There was an acceptable domestic performance in India but there continues to be concerns about the Europe business and that overshadows the local performance. The consolidated revenues for the Q2FY24 stood at Rs 55,682 crore with an operating profit of Rs 4,315 crore and an operating profit margin of 8 per cent.
Attributing the growth to an upswing in consumption and investment, the World Bank has said India will continue to be the fastest growing major economy in the world.
Ten of top 15 companies in 1991 were PSUs; now, there are only six. Their revenue share has also fallen from 86% to 45%
Benchmark equity indices Sensex and Nifty closed higher on Friday after two days of fall, helped by buying in metal, telecom and auto stocks amid a firm trend in global markets. Automakers led by Maruti Suzuki India, Hyundai, Mahindra & Mahindra reporting robust wholesales of passenger vehicles and GST collections crossing Rs 1.50 lakh crore for the third straight month in May also added to the optimism. The 30-share BSE Sensex climbed 118.57 points or 0.19 per cent to settle at 62,547.11.
IT consultancy and services provider Patni Computer Systems has acquired US-based The Reference, a financial and investment solutions provider, for $7.5 million in cash, including its 44 existing employees.\n\n
Households may be feeling the pinch of higher inflation but corporate India is enjoying record high margins and profits. The combined quarterly net profit of listed companies scaled a new high in the April-June 2023 quarter owing to a sharp rise in operating and net profit. The expansion in margins more than compensated for the slowdown in revenue growth, which slipped into single digits in Q1FY24 after a gap of nine quarters.
The country's largest lender SBI on Saturday reported a 9.13 per cent rise in consolidated net profit to Rs 16,099.58 crore for the September quarter, weighed down by money it had to set aside for employees' impending wage and pension revisions. On a standalone basis, the State Bank of India (SBI) had a 8.03 per cent increase in the profit after tax for the reporting quarter at Rs 14,330 crore. However, the same was down 15.13 per cent compared to Rs 16,884 crore in the June quarter.
AzaadiSAT had around 75 small payloads developed by schoolgirls of 75 rural schools.
Analysts seem to be generally pessimistic about Bharat Heavy Electricals (BHEL). Out of 15 brokerages with recommendations since May this year, two have 'buy' while five have 'sell' and eight have 'underweight'/'reduce'/'underperform'/'hold' recommendations. The average target price of the public sector undertaking (PSU) is Rs 61. However, the stock has been consistently hitting new highs, which indicates that there is some kind of valuation mismatch.
'Israelis arrested us before this war and continue to do so -- even more so -- now.'
The markets are lackluster today due to lack of buying interest. At this juncture, which stocks and sectors do experts feel one should invest in?
India will require 1,740 planes over the next 20 years.
India's trade account could come under pressure and there could be an inflation push if crude oil prices remain above the $90 per barrel (Brent) for a prolonged period since India imports over 85 per cent of its oil and roughly 50 per cent of its gas. A rebound in economic activity is bound to lead to higher fuel demand. While India is the third-largest importer of crude, it is a net exporter of refined products, which helps to compensate to some degree.
From the Sensex pack, HDFC, HDFC Bank, Mahindra & Mahindra, UltraTech Cement, Tata Steel, Bajaj Finance, State Bank of India, Reliance Industries, Bajaj Finserv and ICICI Bank were the major gainers. Power Grid, Maruti, Tech Mahindra, IndusInd Bank, HCL Technologies and Axis Bank were among the laggards.
Benefitting from the economic rebound, banks are expected to report a healthy bottom-line and asset quality profile in the quarter ended March 2023 (Q4FY23). The net profit of listed commercial banks is projected to grow by an average 43.6 per cent year-on-year (YoY) in Q4FY23 amid better net interest margins (NIMs) and declining credit costs. This is based on a combined assessment of analyst estimates for 17 banks on Bloomberg database.
The spike at private sector lenders like ICICI Bank and Axis Bank follows a push to grab market share from India's dominant state banks.
Within three trading sessions in May, foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) have pumped in Rs 9,461 crore into Indian equities. This follows net inflows worth Rs 7,936 crore in March, and Rs 11,631 crore in April. The trend, analysts said, could continue going ahead as the US Federal Reserve may soon halt its interest rate hike cycle, which will strengthen foreign fund inflows into emerging markets, including India.
Nestle, Infosys, ICICI Bank, Tata Motors, Tata Consultancy Services, HCL Technologies, Tech Mahindra and Axis Bank were the other major winners. Sun Pharma, Asian Paints, Bajaj Finance and Titan were the laggards.
India may soon see a new set of oil barons with lesser-known companies venturing into crude oil and natural gas production. These new kids on the block have come up through a mix of entrepreneurial grit and backing from oil industry veterans. Nippon Power, South Asia Consultancy, PFH (Poddar Family Holdings) Resources and Chennai-based Adbhoot Estates could be the first ones to start production from blocks awarded during the first round of Discovered Small Field (DSF-1) auctions. Adbhoot is in a 50:50 joint venture with the Bombay Stock Exchange-listed Hindustan Oil Exploration Company that has some five oil producing assets and over 10 blocks across the country.
Among the Sensex firms, Asian Paints, NTPC, Tata Motors, Bharti Airtel, State Bank of India, Larsen & Toubro, Wipro, Tech Mahindra, Tata Consultancy Services, ITC, HDFC Bank and Maruti were the biggest winners. Hindustan Unilever, Infosys, UltraTech Cement, Bajaj Finance, Nestle, Axis Bank, Reliance Industries and HDFC were among the laggards.
'Within a short span, it increased attendance, improved children's physical fitness, and led to a rise in the enrolment ratio.'
As banks' chase for customers to collect cheap deposits is not fructifying, they are forced to offer inflation-beating real interest rates on fixed deposits now, and state-run banks led by Punjab & Sind Bank tops the chart offering 8-8.50 per cent per annum deposit rate. Banks are forced to offer inflation-beating deposit rates for a tenor ranging from 200 to 800 days as credit growth has been far outpacing deposit mobilization throughout this fiscal, leading to a funding crunch.
India's industrial production grew in double digit for the second month in a row at 12.3 per cent in June mainly due to strong performance by manufacturing, power and mining sectors, according to official data released on Friday. However, the data showed that the industrial output growth is lower than 19.6 per cent recorded in May this year. It was 6.7 per cent in April.
Moody's expects that India will record the GDP growth of around 7.5 per cent in 2015 and 2016.
The rally in PSBs, analysts feel, was more a knee-jerk reaction to the development, and the actual benefits will start to accrue once the addition takes place in 2024. "The actual benefit for banks from the inclusion in JP Morgan's EM Index will accrue from June 2024 onwards. "Until then, the larger fundamentals of the market will dictate the moves. "Once the initial euphoria subsides, bond markets will look to global cues which may trigger fresh selling," said Siddharth Khemka, head of retail research, Motilal Oswal Financial Services.
'One of the biggest employment generators, the MSMEs, have not got much from the government.'
The jewellery industry has welcomed the government's decision to ban old Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes, saying gold demand will rise as people will have more faith in the precious metal than the currency notes. But the unorganised builders and secondary (resale) property market would be adversely impacted.
Presenting the Budget in Lok Sabha, Sitharaman said the outlay for the Railways is nine times the amount provided in 2013-2014. She said 100 critical transport infrastructure projects for last- and first-mile connectivity for coal, fertiliser and food grain sectors have been identified and will be taken up on a priority basis with investment of Rs 75,000 crore, including Rs 15,000 crore from private sources, she said.
Poor performance of coal, petroleum refinery products and natural gas pulled down the core sector growth to 2.1 per cent in December, 2013 from 7.5 per cent in the same month a year ago.
IT software and services sector firms continue to be on a roll and very much on track to meet the $60 billion exports target by 2010.
India's exports contracted 12.2 per cent to $34.48 billion in December 2022, mainly due to global headwinds, and the trade deficit widened to $23.76 billion during the same period, according to official data released on Monday. Imports in December 2022 also declined 3.5 per cent to $58.24 billion as against $60.33 billion in the year-ago period. In December 2021, exports stood at $39.27 billion and the trade deficit was at $21.06 billion.
State-run telecom public sector undertaking Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd on Thursday announced an investment of a whopping Rs 78,000 crore (Rs 780 billion) in next three years to expand its mobile, basic and broadband operations across the country.
He unveiled the country's ambitious space project's timeline during a media interaction.
If you thought electric scooters have caught the fancy of only people in the metros, think again. According to data from electric two-wheeler maker, Ather Energy, 54 per cent of its sales of scooters, starting from Rs 1.2 lakh, come from Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities. Based on sales per lakh population, the top five cities for the company are Calicut, followed by Kochi, Kolaphur, Trivandrum and Pune.
Two Adani group companies -- Adani Enterprises and Adani Transmission -- have uprooted the traditional leader Reliance Industries in annual wealth creation in 2022 so far, while the top 100 of them created a massive Rs 92.2 lakh crore of wealth, according to a report. However, Reliance Industries has smashed all records to emerge as the largest wealth creator during the five-year period ending March 2022, says the leading brokerage Motilal Oswal in its 27th annual wealth creation study. The Gautam Adani group companies have been rallying to dizzying heights in the year as the group snapped up many assets and diversified into newer areas.
Defence public sector undertakings (PSUs) have been asked by the Centre to hold roadshows in Dubai and Abu Dhabi to share their financials and business plans to reel in investors. Hindustan Aeronautics (HAL), Bharat Dynamics (BDL), Bharat Electronics (BEL), Garden Reach Shipbuilders & Engineers (GRSE), and Mishra Dhatu Nigam (MIDHANI) have informed stock exchanges that they will conduct investor outreach programmes and participate in 'non-deal' roadshows and meetings with prospective investors from September 12-15. They will share their short- and medium-term growth plans, financial metrics, improvement in their stock performance/ market capitalisation - and make a pitch of sorts to prospective investors.
The early bird results for the January-March quarter of 2022-23 (Q4FY23) show a pick-up in earnings growth, despite a slowdown in revenue growth, thanks to a decline in input costs and lower provisioning for bad loans by banks. The combined net profit of 66 companies that have, so far, declared their quarterly results was up 15.2 per cent year-on-year (YoY) in Q4FY23, an improvement from 4.3 per cent YoY growth in Q3. Net sales growth of these companies, however, slowed down to 11.5 per cent YoY in January-March 2023, the slowest rate in eight quarters.
'An area of land has already been earmarked for their protected habitation.' 'There are also steps being taken to take care of the coral zone and mangroves.'
The Indian High Commissioner to the United Kingdom, Vikram Doraiswami, who was touring Scotland this week was blocked from entering a gurdwara in the capital Glasgow by pro-Khalistan extremists.
