India's leading capital goods and engineering firms are in the midst of one of their busiest seasons, with the combined orderbook surging past Rs 8 trillion in value. As on September 30, 2023, 13 of India's top 15 listed capital goods and engineering firms, for which data for the September 2023 quarter was available, had a total orderbook worth Rs 8.45 trillion - a number unseen at least since 2018-19. "This intuitively looks like an all-time high factoring in inflation," said Anupama Arora, a senior independent analyst who tracks the capital goods sector.
Adani Power, part of the Adani group, plans to add close to 6 gigawatts (Gw) of new power assets in the next five years, according to an investor presentation by the company. That is clearly meant to ride on India's burgeoning power demand. But there is another side to it: All of this new capacity is expected to be thermal power, or power produced from coal.
'As these segments are growing at 25 per cent for the last three years, credit quality has been extremely good.'
Stocks of Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited (HPCL), Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited (BPCL) and Indian Oil Corporation Limited (IOCL) have more headroom left despite the sharp run in the last few weeks, suggests a recent report from Morgan Stanley. Stocks of these oil refining and marketing companies (OMCs), it believes, are seeing multiples re-rate as investors reassess long-term growth prospects. "IOCL trades at one year forward P/BV of 1.2x, 19 per cent below +1 standard deviation (SD); BPCL trades at one year forward P/BV of 1.5x, near historical averages; HPCL trades at one year forward P/BV of 1.5x, near +1SD," Morgan Stanley said.
'Banks make money because they take the right credit calls. So they need to focus on risk mitigation rather than risk avoidance.'
In 2019-20, the capital expenditure of Indian Railways (IR) increased 60 per cent over 2016-17. The draft National Railways plan envisages a further increase in IR's capital expenditure, but an analysis by Business Standard shows that IR has come to depend more on borrowings and budgetary support. In 2016-17, while 11 per cent of its capital expenditure (capex) was funded by internal sources, in 2019-20 the ratio dropped to less than 1 per cent. A 2015 Committee on Restructuring Railways had flagged that over-reliance on borrowings could exacerbate the financial situation of Railways.
HDFC Bank's latest shareholding data showed that the room for foreign investment has fallen just 5 basis points short of the threshold set by Morgan Stanley Capital International (MSCI) to fully include the stock in its indices. Currently, the index provider has applied an adjustment factor of 0.5 since the foreign room is less than 25 per cent. Removal of the adjustment factor will result in inflows of a massive $4.8 billion (Rs 40,000 crore) into HDFC Bank, according to Brian Freitas, a New Zealand-based analyst with Periscope Analytics.
Byju Raveendran, the founder and chief executive officer of the beleaguered edtech firm Byju's, said the company credited all pending January salaries to employees over the past few days. This was communicated to the employees in another letter sent on February 4. Byju's has about 15,000 employees. "I know you were told that you would get your salaries by Monday.
'India's emergence as a top crypto market comes despite a regulatory and tax environment that can be challenging for the industry to navigate.'
Banks and companies in India are taking a cautious approach towards Sri Lanka, which, reeling from a financial crisis, has sought a $1-billion loan from the country to import essential commodities. A senior State Bank of India (SBI) executive said the bank was committed (to Sri Lanka) for the long term. "As far as exposures (are concerned), the bank will be cautious on its dollar exposure to Sri Lankan entities till the situation improves," he said.
The government has imposed anti-money laundering provisions on cryptocurrencies or virtual assets as it looks to tighten oversight of digital assets. In a gazette notification, the Finance Ministry said the anti-money laundering legislation has been applied to crypto trading, safekeeping and related financial services. After this, Indian crypto exchanges will have to report suspicious activity to the Financial Intelligence Unit India (FIU-IND).
In FY23, Indian operations accounted for 41.6 per cent of the consolidated revenue of India's top five multinationals, up from 34 per cent in FY18 and 33.2 per cent and 34.2 per cent in FY21.
74 of these fatalities were reported by 8 companies: Coal India (21), L&T (14), Vedanta (13, of which Hindustan Zinc reported 7), Tata Steel (7), Power Grid Corporation of India (7), JSW Steel (6), and ONGC (6).
The country's largest software services firm Tata Consultancy Services on Monday opened the fourth-quarter earnings season with a stellar set of numbers, crossing the Rs 50,000 crore revenue mark for the first time and earning a net income of Rs 9,926 crore, registering a growth of 7.4 per cent year-on-year. The company said its revenue jumped 15.8 per cent to Rs 50,591 crore in the reporting quarter on an annualised basis. Many analysts were expecting the Tata group flagship to report over Rs 10,000 crore of net income and revenue to cross the Rs 50,000 crore mark this quarter.
India's real estate market is poised for growth across categories - residential, commercial, and rental. Currently valued at Rs 24 trillion, or about $300 billion, it is projected to surge to $1.3 trillion by 2034, and then grow further to $5.17 trillion by 2047, indicates a report by the Confederation of Real Estate Developers Associations of India (Credai).
Indians having undisclosed income in the United States (US) may face proceedings under Black Money (Undisclosed Foreign Income and Assets) and Imposition of Tax Act, 2015, this financial year. Also, those named in global leaks may be searched, show-caused, and prosecuted, according to the FY23 internal action plan of the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT). The CBDT has rolled out an aggressive target and timeline to investigate tax evasion matters, especially those involving undisclosed foreign assets.
Banking and telecom will see the highest impact of this transition.
The point made by sociologist M N Srinivas, that it represented a Sanskritic act that was linked to caste, is never raised in Indian debates and the disapproval of drink is almost universal, notes Aakar Patel.
'There is uncertainty regarding job opportunities for our children after they serve for just four years under the Agnipath scheme.'
'There has been a huge shift. Consumer needs and requirements have changed, and differ from city to city.'
'AI is not a new thing for us. We started our AI journey in 2015.'
The Reserve Bank has told the International Monetary Fund (IMF) that the objective of frequent interventions in the forex market is to curb excessive volatility, dismissing the Fund's rationale for reclassifying India's exchange rate regime. The IMF, following the Article IV consultation with the Indian authorities, reclassified the status of the exchange rate regime to "stabilised arrangement" from "floating" for period between December 2022 to October 2023. India's Executive Director at IMF K V Subramanian and Senior Advisors Sanjay Kumar Hansda and Anand Singh questioned the selection period adopted by the Fund for analysis and also reclassification of the country's exchange rate regime.
The RBI was not party to the decision to demonetize 500 and 1,000-rupee notes, which was taken at the highest level of India's political leadership.
Over 100,000 small and medium-sized businesses are non-compliant with e-invoicing norms under the goods and services tax (GST) regime, a mandatory requirement for businesses with an annual turnover of over Rs 5 crore. E-invoicing provides real-time access to invoices that are prepared by the supplier on the purchase of goods, allowing faster accessibility to input tax credit, thereby limiting the manipulation of fake credit as it has to be generated before the transaction. "The default has been reported mainly in businesses with a turnover between Rs 5 crore and Rs 20 crore," a senior official informed
'We are cautious only on sub-sectors that have seen massive melt-up during the past six months.'
With land acquisition completed and infrastructure work streamlined, India's bullet train dreams are slowly, but finally, inching closer to reality.
In a boost to the embattled Adani Group, Mauritian Financial Services Minister Mahen Kumar Seeruttun has told the nation's Parliament that Hindenburg Research's allegations of the presence of 'shell' companies in the Island nation are 'false and baseless' and that Mauritius was in compliance with OECD-mandated tax rules. US short seller Hindenburg on January 24 alleged that billionaire Gautam Adani used shell companies based in Mauritius to manipulate stock prices of his Indian-listed companies.
'The private sector will look to the budget to check whether there are any headwinds or tailwinds.'
The IMF on Tuesday projected a growth rate of 6.1 per cent for India in 2023, which is a 0.2 percentage point upward revision compared with the April projection. This is reflective of the "momentum" from stronger-than-expected growth in the fourth quarter of 2022 as a result of stronger domestic investment, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said. "Growth in India is projected at 6.1 per cent in 2023, a 0.2 percentage point upward revision compared with the April projection," it said in its latest update of the World Economic Outlook.
Even as the slowdown in the information technology (IT) services sector deepens, banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI), as well as oil and gas companies, emerge as the primary drivers of corporate earnings in the country. The IT services sector's share in corporate earnings declined to a five-year low of 17.4 per cent in the second quarter (Q2) of 2023-24 (FY24), whereas banks and finance companies accounted for 46.5 per cent, and oil and gas firms contributed 16.8 per cent. At their peak, IT services firms like Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Infosys, HCLTech, and Wipro represented just over a third of the combined net profit of all listed companies in the Business Standard sample.
The 'Rating Level 4' means that the financial market regulators have all regulatory measures "fully in force"
The total value of assets held by India's financial institutions touched nearly $2.8 trillion, the third largest among BRICS nations, in 2013.
'The fact still remains that we will have to deliver, so the pressure is now on us to make sure we get our resources, our supplies lined up at acceptable costs.'
TCS said FY15 will be a better year in terms of top line growth and the deal pipeline remains strong
The share of foreign companies in private sector investments, directed towards building new factories and other facilities, has declined over the past six months. A mix of large domestic announcements and relatively lower growth in foreign capital expenditure (capex) plans have played a role, although foreign investments remain near record levels. The share of foreign companies in the overall private sector investments over the four quarters ended June 2023 has dipped to 14.9 per cent, as shown by a Business Standard analysis of data from the project tracker Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy.
Crude and gas supply concerns have eased amid reports that Israel and Hamas have struck a peace deal. The International Energy Agency estimates oil demand may drop slightly in calendar 24 but Opec probably has enough pricing power to maintain $80/ barrel Brent prices. Russia's share of India's crude imports remained strong at about 35 per cent in September 2023.
In the June quarter of FY24, 51 per cent of consumers who took small-ticket personal loans already had more than four credit products at the time of accessing yet another new loan, compared with just 17 per cent in the June quarter of FY20, points out Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
Japan's Sumitomo Realty & Development Company will buy a 22-acre land parcel in central Mumbai from Bombay Dyeing for Rs 5,200 crore, the Wadias-run company said on Wednesday. The sale of the land parcel in Worli is one of the biggest land sale transactions in the history of the financial capital.
As corporate India prepares to put its house in order, the transition raises concerns
'I don't think we have ever seen such alignment of everything that we need in the banking sector.'
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