A 25 per cent year-on-year (Y-o-Y) increase in budget allocation towards the roads sector for FY24 has led to renewed interest among investors. However, a combination of escalating costs for Bharatmala and unseasonal rains to some extent have impacted progress. Bharatmala's cost has nearly doubled from Rs 5.35 trillion to Rs 10.6 trillion and the finance ministry has asked MoRTH to go slow until Cabinet approval is received.
After the success of the National Highways Authority of India's (NHAI's) first infrastructure investment trust (InvIT) with foreign institutional investors, the Centre is working on a proposal to launch a fresh InvIT for national highways, where domestic retail investors can hold units of the trust
Union Minister Nitin Gadkari on Thursday said the government will approach the capital market this month to raise funds for road projects. Addressing an event, he said toll revenue of the NHAI will soar to Rs 1.40 lakh crore per annum in next three years from Rs 40,000 crore per annum currently. "This month, I will be approaching the capital market to raise funds for road projects...Our toll income is very good and NHAI's rating is AAA...I am 100 per cent sure that we will get a good response from the capital market," the Road Transport and Highways minister said.
Retail inflation eased to 4.06 per cent in January, mainly on account of a decline in vegetable prices, as per government data released on Friday. The inflation based on Consumer Price Index (CPI) was 4.59 per cent in December 2020.
Actor Amitabh Bachchan has paid up GST of Rs 1.09 crore on sale of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) worth Rs 7.15 crore following a notice by the Directorate General of Goods and Services Tax Intelligence (DGGI), people aware of the matter said. Though Bachchan has deposited the amount, investigations by tax authorities continue, they said. Bachchan had entered into an agreement with Rhiti Entertainment Pte. Ltd, Singapore, for conversion of his content into NFTs by way of an auction.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday said that the Bharatiya Janata Party might conduct the Lok Sabha polls in December itself, claiming that all choppers have been booked by the saffron party for campaigning.
Vegetable rates may ease from September, led by tomato prices, which have started showing signs of correction on the back of increased supply, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Shaktikanta Das said on Wednesday. "Looking ahead, the spike in vegetable prices in July is starting to see a correction, led by tomato prices. "New arrivals of tomatoes in mandis are already softening the prices, coupled with proactive supply management in the case of onions.
Housing sales rose 8 per cent annually during the April-June period to 80,250 units across eight major cities, mainly on increased demand in Mumbai and Pune, according to PropTiger. Sales stood at 74,320 units in the year-ago period across primary (fresh sales) residential markets of the top eight cities. The housing brokerage firm on Wednesday released its Real Insight Residential - April-June 2023 report, stating that housing sales rose in three cities Mumbai, Pune and Ahmedabad but declined in other five major cities -- Delhi-NCR, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Chennai and Kolkata.
Catch up on everything that happened in the country, in images.
State Bank of India (SBI) on Monday raised its benchmark lending rates by up to 50 basis points (or 0.5 per cent), a move that will lead to an increase in EMIs for borrowers. The increase in lending rate comes days after the Reserve Bank of India hiked its benchmark lending rate by 50 basis points to tame inflation. External Benchmark based Lending Rate (EBLR) and Repo-Linked Lending Rate (RLLR) have been raised by 50 basis points while the hike in Marginal Cost of funds-based Lending Rate (MCLR) is 20 basis points across all tenure.
Bajaj Auto's market capitalisation (market cap) hit Rs 2 trillion mark for the first time. The stock of the two and three-wheeler major rallied 6 per cent to hit a new high of Rs 7,420 on the BSE in Tuesday's (January 9) intraday trade after its board approved Rs 4,000 crore share buyback at Rs 10,000 per share. The stock ended the day at Rs 7,093.75, up 1.55 per cent and its market cap a shade above Rs 2 trillion.
There's a lot more to the festival than just five days of celebration; that is something you can only experience when you live in Kolkata. And that's what every Bengali living outside the state misses, notes Chitrangada Datta Chaudhuri.
Durga Puja, the festival that honours goddess Durga and celebrates her victory over the mythological demon named Mahishasura, kickstarts on Sunday.
The National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT) has set aside the penalty imposed on multi-conglomerate ITC by fair trade regulator CCI for not notifying for the acquisition of brands 'Savlon' and 'Shower to Shower' in 2017. ITC had 2017 acquired the antiseptic brand Savlon and the personal care product brand Shower To Shower from Johnson & Johnson Private. The Competition Commission of India (CCI) had on December 11, 2017, imposed a fine of Rs 5 lakh on ITC for alleged failure to give notice under sub-section 2 of Section 6 of the Competition Act.
Manufacturing activities in India accelerated further and touched a four-month high in April, boosted by robust new business growth, mild price pressures, better international sales, and improving supply-chain conditions, a monthly survey said on Monday. The seasonally adjusted S&P Global India Manufacturing Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI) increased from 56.4 in March to 57.2 in April, indicating the fastest improvement in the health of the sector so far this year. The March PMI data pointed to an improvement in overall operating conditions for the 22nd straight month.
The estimated size of the Durga Puja economy could be about Rs 2.75 trillion in 2021 had there been no pandemic, points out Atanu Biswas.
Production of eight infrastructure sectors expanded by 7.9 per cent in September -- the highest in three months -- on account of better show by coal, fertiliser, cement and electricity segments, according to official data released on Monday. In September last year, the growth rate stood at 5.4 per cent. It was 4.1 per cent in August. The previous high was in June when the output expanded by 13.1 per cent.
Euphoric scenes were witnessed when Pope Francis declared Mother Teresa a saint.
Sugar prices are hovering near six-year highs, leaving a bad taste in Indian consumers' palates but sweetening the portfolios of investors in related stocks at Dalal Street. Shares of sugar manufacturers such as Piccadily Agro, DCM Shriram, Magadh Sugar, and Bajaj Hindustan have rallied up to a whopping 200 per cent so far in the financial year 2024 (FY24) as deficient monsoon rains in major sugarcane producer states like Maharashtra and Karnataka are expected to lead to a shortfall in sugar output ahead. In comparison, the BSE Sensex has modestly gained 11 per cent during this period.
Barring crude oil and cement, all other sectors recorded positive growth in November. In October, these core sectors' output had grown by 8.4 per cent. In February this year, the growth rate contracted to 3.3 per cent.
India's economy contracted by 7.3 per cent in fiscal 2020-21. The pandemic, it said, will leave new economic scars and deepen pre-pandemic constraints.
Wholesale price-based inflation spiked to a record high of 15.08 per cent in April on rising prices across segments from food to commodities. The WPI-based inflation was 14.55 per cent in March and 10.74 per cent in April last year. "The high rate of inflation in April 2022 was primarily due to rise in prices of mineral oils, basic metals, crude petroleum & natural gas, food articles, non-food articles, food products and chemicals & chemical products etc. as compared to the corresponding month of the previous year," the commerce and industry ministry said in a statement.
The country's largest lender SBI on Friday reported a 41 per cent surge in standalone net profit at Rs 9,114 crore for the fourth quarter ended March 2022, helped by decline in bad loans. State Bank of India (SBI) had registered a profit of Rs 6,451 crore during January-March period of 2020-21, the lender said in a regulatory filing. Total income of the bank during the March quarter increased marginally to Rs 82,613 crore, from Rs 81,327 crore in the same period of the previous fiscal.
It is not clear whether the two judgements will be concurring or dissenting.
>It's not easy to predict the market. But there are at least two positive factors to back the PSU banks, explains Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
Citing the sharp rise in food prices, economists at a foreign bank have forecast a steeply higher retail inflation print for July, pegging it at 6.7 per cent, up 190 basis points from the previous month. Deutsche Bank India economists led by chief economist Kaushik Das, in a report on Monday ahead of the monthly inflation print and the Reserve Bank's monetary policy review, said that the July consumer price-based inflation index (CPI) is likely to print at 6.7 per cent on-year as against 4.8 per cent in June. The Reserve Bank is widely believed to leave the key interest rates unchanged for the fourth time in its upcoming bi-monthly monetary policy decision on August 10.
The country's largest lender State Bank of India (SBI) on Wednesday reported a 69 per cent jump in its consolidated net profit at Rs 8.889.84 crore for the second quarter ended September 30 on account of decline in bad loans. The bank's net profit was Rs 5,245.88 crore in the July-September quarter of previous fiscal, SBI said in a regulatory filing.
Debit card payments remained sluggish due to the surge in digital transactions after the pandemic, and the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) has emerged as the most popular mode of money transfer, particularly for small value transactions, according to RBI data. In July 2020, the total debit card spends stood at Rs 2.81 trillion, as compared to Rs 3.15 trillion in July 2023, reflecting a growth of 11.96 per cent. UPI spends have seen a whopping growth of 428 per cent, zooming from Rs 2.90 trillion to Rs 15.33 trillion during the same period, the data revealed.
Bandhan Bank said on Monday that it has been empanelled by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to act as an agency bank to facilitate transactions related to government businesses. The RBI's decision will help Bandhan Bank in contributing to nation-building, its MD and CEO Chandra Sekhar Ghosh said. The announcement comes months after a RBI guideline that authorised scheduled private sector banks as agency banks of the regulator for the conduct of government business.
All that happened in India in the past week, in photos.
The department of commerce has urged the agriculture ministry as well as the diplomatic mission in Tehran to apprise it of details as to why Iranian buyers have stopped import of rice and tea from India, a senior government official said. Exporters said that exports of items such as high quality tea and rice have stopped since last week. As of now, there has been no confirmation from the authorities and the response from the embassy in Tehran is also taking time, they said.
Regulator Irdai on Friday directed SBI Life Insurance Company to takeover the policy liabilities of around two lakh policies along with assets of Sahara India Life Insurance Co Ltd (SILIC) with immediate effect. The decision was taken at the meeting of the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (Irdai) in view of deteriorating financial health of the SILIC. "The Authority has identified SBI Life Insurance Company Limited (SBI Life), which is one of the largest life insurers in the country with satisfactory financials, as the acquirer insurer of the life insurance business of SlLIC.
Analysts remain selective on cement stocks amid the likely government's capex push ahead of the scheduled general elections in May 2024. While UBS has initiated coverage on the Indian cement sector with an anti-consensus negative view and suggests investors sell select cement stocks on a rally, those at Nomura remain selectively bullish on the sector and prefer companies with large brownfield optionality and multi-region presence. In the near-term, UBS expects strong earnings of cement companies in the next two quarters to be driven by robust demand and margin tailwinds, but suggests any sharp uptick in stock prices could offer a good opportunity for booking profits in the related counters.
Bharti Airtel on Thursday said its 5G services have gone live in eight cities of Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Siliguri, Nagpur and Varanasi. The customer availing 5G services will have to pay as per their existing 4G plan, it said. "Airtel has been at the forefront of India's telecom revolution for the last 27 years.
'Before Maradona and the 1986 World Cup people were mostly fans of Brazil, but Maradona after the 1986 World Cup divided Kolkata in two halves.'
Jewellers in India, the world's second largest gold consuming country after China, have started receiving more inquiries for purchase of gold or silver immediately after the Reserve Bank's announcement to withdraw Rs 2,000 notes from circulation. However, there is no panic buying of the precious metal unlike the situation witnessed in 2016 during demonetisation, jewellers body GJC said on Sunday. In fact in the last two days, the actual gold purchase has been less in exchange of Rs 2,000 notes due to strict Know your Customer (KYC) norms although sources said some jewellers have started charging a 5-10 per cent premium, taking the gold prices to Rs 66,000 per 10 grams level.
Financial index provider MSCI on Thursday said that it is reviewing the free float status of some Adani Group securities after market participants flagged concerns over eligibility of some of the group firms' securities for its indexes. MSCI defines the free float of a security as the proportion of shares outstanding that is considered available for purchase in the public equity markets by international investors. In a statement, the index provider said that it has received feedback from a range of market participants concerning the eligibility and free float determination of specific securities associated with the Adani Group for the MSCI Global Investable Market Indexes.
New investment projects announced in the manufacturing sector declined in the three months ended June 2023. The value of new projects was lower than in the March quarter, as well as the year-ago period, shows data from project tracker the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE). The new project announcements worth around Rs 85,000 crore in the manufacturing segment in June were a 48 per cent decline from the Rs 1.6 trillion in March and a 66 per cent decline from the Rs 2.5 trillion seen in June 2022.
With sentiment for the automotive (auto) sector turning positive, stocks of two-wheeler auto majors have been hitting their 52-week highs. Hero MotoCorp, Bajaj Auto, TVS Motor Company, and Eicher Motors recently reached their yearly highs on strong sales in the festival season and the expectation of faster growth rates ahead. Since the start of this month, listed two-wheeler majors have delivered returns in the 12-17 per cent range, compared to the 7 per cent gains for the S&P BSE Auto Index and 3 per cent for the benchmark S&P BSE Sensex.
The country's Fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) industry witnessed a consumption slowdown in the December quarter, with an overall "negative" volume growth, as consumers continue to reel under inflationary pressure, says a report. According to the report released by data analytics firm NielsenIQ on Thursday, in October-December, the FMCG industry grew 7.6 per cent in terms of value but its volume growth was (-) 0.3 per cent. "... Overall FMCG volume growth is negative, the absolute values, as well as volumes, continue to be above pre-Covid levels across markets," it said.
