Finance Minister P Chidambaram on Tuesday said the Rs 14,150 crore (Rs 141.50 billion) worth of oil bonds meant for oil marketing companies will be issued within this month.
If crude oil prices stay at current levels, the Indian government would not be required to issue additional oil bonds to the four state-run oil marketing companies in the current financial year, Finance Minister P Chidambaram said on Monday. Oil retailers, however, are unlikely to cut prices of petroleum products in response to falling crude prices unless private retailers like Essar Oil and Reliance Industries Ltd restart operations and offer a lower price.
With an expected earnings growth of 15 per cent, benchmark index Nifty 50 may hit 24,500 level by December 2024 and move further to surpass the level of 26,500 by December 2025, Emkay Investment Managers said on Tuesday. The 50-share Nifty settled at 22,888.15 on Tuesday. In the previous day, it hit a new lifetime peak of 23,110.80.
'The main worry is lots of new investors coming into the markets in order to make a quick buck/easy money.' 'Those things are happening again and have happened in the past as well.' 'All that has led to problems.' 'We are not there yet, but will get there eventually.'
Indian Oil raised prices of commercial LPG, sold in 19 kg cylinders, to Rs 1,108.5 per cylinder on Nov 1, from Rs 1,095.24 per cylinder on Oct 1. Commercial LPG is not subsidised and oil companies revise their prices in line with international prices on the first of every month. "Commercial LPG prices are expected to go up in December too," said an IO official. But prices of automobile LPG have come down by around 5.34 per cent on Nov 1 compared with prices on Oct 1.
With India making it clear that the US doesn't have enough spare capacity for crude oil, Washington, DC, now wants India to sign fixed-term liquefied natural gas (LNG) contracts with American producers, multiple sources in the know said.
Sun Pharma, Tata Steel, State Bank of India, Axis Bank, Tata Motors, Larsen & Toubro and ICICI Bank were also among the Sensex gainers. HCL Tech, UltraTech Cement, Nestle and Hindustan Unilever were among the laggards.
India would neither succumb to the Americans on issues of national security, such as its defence ties with Russia, nor cede ground on its domestic interests in the agriculture and dairy sectors.
'What the US appears to be doing is to force India to be "the buyer of last resort", on whom their products can be dumped, 1.4 billion people have to eat something, so why not eat American corn?' 'What is exercising the Trump lot is the fact that most of the farms are in solidly Republican Midwestern states: Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, Wisconsin,' points out Rajeev Srinivasan.
India is back on the diplomatic table pushing oil producing countries to raise production in a bid to cool down runaway oil prices. Brent crude oil prices traded above $90 a barrel, on Thursday, for the first time since 2014. Brent is the most popular marker for crude oil trade. It is used as a benchmark for two-thirds of the world's internationally traded crude oil.
Appreciation of the rupee has stemmed rising losses of the oil marketing companies, despite the price of the Indian basket of crude oil hovering above $65 per barrel over the last month, against an average of $60 a barrel in March.
"My understanding is that the rules are weighted in favour of big cars, even though smaller cars emit fewer emissions per passenger, use less material, and consume less fuel," Bhargava said in an interview with Business Standard.
Six non-BJP ruled states -- West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Telengana, Kerala and Jharkhand -- have not reduced the VAT on petroleum products, leading to higher prices of petrol and diesel there, Petroleum Minister Hardeep Singh Puri said on Thursday. Puri said in Lok Sabha that the central government has reduced excise duty on petroleum products and some other states, following cues, reduced their Value Added Tax (VAT). Six states -- West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Telengana, Kerala and Jharkhand -- have not reduced the VAT, he said amidst vocal protests by the opposition members.
Expecting oil prices to remain under pressure, Fitch Ratings said deregulation of diesel prices in October will help in lowering the under-recoveries (which is nothing but international petroleum prices minus the subsidised retail rates).
BPCL is a high revenue-earning public-sector undertaking (PSU) and plans to privatise it are completely off the table, Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister Hardeep Singh Puri said on Tuesday after assuming charge of the ministry for the second time. "Why would we divest ourselves of highly successful Maharatnas like BPCL," Puri said, arguing the Centre was not in favour of divesting its stake in oil PSUs.
With the rising price of crude oil, the gap between the desired selling price and the actual selling price -- referred to as under-recovery -- is up to Rs 190 crore (Rs 1.9 billion) a day. The solution is to raise retail prices, an unpopular move.
The Nifty ended with a loss of 52 points at 5,269. BSE market breadth was negative. Out of 2,959 stocks traded, 1,696 declined while 1,148 advanced.
India on Wednesday asserted that its energy purchases from Russia remain 'minuscule' in comparison to its total consumption and that legitimate energy transactions cannot be politicised as energy export from Russia are yet to be sanctioned. The world's third-biggest oil-consuming and importing nation has in recent weeks snapped few cargoes available from Russia at deep discounts as part of its plans to diversify its import basket. These purchases have been commented upon.
A massive drone strike on the world's largest crude-processing facility operated by Saudi Arabia's Aramco has driven oil prices to their highest level in nearly four months. The attack has knocked out over half of Saudi Arabia's production as it cut 5.7 million barrels per day or over 5 per cent of the world's supply.
Corporate India is embarking on an ambitious investment drive, with capital expenditure (capex) expected to double to $850 billion over the next five years, according to a report by S&P Global Ratings. Indian power & transmission, airlines, and green hydrogen sectors would spearhead the spending, the report said.
Indian Oil Corporation, the country's largest petroleum product marketer, has already started selling only premium fuels in nearly 25 of the 50 fuel stations it has in Mumbai, and in almost 10 of 50 outlets in Delhi. Bharat Petroleum Corporation and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation are also planning to follow IOC's example.
This is to compensate for their under-recoveries on the sale of petroleum products during the current financial year. Indian Oil Corporation has been issued oil bonds worth Rs 5,817.27 crore, while Bharat Petroleum Corporation has been issued bonds worth Rs 2,144.32 crore. Hindustan Petroleum Corporation has got bonds worth Rs 2,038.41 crore. Prior to this, bonds worth Rs 60,967 crore had already been issued.
As per the current market price, the government is expected to fetch Rs 5,300 crore (Rs 53 billion) by selling 10 per cent equity or 24.27 crore (242.7 million) shares at discounted price to Oil and Natural Gas Corporation and Oil India Ltd.
Higher crude oil prices have almost doubled the under-recoveries of government-owned oil marketing companies -- Indian Oil Corporation, Bharat Petroleum and Hindustan Petroleum -- in the past three years.
Indian stock markets have experienced some ups and downs in the first half of 2025. However, both the Nifty 50 and Sensex saw steady gains, supported by a healthy economy and better corporate earnings. In this article, we will look at the detailed performance of these key indices and explore the sectors that drove the market rally.
'I would not suggest buying these stocks in the dip, as the upside in profit is dented without a safety net for a rainy day.'
State-owned fuel retailers IOC, BPCL and HPCL are likely to lose Rs 65,000 crore on selling diesel, domestic LPG and kerosene below cost during the current fiscal, Oil Minister Murli Deora said on Wednesday.
The sugar industry is gearing up to offer the entire quantity for the tenders, which will close on September 2.
The three state-owned oil marketing companies say they expect to report losses in the fourth quarter of the 2007-08 financial year with the government likely to bear 42.7 per cent of their retail losses against the 57 per cent it had promised in February. The three companies, IOC, BPCL and HPCL bear revenue losses because they are forced to sell petrol, diesel, cooking gas and kerosene at subsidised prices.
ITC, State Bank of India, HCL Technologies and IndusInd Bank were the other big laggards. NTPC, UltraTech Cement, HDFC Bank and Mahindra & Mahindra were among the gainers.
Markets snapped a three-day winning streak to end lower on Tuesday on profit taking.
Getting compensated for at least 90 per cent of losses without government subsidy appears difficult.
IBP Co Ltd plans to source fuel for its retail network from Reliance Industries Ltd's Jamnagar refinery in Gujarat and the upcoming refinery of Nagarjuna Oil, according to the draft prospectus filed by the company.
"Oil marketing companies are to take decision depending on cost of their imports. It is market related as per as oil market companies are concerned on petrol," Mukherjee told reporters.
The decision came following the intervention of Civil Aviation Minister Vayalar Ravi who met Petroleum Minister S Jaipal Reddy to sort out the issue.
In trade negotiations, as in chess, sometimes you need to accept a temporary disadvantage to secure a better long-term position, points out Sonal Varma, chief economist (India and Asia ex-Japan) at Nomura.