The downgrade reflects its opinion that the fiscal consolidation plan which Congress and the administration recently agreed to "falls short of what, in our view, would be necessary to stabilize the government's medium-term debt dynamics."
Out of 200-odd countries, just 16 nations have the coveted triple-A rating.
A day after Standard & Poor's (S&P) came out with its report on how India could be the first among Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRIC nations) to lose its investment-grade rating, markets shrugged off the concern, ending in the green.
The market for Shariah funds is set to grow with Benchmark Mutual Fund launching the first-ever Shariah Benchmark Exchange-traded scheme in India. It's an open-ended listed index scheme.
Bharatiya Janata Party president J P Nadda on Tuesday asked the party's social media teams to follow the organisation's values and refrain from indulging in lowering the standard of political discourse, "irrespective of what narrative the Opposition chooses".
Venture Capital giant Sequoia India & Southeast Asia has rebranded itself to Peak VX Partners. The VC firm will now manage its assets under management (AUM) in the region of over $9.2 billion across 13 funds independently. The rebranding exercise followed Sequoia Capital's break-up into three independent entities across the globe. Besides Sequoia India & Southeast Asia, Sequoia China business has adopted the name HongShan in English (it will
Jimny will be priced between Rs 12.7 lakh and Rs 15.05 lakh.
From the Sensex pack, Tata Steel declined 3.45 per cent, followed by Tata Motors which fell by 3.19 per cent. Bajaj Finserv, NTPC, JSW Steel, State Bank of India, Larsen & Toubro and Bharti Airtel were among the other major laggards. Nestle, Asian Paints, Hindustan Unilever and Tech Mahindra were the gainers.
The political fall-out of the US downgrade is not over. Republicans and Democrats are both trying to pin the blame on the other party, displaying their great skill in spinning news to score partisan political points.
Anil Agarwal, chairman of the Vedanta group, has not started the New Year on a good note.
The slowdown in private consumption in the economy is taking a toll on the growth of fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG). The net sales growth of listed FMCG companies hit a 14-quarter low of 2.5 per cent in October-December 2023 (Q3FY24). This is the lowest revenue growth for the industry since the June 2020 quarter, when the FMCG firms in the Business Standard sample had reported a 13.2 per cent Y-o-Y decline in combined net sales owing to the lockdown.
In a statement, the state government alleged 'malicious attempts' to discourage the use of products lacking a halal certificate not only seek 'unfair financial benefits' but also form part of a 'pre-planned strategy to sow class hatred, create divisions in society, and weaken the country' by "anti-national elements".
Global rating agency Standard & Poors (S&P) has said that despite the outlook for Indian corporates being stable, a negative bias persists with corporate entities pursuing rapid inorganic growth with leveraged buyouts and debt-supported expansion.
Mergers and acquisitions (M&As) by Indian companies have declined sharply by 80 per cent so far this year, in contrast with the same period last year, as bankers predict lower deal volumes due to falling profit margins of Indian companies and feeble stock markets. The decline in Adani Group shares has also hit buyer sentiment. According to data from Refinitiv, M&As in India stood at $3.3 billion from 253 deals, year-to-date (YTD) - a fall of 80 per cent year-on-year (YoY). Cross-border deals by Indian companies were also down 84 per cent to just $1.5 billion.
The recent surge in crude oil prices could shave off the gains made by India Inc in profit margins in the past few quarters. Worse, it comes at a time when consumer demand in the country is slipping and major global economies are witnessing a slowdown. A back-of-the-envelope calculation suggests that the margin expansion accounted for three-fourths of the rise in the listed firms' operating profit between the April-June quarter (Q1) of FY23 and Q1FY24, and only a quarter of profits gains came from revenue growth.
US-based chipmaker Micron Technology is expecting demand for semiconductors to rise significantly in the next few years, globally and in India, as memory consumption is going up, largely driven by the widespread adoption of technologies like artificial intelligence (AI). "Memory consumption is expected to double by the end of the decade and the biggest driver in this is AI. "While it's natural to talk about compute and GPUs (graphics processing units) in the context of AI, it is not to be forgotten that the true enabler for AI is memory ... in all the AI engines that we talk about, there is a lot of need to access memory quickly," Anand Ramamoorthy, managing director, Micron Technology India, told Business Standard.
Higher inflation has again become a matter of concern for fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) companies. After prices of commodities like sugar and wheat moved higher and stabilised at those levels, the crude oil too surged, adding to FMCG firms' worries. Besides, a dry spell in August in the ongoing monsoon season impacted rural demand.
Behavioural investment experts have their reasons, the media has its own reasons, and I have a combination of all of this, says P V Subramanyam!
Subir Gokarn, Executive Director and Chief Economist at Standard & Poor's Asia Pacific, is heading the shortlist of candidates for the Reserve Bank of India Deputy Governor's post. Gokarn is also a Business Standard columnist.
For the consumer, there would be practically no impact on prices of essential medicines this year.
The safest banks are those that have shown their strength in times of turbulence.
An S&P stock screen identifies the 10 best-performing stocks during a month that saw unprecedented market turmoil
The global rating agencies S&P and Moody's have downgraded the credit ratings for several government-related entities in Dubai on fears about the government's failure to provide timely financial support to them.
Global rating agency Standard & Poor's on Tuesday said tight monetary policy to tame rising inflation will slow down India's growth a bit to 7.5-8 per cent in 2008 and expressed concern about the worsening fiscal situation.
A 4-year study of nearly 300 companies listed on the National Stock Exchange of India found evidence of a positive and significant relationship between corporate governance practices and company performance, S&P said on Wednesday.
'...which is possible through flexicap and multicap funds.' 'The latter has a better balance between large, mid and smallcap stocks.'
Brokerages expect Nifty50 companies to have cumulatively witnessed strong double-digit growth in their earnings in the first quarter of FY24 (Q1FY24). This growth in the combined earnings is expected to have been driven by banks, automakers, and oil & gas companies. Other sectors may report muted profit growth.
Close on heels of the launch of Gift Nifty (earlier SGX Nifty), domestic exchanges are pushing for extension of trading hours for the onshore derivatives market, said sources. Bourses are waiting for a final approval from market regulator Sebi on the proposal to keep the derivatives market open for longer hours, they said. The move is aimed at attracting more trading members for onshore futures and options (F&O) contracts amid risk that global investors could prefer trading at Gift City given the tax benefits.
In a step towards diversifying its resource base and securing green energy minerals, India is poised to launch its first-ever offshore mineral auction in the first quarter of 2024, announced Union Minister of Mines Pralhad Joshi during the launch event of the National Geoscience Data Repository portal. The government plans to hold auctions in March, offering 10-15 blocks for bidding. Meanwhile, the ministry of mines is currently developing rules and regulations for offshore mining.
But says govt finances the weakest aspect of the country's macroeconomic profile.
S&P, which holds 51.4 per cent in Crisil, named Roopa Kudva as the region head for South Asia. Kudva would be part of S&P's Asia-Pacific executive committee, the agency said in a statement. She would continue as the managing director and CEO of Crisil.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is likely to step up efforts to boost consumption and rural economy while keeping inflation under check when she presents her sixth straight Budget on February 1. Experts said one way to boost consumption is to put more money in the hands of people, and one of the possible ways of doing it is by reducing the tax burden through tinkering with tax slabs or increasing the standard deduction. Another proposal is related to increasing the funds under the rural employment guarantee scheme MGNREGA and higher payout for farmers.
We expect the region to record another year of solid growth in 2011, the survey said.
Rating agency Standard & Poor's on Tuesday said fiscal pressures would weigh on India's credit quality. In a report released today, the agency said that a resumption of a timely and sustainable fiscal consolidation plan that resulted in lower debt and interest burden, and further reforms to boost economic growth could improve India's sovereign ratings.
Mayaram said the concerns over the pace of implementing economic reforms were "overstated".
Contraction in mining and capital goods pulls down industrial growth to 0.1%; FM says steps being taken to revive investments.
The rally in the equity markets in the second half of 2023 has led to a sharp surge in the cutoff for stocks to qualify as largecaps and midcaps. On the latest list put out by the Association of Mutual Funds in India (Amfi), the smallest largecap stock now has a market capitalisation (m-cap) of Rs 67,000 crore, 35 per cent higher than in July 2023. In the case of midcaps, the cutoff has surged 26 per cent to Rs 22,000 crore.
The net profit of the listed Adani group companies more than doubled year-on-year (Y-o-Y) in the first half of 2023-24 (H1FY24), even as their revenue declined in this period. The nine firms posted a 107.7 per cent jump in net profit at Rs 23,929 crore in April-September compared to the year-ago period. Net sales, on the other hand, were down 14 per cent to Rs 1.49 trillion in H1FY24, data collated by Business Standard showed.
The officials, sources said, will impress upon rating agencies the resolve of the government to follow the path of financial prudence and bring down the fiscal deficit to 3 per cent by 2016-17.
Consumer durables retailers and manufacturers may end up bearing the cost of the Reserve Bank of India's (RBI's) tightening on easy personal loans, as their margins are expected to be impacted by higher borrowing costs. During the recently passed festival season, consumer durables companies started offering longer tenure loans, zero down payments, and zero interest on a wider assortment of products than ever before, making the products more affordable. While 18- and 24-month easy monthly instalment (EMI) options were available earlier, companies offered them only on select products; now, they are being extended to a larger section of products.
