Biz Bits

SBI Life Insurance has been ranked No 1 life insurer in the list of companies whose agents have qualified for the Million Dollar Round Table...

SBI Life tops in MDRT ranking

MUMBAI: SBI Life Insurance has been ranked No 1 life insurer in the list of companies whose agents have qualified for the Million Dollar Round Table MDRT across the globe for the year 2010. MDRT is an association of the world8217;s best life insurance sales professionals. This is the second consecutive year in which the company has topped MDRT. In 2010,SBI Life has 2,904 MDRT members,up from the 2,677 in 2009. SBI Life is followed by the US8217;s New York Life and Korea8217;s Samsung Life Insurance in the rankings. LIC is ranked fourth with 1,218 members.

SBI Funds ties up with OBC

MUMBAI: Oriental Bank of Commerce,with its wide-spread network of 1,533 branches and very strong base of one crore current and savings customers,has formalised its tie-up with SBI Funds Management Pvt Ltd 8211; investment managers for SBI Mutual Fund,one of the largest mutual funds in the country. The customers of Oriental Bank of Commerce would now be offered mutual fund investment products from SBI Mutual Fund.

SIB,UAE Exchange in tie-up

MUMBAI: South Indian Bank SIB has tied up with UAE Exchange to launch 8220;SIB Flash8221;,a real-time remittance facility that enables a remitter to send remittances to SIB8217;s 580 branches. SIB is the first Bank in India to offer an instantaneous remittance facility with an exchange house. According to SIB8217;s Managing Director Dr V A Joseph,this service will enable NRIs to remit funds instantaneously into the beneficiary8217;s account with SIB through UAE Exchange8217;s online banking service. The beneficiary8217;s account will be credited within seconds from the completion of remittance,without manual intervention.

PNB launches three new services

MUMBAI: KR Kamath,Chairman amp; Managing Director of Punjab National Bank,launched 8216;PNB NRI REMIT-INDIA8217; and RET AD technosavy products in Mumbai. PNB NRI REMIT-INDIA is an online cross boarder remittance solution to send money from the US to India. This is in association with the Bank of New York Mellon,New York. RETAD is an online reporting system meant for bank branches authorized to deal in foreign exchange. Kamath also relaunched the PNB World Travel Card in association with MasterCard.

Varun Ind ties up with Australian co

MUMBAI: Varun Industries Limited has entered into an MOU with Cluff Resources Pacific NL,an Australian company to set up a JV for exploration and development of gold,platinum and gem stone projects in Southern Madagascar for which Varun Group holds a mining licence. It has already acquired uranium,oil amp; natural gas and iron ore reserves in Madagascar,said Kiran Mehta,CMD Varun Industries.