, Columnist
Anguish in the Shadows for India
`Human ATMs' are on the way out, and the rural economy is slowing.
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India's bleary-eyed bankers are raking it in. The outlawing of large-denomination bills led to angry lines at ATMs and long working hours for tellers, but it also triggered a stampede of deposits, lowering the banks' cost of funding.
There's another corner of finance, though, where New Delhi's gamble to ferret out undisclosed wealth by banning 500 and 1,000-rupee banknotes is causing distress -- the world of shadow banks that make small loans, sometimes against gold, but usually without requiring any collateral.