 continuously between 1996 and 2007, but started declining after that - 55th in 2008, 59th in 2009 and 2010 each, 55th again in 2011, 71st in 2012 and then 58th in 2013.
(With PTI inputs)
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