Finance Minister Arun Jaitley announced slew of reforms for the masses.
While India has become the largest data generating nation, and hosts more than 152 data centres, it is fed by only 18 undersea cables.
Backing embattled Adani Group, rating agency CRISIL Ratings on Friday said the conglomerate has sufficient liquidity and operational cash flows to meet debt obligations and committed capex and that there has been no negative actions so far by lenders and investors following the US indictment of group founder chairman. The Adani Group, which has the flexibility to reduce certain discretionary capital expenditure (capex) depending on developments in financial markets and future capital availability, has a healthy Ebitda and cash balance that reduces its dependence on external debt to sustain operations, it said in a bulletin.
Only a limited set of investors should invest directly in corporate bonds.
The Budget assumes significance as it comes on the back of lower-than-expected growth numbers during the second quarter and geopolitical uncertainty.
After Chennai, it is Coimbatore, Madurai, and Tiruchirappalli, that are emerging as manufacturing hubs. Coimbatore is India's top Tier-II city in terms of the number of GCCs, according to a report by Cushman & Wakefield.
According to an industry analyst, the telecom infrastructure sector needs over $20 billion, while the passive infrastructure segment needs an investment of over $12 billion.
Two years after his dismissive stance on India's AI potential raised eyebrows here, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman on Wednesday gave a ringing endorsement to Artificial Intelligence momentum in the country -- and billed India as an important market not just for the new-age technology itself but for the ChatGPT creator as well. In New Delhi on Wednesday, Altman -- while sharing dais with Union IT minister Ashwini Vaishnaw -- said India is the second biggest market for the company and that Open AI had tripled its users here in the last year.
'That way you're not hostage just to US sort of exports to India.'
'It may take some time for them to get down to the details, such as the location and capacity.'
'No Budget has so far has addressed the issue of the government's abysmal productivity of capital spending, improving which will be the big game changer. 'But, the government's tight lock on businesses, banks, education, and even essential services like transportation and large parts of infrastructure and healthcare is destroying capital year after year,' points out Debashis Basu.
Srei Infrastructure Finance is set to be the first Indian company to go for Islamic financing for over Rs 200 crore
India's demographic advantage and diverse economic landscape position it uniquely to benefit from AI, the Economic Survey for 2024-25 tabled in the Parliament on Friday afternoon asserted. However, achieving these benefits requires significant investments in education and workforce skilling, supported by enabling, insuring, and stewarding institutions, the state of the economy report tabled by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said.
Elaborating on this theme, Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan pointed out that if the power sector had not been opened up through reforms initiated in 2003, India would still have been in darkness.
When Gensol Engineering made its public market debut through a small and medium enterprises (SME) initial public offering (IPO) in September 2019, its promoters held a commanding 96 per cent stake. Now, that figure has shrunk to a "negligible" fraction.
Corporate bond issuances fell by around 22 per cent in August, despite easing yields as issuers delayed raising funds awaiting the US Federal Reserve to start cutting interest rates from this month. Corporates and financial institutions expect yields to fall further and borrowing costs to become cheaper, said market participants. The US Fed is widely expected to cut interest rates by 25 bps in the 17-18 September meeting, marking the start of a downward interest rate cycle.
Proliferation of home chargers of around 7 KWh and above, which take six to seven hours to fully charge a car depending on the model, bring running costs down by a third or so. That, coupled with the increasing range of modern electric cars, can lead to a massive increase in sales.
JSW Steel, owned by Sajjan Jindal, has emerged as the world's most valuable steelmaker, boasting a market capitalisation (mcap) of nearly $30.31 billion, according to Bloomberg data.
So, what's the problem if our present is screwed up when the future promises to be profitable? It's an Indian habit, notes Shyam G Menon.
In his Budget speech, the finance minister said: "We propose to facilitate higher investment in affordable housing. Affordable housing will now be given infrastructure status, which will enable these projects to avail the associated benefits."
Artificial Intelligence, innovation and next-generation technologies figured prominently during the high-stakes discussion between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and US President Donald Trump at the White House, as the two sides announced transformative measures, including the US-India TRUST initiative, roadmap on accelerating AI infrastructure and INDUS Innovation, to boost tech ties.
The Supreme Court on Wednesday was told that the International Cricket Council (ICC) has agreed to consider allowing three nominees from the Indian Cricket Board (BCCI) to participate in its crucial meeting in Dubai on 2 February.
The Karnataka government on Wednesday put the reservation bill for Kannadigas in private firms on hold amid fierce criticism from business leaders and tech tycoons.
While this will incur a revenue loss amounting to 0.2 per cent of GDP, it will provide a strong boost to consumer sentiment and spending, points out Rajani Sinha.
The Prime Minister's Office has suggested that EPFO should deploy 15 per cent of its funds as loan for low cost housing saying it would generate a credit flow of Rs 70,000 crore (Rs 700 billion).
The United Kingdom extracted USD 64.82 trillion from India over a century of colonialism between 1765 and 1900 and USD 33.8 trillion of this went to the richest 10 per cent -- enough money to carpet London in notes of 50 British pound almost four times over.
The proposed exemption in customs duty on import of lithium, cobalt and other rare minerals in the Union Budget 2024-25 is likely to lower the battery production cost and help in making electric vehicles more affordable for the buyers, auto industry leaders said on Tuesday.
Discussion paper fixes Rs 1,000 cr as minimum capital for these specialised banks
If it was Andhra Pradesh last Budget, it's poll-bound Bihar that has now turned to Centre with a list of demands. How the NDA government is delivering on promises.
India's e-commerce market alone is projected to reach $200 billion by 2026, making it a prime industry for ambitious entrepreneurs, explains rediffGURU Harsh Bharwani.
Isn't there something significant in the UPI example for all of us to learn from and execute to enable world-scale success for our startups?, asks Ajit Balakrishnan.
The most striking features of this Budget was its focus on simplification and improving the ease of doing business in India, asserts Kaku Nakhate.
Had you invested Rs 10,000 each in JSW Steel, Titan Company and Bajaj Finance 20 years ago, when they were just penny stocks (trading below Rs 10), you would have become a millionaire by now.
Only NIIF has stayed the course as a viable infrastructure financing institution.
A vacation bench of Justices M M Shantanagoudar and Deepak Gupta was informed by Guha's counsel that he had tendered his resignation on May 28 to Vinod Rai, Chairman of the Committee of Administrators of the Board of Control for Cricket in India.
For development finance institution to succeed now, the government must stand like a rock behind it and be patient.
With its age-old fascination for education, southern states have done better than the North. Start-ups, IT hubs, and industry majors setting up shop have changed the face of the South. Nearly 79% of global offices set up by international conglomerates in India are in the South. Almost 46% of tech unicorns are from the South. The GDP per person in the South is 4.2 times higher than the North. None of these indicators can be ignored by any central government, whatever the political compulsions, notes Ramesh Menon.
Here is a list of items set to become cheaper and costlier.
