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It's a Saturday morning, and you get a Whatsapp message. Is it your partner or friends asking about weekend plans? Oh, it's your insurance company!

Bharti AXA General Insurance announced on February 26 that it has started delivering policies and renewal premium to its customers through the instant messaging platform.

The insurer joins a list of companies like ICICI Prudential Life Insurance, Future Generali India Insurance, Bajaj Allianz General Insurance and Aditya Birla Health Insurance among others to offer products and services to customers.

In July 2019, Niti Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant had said that WhatsApp had 400 million active users in India. For insurers this seems like a golden opportunity, considering that insurance policies are a 'push' product in India where customers need to be nudged to buy it.

Indians are hooked to WhatsApp for personal and professional communication with workplace colleagues. Banks and mutual funds have also jumped on to the bandwagon, offering services on the messaging platform. So why will insurers back off?

Not only policy documents are being sent over WhatsApp, but customers are also allowed to submit claim documents and pictorial evidence for motor claims over these chats. For insurers, 'cross-selling' is the biggest opportunity on chat platforms.

The heads of sales at a Mumbai-based insurer told Moneycontrol that ever since a majority of users opted for the telecom regulator's 'Do Not Disturb' or DND service, it has been tough to contact customers to sell relevant products. Though insurers also experimented with Facebook and Twitter to contact customers, companies tasted little success.

WhatsApp does not have such DND service to bar promotional messages. The platform usually displays it as a 'business account' if it is registered that way. This is being used as a sales advantage. If the policyholder clicks on a link, insurers would get access to offering products and services on the chat platform.

WhatsApp is different. Young professionals in the age group of 25-30 years, who are the main target segment of insurance companies, are prolific users which also lessens the chances of them missing the message.

A study by smartphone brand Vivo and Cybermedia Research in December 2019 showed that an average Indian spent 1/3rd of their waking hours (the time a person is awake) on their phone, which translated to 1,800 hours a year.

With a high likelihood of a prospective customer rejecting insurers' calls by tracing identity details from apps like Truecaller, using WhatsApp has now become the top choice for companies.

However, just like the multiple pesky calls you would keep blocking on your smartphone, WhatsApp calls from sales-persons could soon become a reality. It could get worse if you are added to random WhatsApp groups for 'cross-selling' and promotional offers.

Why just insurers? Other financial services firms have already started using WhatsApp. These entities could soon be joined by real estate firms, retailers, food delivery apps and even the infamous eyewear brands who are ready to make the switch to chat platforms. It could be easy to ignore multiple text messages sent to lure customers. But over chat, this would be tough to miss.

But what about the dangers of over-use of technology?

While companies claim that all service requests and policy documents are encrypted, a smartphone being hacked is not uncommon. In fact, even Amazon's Jeff Bezos fell prey to a situation after private texts and pictures were leaked.

The young Indian is technologically savvy, but since they consume a lot of content on their smartphones, there are potential threats of data theft by hackers. Merely clicking on an unknown link could give access to your phone to third-party users who could then also control the device.

Insurance companies in India are yet to address these concerns. Also, within services offered on instant messaging platforms, there is no clarity on which set of insurance employees are able to access your personal data shared over chats.

For older customers, there are other challenges. Someone who has just started using WhatsApp at the age of 50 could find it a challenge to navigate the application. Here if a policy document or claim intimation would be over this messaging app, chances are that the customer could be unable to access it. A few incorrect steps would either lead to a wrong policy purchase or even rejection of a claim.

Physical services of insurance are still available. But if the idea is to make the process simpler and faster, it should be accessible to all.

Keeping in touch is a good practice. But when it comes to persistent insurance salespersons, maintaining a safe distance looks like a better option at least on WhatsApp.

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Industry needs to focus on sustainable packaging materials as one can not allow them to be a source of waste to spoil the environment, a top government official said on Thursday.

Commerce Secretary Anup Wadhawan said that packaging material should be biodegradable, re-usable and recyclable.

"We need to focus on this aspect. We cannot allow packaging to be a source of waste... littering the environment, spoiling the ecosystem and cause potential damage to animals," he said.

He was addressing a national conference on packaging, organised by Indian Institute of Packaging (IIP) here.

"We need to address this by making right choice of material," he said.

Further, Wadhawan said that there was a need encourage entrepreneurship and skilling to promote growth of the sector.

Speaking about the sector, IIP Joint Director Madhab Chakraborty said that the current Indian market size of the sector is about USD 32 billion.

He said three new centres of the institute are coming up at Guwahati, Bangalore, and Andhra Pradesh.

"We have got land for all these three centres," he said adding that there was huge demand in the sector for industry to work on innovative environment-friendly materials.

The IIP is a national apex body which was set up in 1966 by the packaging and allied industries and the Ministry of Commerce with the specific objective of improving the packaging standards in the country.

The institute is an autonomous body working under the administrative control of the ministry.

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The central government has released Rs 19,950 crore as GST compensation to states, taking the total amount released to them to over Rs 1.2 lakh crore. In a statement, the finance ministry said Rs 19,950 crore was released to states and union territories last Monday.

When the Goods and Services Tax (GST) came into force in July 2017, states, which lost powers to levy taxes such as VAT, were guaranteed to be compensated for any loss of revenue in the first five years of GST implementation.

This compensation was to come out of a pool that is to be created by levy of cess on certain sin and luxury goods over and above the GST tax rate. The shortfall is calculated assuming a 14 percent annual growth in GST collections by states over the base year of 2015-16.

"With this release of GST compensation, the central government has released a total of Rs 1,20,498 crore towards GST compensation to the states/UTs during current fiscal," the statement said.

The money released compares to only Rs 78,874 crore having been collected as compensation cess in the current FY (till January 31, 2020).

Finance Ministry officials said total GST compensation cess of Rs 62,611 crore was collected in the FY 2017-18, out of which Rs 41,146 crore was released to the states/UTs that fiscal as GST compensation.

In FY 2018-19, Rs 95,081 crore was collected as GST compensation cess of which Rs 69,275 crore was released to the states/UTs as GST compensation.

Officials said that as on March 31, 2019, an amount of Rs 47,271 crore compensation cess collected had remained unutilised after the release of GST compensation to the states/UTs in the 2017-18 and 2018-19.

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There is an almost daily swing on market sentiment as traders grapple with the bigger picture implications of COVID-19. The dissemination of newsflow out of China is looking to be more positive. Although the total number of deaths has topped 2000, the numbers of daily new cases and deaths are now falling. Furthermore, the official information is that Chinese businesses are getting back to work following weeks of shutdown and quarantine. Traders are faced with a dilemma of whether they can rely on the official data. Levels of pollution and electricity usage have been often used as more reliable gauges in the past and will need to be watched as to whether they marry up with the official data. It does seem as though knee-jerk reactions to bad news (Apple’s revenue warning being the latest) tend to last for a day or so before traders refocus on the dovish leanings of central banks and a continued tendency to “climb the wall of worry”. For markets, there is a more settled outlook to sentiment forming today. Through all of this, the dollar remains a go-to destination of capital choice, whilst gold is also playing strongly. What is interesting though, is that sentiment on the oil markets has turned a corner, with an appetite to buy into weakness now increasingly prevalent.

Wall Street closed lower last night with the S&P 500 -0.3% at 3370. However, with US futures looking perky today, around +0.3% back higher, this is allowing a decent Asian session (Nikkei +0.9%, Shanghai Composite -0.3%). European markets are taking this positively, with FTSE futures +0.7% and DAX futures +0.6% pointing to decent early gains today. In forex, there is a positive risk skew to majors, with JPY underperforming and a rebound for AUD and NZD. Once more we see EUR supported early in the European session, but can the cycle of sell-offs be broken and be translated into a recovery?  In commodities, gold continues to climb higher by +$3 (+0.2%), whilst oil is also supported and is over half a percent higher.

The key data on the economic calendar kicks off with UK CPI at 0930GMT. Headline UK CPI is expected to fall by -0.4% in January but this would still mean a year on year improvement to +1.6% (from +1.3% in December). Core UK CPI is expected to drop by -0.6% on the month but the year on year reading is expected to increase slightly to +1.5% (from +1.4% in December).  Into the afternoon, the focus is on inflation for the US, but this time it is the PPI, or factory gate inflation. US PPI is at 1330GMT and is expected to see headline PPI increase to +1.6% in January (from +1.3% in December), whilst core PPI is expected to pick up to +1.3% (from +1.1% in December). US Building Permits at 1330GMT are expected to increase slightly to 1.450m (from +1.420m in December). US Housing Starts are expected to fall to 1.425m (from 1.608m in December). The FOMC minutes for the January meeting are at 1900GMT where the focus will be on what the Fed had to say about the impact of the Coronavirus and inflation.

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Union Coal and Mines Minister Pralhad Joshi has announced that the government looks to stop the substitutable import of thermal coal from 2023-24. The government wants to bridge the substitutable shortfall by 2023-24, he told PTI on the sidelines of a two-day brainstorming session organised at Kevadia in neighbouring Bharuch district, about 90 km from Vadodara.

The government recently introduced an ordinance to amend regulations to open up coal mining to other firms outside the steel and power sectors, Joshi stated.

"Whatever the substitutable shortfall is there, we want to achieve it by 2023-2024. We want to stop the substitutable import of the coal."

The government may conduct an auction of 100 fully explored blocks, Joshi said. The latest move in the coal sector is expected to create an efficient energy market, thereby bringing more competition, while reducing coal imports.

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The Japanese yen fell against the U.S. dollar on Wednesday in Asia, while the Chinese yuan inched up as traders continued to focus on developments on the coronavirus front.

The USD/JPY pair gained 0.2% to 110.04 by 1:30 AM ET (05:30 GMT) as the Japanese yen lost some safe-haven appeal due to the uptick in Asian stocks today.

The USD/CNY pair rose 0.1% to 7.0012. The People's Bank of China (PBOC) has set the Yuan reference rate 7.0012 at versus Tuesday's fix at 6.9826.

Meanwhile, the US dollar index that tracks the greenback against a basket of other currencies inched up 0.1% to 99.370.

The Hubei province reported 132 deaths for Feb. 18. So far, China has 74,186 confirmed cases of the virus, according to government data.

While the new cases in Hubei fell for a second day, the World Health Organization cautioned that "every scenario is still on the table" in terms of the epidemic's evolution, and that it was too earlier to know if the epidemic was being contained.

"The market is trying to model itself on coronavirus and it's struggling really hard to understand how that goes and that's pushing capital in to the U.S.," said Chris Weston, head of research at Melbourne brokerage Pepperstone, in a Reuters report.

"The U.S. remains that least-dirty T-shirt, the best house in a fairly shabby-looking neighborhood. As a destination for capital, it's still the light that you look for."

The EUR/USD pair steadied at 1.0793 after falling to near a two-year low yesterday as investor sentiment in Germany deteriorated more than expected in February, adding to concerns about the ongoing weakness in the euro zone.

The Japanese yen fell against the U.S. dollar on Wednesday in Asia, while the Chinese yuan inched up as traders continued to focus on developments on the coronavirus front.

The USD/JPY pair gained 0.2% to 110.04 by 1:30 AM ET (05:30 GMT) as the Japanese yen lost some safe-haven appeal due to the uptick in Asian stocks today.

The USD/CNY pair rose 0.1% to 7.0012. The People's Bank of China (PBOC) has set the Yuan reference rate 7.0012 at versus Tuesday's fix at 6.9826.

Meanwhile, the US dollar index that tracks the greenback against a basket of other currencies inched up 0.1% to 99.370.

The Hubei province reported 132 deaths for Feb. 18. So far, China has 74,186 confirmed cases of the virus, according to government data.

While the new cases in Hubei fell for a second day, the World Health Organization cautioned that "every scenario is still on the table" in terms of the epidemic's evolution, and that it was too earlier to know if the epidemic was being contained.

"The market is trying to model itself on coronavirus and it's struggling really hard to understand how that goes and that's pushing capital in to the U.S.," said Chris Weston, head of research at Melbourne brokerage Pepperstone, in a Reuters report.

"The U.S. remains that least-dirty T-shirt, the best house in a fairly shabby-looking neighborhood. As a destination for capital, it's still the light that you look for."

The EUR/USD pair steadied at 1.0793 after falling to near a two-year low yesterday as investor sentiment in Germany deteriorated more than expected in February, adding to concerns about the ongoing weakness in the euro zone.

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The dollar stood tall over the languishing euro and heavily sold exporter currencies on Wednesday, as investors reckoned with a deepening economic fallout from the coronavirus.

The new coronavirus has caused 2,004 deaths in China and infected more than 74,000 people, while measures to contain it have paralyzed the economy and the supply chains it feeds.

Apple Inc (O:AAPL) has warned it will probably miss its March quarter sales guidance amid disrupted production and shopping habits. Car makers are idling plants for lack of parts.

The yield curve between U.S. three-month bills and 10-year notes inverted overnight, a bearish economic signal, and German investor confidence slumped as its economy stagnates, sending the euro cheaper than $1.08 for the first time since 2017.

"The market is trying to model itself on coronavirus and it's struggling really hard to understand how that goes and that's pushing capital in to the U.S.," said Chris Weston, head of research at Melbourne brokerage Pepperstone.

"The U.S. remains that least-dirty T-shirt, the best house in a fairly shabby-looking neighborhood. As a destination for capital, it's still the light that you look for."

Against a basket of currencies, the greenback is sitting by a four-month high at 99.452 (=USD). It touched a one-week high against the Australian and New Zealand dollars overnight.

Both Antipodean currencies are heavily exposed to China, and both have lost roughly 5% against the dollar this year . Norway's krone, sensitive to the global growth outlook via oil exports, has shed 6% in 2020 and slumped to an 18-year low overnight .

The euro (EUR=) has fallen 3.7% amid increasing signs of divergence between the European and U.S. economies.

The single currency last bought $1.0796. Moves in major currencies were slight in morning trade.

China says figures indicating a slowdown in new cases in recent days show the aggressive steps it has taken to curb travel and commerce are slowing the spread of the disease beyond central Hubei province and its capital, Wuhan.

That has not stopped worries mounting, with hedge funds turning to proxies from railway movements to port activity and air pollution to try and gauge how much production remains offline.

Gold is sitting above $1,600 an ounce for the first time since U.S.-Iran tensions in the Middle East sent it spiking in early January . Priced in euros, gold's value jumped almost 2% to a record high overnight (XAUEUR=R).

Investors are looking to the minutes from the Federal Reserve's January meeting, due to be released at 1900 GMT, for insight in to the Fed's thinking about virus risks.

European purchasing managers index numbers and part-month Korean export figures, both due on Friday, are also going to be closely watched for the first hard signs of economic impact.

"We assess the risks are firmly skewed towards the negative effects of COVID-19 lasting longer," Nomura analysts wrote in a note, using the World Health Organization's designation for the illness caused by the coronavirus.

"Therefore, we maintain our cautious view through positions in long USD/THB, long USD/CNH, long USD vs GBP, NZD and long AUD/NZD."

China's yuan was last steady at 7.0017 per dollar in offshore trade .

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The dollar stood tall over the languishing euro and heavily sold exporter currencies on Wednesday, as investors reckoned with a deepening economic fallout from the coronavirus.

The new coronavirus has caused 2,004 deaths in China and infected more than 74,000 people, while measures to contain it have paralyzed the economy and the supply chains it feeds.

Apple Inc (O:AAPL) has warned it will probably miss its March quarter sales guidance amid disrupted production and shopping habits. Car makers are idling plants for lack of parts.

The yield curve between U.S. three-month bills and 10-year notes inverted overnight, a bearish economic signal, and German investor confidence slumped as its economy stagnates, sending the euro cheaper than $1.08 for the first time since 2017.

"The market is trying to model itself on coronavirus and it's struggling really hard to understand how that goes and that's pushing capital in to the U.S.," said Chris Weston, head of research at Melbourne brokerage Pepperstone.

"The U.S. remains that least-dirty T-shirt, the best house in a fairly shabby-looking neighborhood. As a destination for capital, it's still the light that you look for."

Against a basket of currencies, the greenback is sitting by a four-month high at 99.452 (=USD). It touched a one-week high against the Australian and New Zealand dollars overnight.

Both Antipodean currencies are heavily exposed to China, and both have lost roughly 5% against the dollar this year . Norway's krone, sensitive to the global growth outlook via oil exports, has shed 6% in 2020 and slumped to an 18-year low overnight .

The euro (EUR=) has fallen 3.7% amid increasing signs of divergence between the European and U.S. economies.

The single currency last bought $1.0796. Moves in major currencies were slight in morning trade.

China says figures indicating a slowdown in new cases in recent days show the aggressive steps it has taken to curb travel and commerce are slowing the spread of the disease beyond central Hubei province and its capital, Wuhan.

That has not stopped worries mounting, with hedge funds turning to proxies from railway movements to port activity and air pollution to try and gauge how much production remains offline.

Gold is sitting above $1,600 an ounce for the first time since U.S.-Iran tensions in the Middle East sent it spiking in early January . Priced in euros, gold's value jumped almost 2% to a record high overnight (XAUEUR=R).

Investors are looking to the minutes from the Federal Reserve's January meeting, due to be released at 1900 GMT, for insight in to the Fed's thinking about virus risks.

European purchasing managers index numbers and part-month Korean export figures, both due on Friday, are also going to be closely watched for the first hard signs of economic impact.

"We assess the risks are firmly skewed towards the negative effects of COVID-19 lasting longer," Nomura analysts wrote in a note, using the World Health Organization's designation for the illness caused by the coronavirus.

"Therefore, we maintain our cautious view through positions in long USD/THB, long USD/CNH, long USD vs GBP, NZD and long AUD/NZD."

China's yuan was last steady at 7.0017 per dollar in offshore trade .

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As Chhattisgarh government focuses on diversifying from core industries such as mineral and steel to strategically important areas like agro and food processing, IT and defence Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel has invited American companies to invest across key sectors in the state.

Baghel, currently on a multi-city visit to the US, highlighted his state's investor-friendly and ease of doing business policies as he met representatives of various sectors and members of diaspora from the state inviting them to visit and invest in Chhattisgarh.

"We are a mineral rich state and have several mineral based-industries. We invite companies and investors from America to come and explore core sectors” as well those sectors and regions where there is untapped potential, Baghel told PTI in an interview.

Baghel, accompanied by a high-level official delegation, had over the weekend addressed students at the India Conference at Harvard. He addressed a business lunch Tuesday organized by the Consulate General of India in New York and the US India Strategic Partnership Forum (USISPF).

Baghel said over the next few years his government will focus on strengthening the purchasing power of people in his state.

The state government is also committed to poverty eradication and diversifying from core sectors such as minerals, steel, power to sectors of strategic importance such as agro and food processing, IT, bio ethanol, electronics, textile and apparel, engineering and defense, higher education, pharma and automobile and electric vehicles.

“My target is to see how to increase the purchasing power of the people. No matter how many industries we set up, if people do not have money to buy the products, then what is the benefit of the industries,” he said.

Baghel said that in order to maintain this balance, it is very important to increase the purchasing power, which will in turn benefit businesses and industries.

He underlined that the state government will work towards strengthening the purchasing power of the people, which will ensure demand and then the wheels of the industry will start turning and production will take off.

The state government is looking at making the citizens economically self-sufficient, create demand and let the industry move in to fulfill that demand.

He noted that Chattisgarh is rich in natural resources such as dense forest cover, water and mineral resources yet poverty is still prevalent in some areas. “Poverty eradication is most important. Sectors such as health, education and agro-based industries will help generate new job opportunities as well as increase people's income,” he said.

The state, which has a strong presence of several core sectors industries, is focussed on diversifying from the core areas to non-core areas.

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India has emerged as the fifth-largest world economy in 2019, overtaking the UK and France, as per a report by US-based think tank World Population Review.

"India's economy is the fifth-largest in the world with a gross domestic product (GDP) of $2.94 trillion, overtaking the UK and France in 2019 to take the fifth spot," it said.

The size of the UK economy is $2.83 trillion and that of France is $2.71 trillion.

In purchasing power parity (PPP), India's GDP is $10.51 trillion, exceeding that of Japan and Germany. Due to India's high population, India's GDP per capita is $2,170 (for comparison, the US is $62,794), it said.

India's real GDP growth, however, it said is expected to weaken for the third straight year from 7.5 per cent to 5 per cent.

The think-tank in its review that India is developing into an open-market economy from its previous closed and inward "autarkic" policies.

The report observed that India's economic liberalisation began in the early 1990s and included industrial deregulation, reduced control on foreign trade and investment, and privatisation of state-owned enterprises.

"These measures have helped India accelerate economic growth," it said.

India's service sector is the fast-growing sector in the world accounting for 60 per cent of the economy and 28 per of employment, the report said, adding that manufacturing and agriculture are two other significant sectors of the economy.

The US-based World Population Review is an independent organisation without any political affiliations.