Over the past week, the BSE Sensex ended on a muted note, showing a marginal gain of 2.25 points at 28,114.56.
Bharti Airtel was the top gainer in the Sensex pack, rallying nearly 7 per cent, followed by Bajaj Finance, Bajaj Finserv, Asian Paints, Titan, TCS and Tech Mahindra. NSE Nifty soared 201.15 points to an all-time closing peak of 17,132.20.
Just ahead of its mega FPO opening to public investors, Vodafone Idea (VIL) has announced closure of its anchor book allocation, raising about Rs 5,400 crore from marquee global as well as domestic investors, according to a statutory filing by the telco. This could be the third-largest anchor book after One 97 Communications and Life Insurance Corporation (LIC). One 97 Communications and LIC had raised Rs 8,235 crore and Rs 5,627 crore in the anchor round, respectively.
In yet another major outsourcing deal, Sunil Mittal-owned Bharti Group on Tuesday entered into a over Rs 580 crore ($125 million) deal with telecom major Nokia to expand the network in eight circles.
Comviva (formerly Bharti Telesoft) is in talks with several telecom service providers, including group company Bharti Airtel, to launch a SIM (or Subscriber Identity Module) card that allows up to 10 users to share the same mobile phone with their own specific numbers.
India's first auction of 5G spectrum, that powers ultra-high data speeds, is currently underway with a total of 72 GHz (gigahertz) of radiowaves worth at least Rs 4.3 lakh crore up for bidding. Billionaire Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Jio, Sunil Mittal-led Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Idea and a unit of billionaire Gautam Adani's flagship Adani Enterprises are in the race to bid for 5G spectrum, that offers speeds about 10 times faster than 4G, lag-free connectivity, and can enable billions of connected devices to share data in real-time. In addition to powering ultra-low latency connections, which allow downloading full-length high-quality video or movie to a mobile device in a matter of seconds (even in crowded areas), Fifth Generation or 5G would enable solutions such as e-health, connected vehicles, more-immersive augmented reality and metaverse experiences, life-saving use cases, and advanced mobile cloud gaming among others.
Jio's spectrum trading pact with Airtel has enabled India's largest telco to top-up its holding in three key circles and yielded potential savings of about $400 million, according to a report. It is pertinent to mention here that Reliance Jio has signed an agreement with Bharti Airtel to acquire a portion of spectrum in 800 MHz band for Andhra Pradesh, Delhi and Mumbai circles at an aggregate value of Rs 1,497 crore -- marking the first such deal between the two telecom giants that otherwise compete fiercely in the market. Market analysts have termed the deal "mutually beneficial" and "win-win for both". UBS in a note cited Jio's spectrum buys in the 800 MHz band in Andhra Pradesh, Delhi and Mumbai in the recently-concluded auctions.
Bharti to spend Rs 1,600 cr for spectrum payout over 10 yrs; Telenor to service its own debt.
Airtel already offers services in Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and 17 African countries apart from India.
The plan coming under 'Super Lifetime Prepaid' offers an Airtel user local outgoing tariff of Re 1 for life. Under this plan, the customer can stay mobile by paying just Rs 999 and they have to use a minimum of Rs 200 every 180 days to continue enjoying lifetime validity benefits.
Maruti, IndusInd Bank, Bajaj Finserv, Eternal, Mahindra & Mahindra, Tata Steel, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Titan, HDFC Bank, and NTPC were among the other major gainers. Bharti Airtel and Sun Pharma were the laggards.
Bharti Enterprises Group CFO Sarvjit S Dhillon said there is more clarity on the regulatory front now, which is a good sign for the industry.
Vodafone has to sell its entire stake in Airtel following new norms issued by government.
For Vittal, who will take over from the current CEO, Sanjay Kapoor, in March, reversing the telco's shrinking revenues and market share will be among the first of the challenges.
Given the ongoing economic turmoil, the DEA has raised concerns that the government may not be able to get the right value for its stake. TCIL has been seeking an exit route for over two years. It first wanted to get the company listed so that it could exit. However, the proposal was turned down by Bharti Airtel, which has 70 per cent stake.
Bharti Airtel was the biggest gainer, rising by over 4.51 per cent. Adani Ports, Sun Pharma, Tata Steel, HCL Technologies, Infosys, JSW Steel and Mahindra & Mahindra were the other big gainers.
It is believed that apart from Bharti Airtel and Bharti Infratel, there are four players that have made a bid.
Bajaj Finserv, IndusInd Bank, Adani Ports, UltraTech Cement, Bajaj Finance, Tata Consultancy Services, Infosys, Bharti Airtel, Hindustan Unilever and JSW Steel were the other big laggards.
Bharti Airtel is rolling out last-mile connectivity with a target of reaching over 20 mn addressable households in 90-100 cities in the next 3 years
From the Sensex pack, Zomato jumped nearly 5 per cent, followed by Titan which climbed almost 4 per cent. IndusInd Bank, Maruti, Tech Mahindra, Adani Ports, Bharti Airtel and HDFC Bank were also among the gainers.
Stock markets will be driven by quarterly earnings by index majors, global trends and the RBI's interest rate decision this week after digesting news on budget proposals and US Federal policy outcome, say analysts. The trading activity of foreign investors and the movement of global oil benchmark Brent crude would also dictate trends in equities. "On the domestic front, the MPC (Monetary Policy Committee) meeting is scheduled from February 6-8.
The government has held back allocating additional spectrum to Bharti Airtel in Orissa, in view of the telecom tribunal's recent judgment that GSM operators have no vested right to get airwaves beyond 6.2 MHz.
Airtel reported a 19 per cent rise in its ARPU in the March quarter, as it removed the non-paying users from its network.
Bharti hopes to make Airtel the country's most-admired brand by 2010. Has it done enough to rise above the clutter?
A source at the CBI told Reuters that officials were likely to file charges related to the broader case as early as Friday but did not specify whether those might included Bharti.
Many users did not know that their entitlement was not coming to their regular bank account but going to an account which they had not applied for.
The idea is to reduce capital investments and improve profitability.
Contractor, Nayak & Kishnadwada, the chosen audit agency, has told DoT in a letter that Bharti has started providing some of the pending information, which is being verified.
The 50 million customers span mobile, broadband and fixed telephone services, with wireless segment estimated to be contributing as much as 96 per cent (47.99 million) of the total base.
From the Sensex pack, Tata Motors, Asian Paints, HDFC Bank, JSW Steel, Hindustan Unilever, Nestle and Titan were the major laggards. In contrast, Bharti Airtel, Power Grid, NTPC, Mahindra & Mahindra, Larsen & Toubro and HCL Technologies were among the major gainers.
Bharti Airtel customers can now avail its 4G data plans starting from Rs 450, down 31 per cent from Rs 650 earlier in Bengaluru, Kolkata, Pune and Chandigarh circles.
Bharti Enterprises, the holding company of Bharti Airtel and other businesses such as insurance and retail is aiming to achieve $10 billion revenue by 2010 and become a strong conglomerate a decade later, its chairman Sunil Mittal said on Monday.
The two also met corporate affairs minister Salman Khurshid, who asked them to keep his ministry in the loop.
Demanding a level playing field for the old operators, Bharti group chief Sunil Mittal told PTI: 'our view is that the spectrum given to us and other operators from time to time is under a policy and there is no question of any additional payment for this.'
A new dimension will be added to the India's growth story by Bharti Airtel's acquisition of Kuwait's Zain Telecom, besides enhancing the country's brand equity
Four of the 10 most valued domestic firms together added a whopping Rs 231,320.37 crore in market valuation last week, with market heavyweight Reliance Industries contributing the most to the overall gains. Last week, the Sensex jumped 884.57 points or 1.61 per cent. While TCS, Infosys and ICICI Bank were the other gainers from the top-10 pack, HDFC Bank, HUL, LIC, SBI, HDFC and Bharti Airtel faced erosion from their market valuation.
The company is also in discussions with state-run telecom major BSNL for sharing passive infrastructure across the country, Bharti Airtel's President Manoj Kohli told reporters after announcing the second quarter results. The company intends to have a minority stake in its tower company after the demerger.
The Indian telecom giant has offered to buy all of the company's African operations except in Sudan and Morocco for $10.7 billion.
