CBI arrests IDBI Chairman, SEBI’s recommendations to FinMin, RBI rejects EC’s plea- Weekly Digest #32

Monday- 23rd January 2017

• The SEBI has asked the Finance Ministry to ease tax rules for stock trading and investments in mutual funds, to help give the equity market a boost. It has suggested lowering the securities transaction tax (STT) for stock trading and reducing the holding period for debt mutual funds to 12 months from 36 months for consideration of long-term capital gains.
• ShopClues has deferred plans for a public listing of its shares to 2018, blaming the government’s scrapping of high-value banknotes for its decision. The company had said it would file for an IPO of its shares on Nasdaq by September 2017. It is now targeting the first quarter of 2018 for the IPO and will seek to raise funds meanwhile.
• An SBI-led consortium of lenders filed a plea in the Supreme Court seeking to be included in the proceedings of the case involving Aircel, saying they would be severely affected if the telco is restrained from earning revenue using its 2G airwaves, which would impact repayment to creditors.
• The CBI on Monday arrested at least 8 people, including former IDBI Bank chairman Yogesh Agarwal and former CFO of now defunct Kingfisher Airlines, A Raghunathan in connection with the allegedly fraudulent loan transaction of ₹950 crore between the company and the bank.
• Uber India has appointed Pradeep Parameswaran, former CEO of cable firm DEN Networks, as the head of central operations, as it is looking to topple market leader Ola after exiting China last year.

 

Tuesday- 24th January 2017

• Bharti Airtel’s Q3 net profit slumped 55% to ₹504 crore owing to free services offered by Reliance Jio and impact of demonetization.
• Resignations at Flipkart continue as Ashish Agrawal and Hari Vasudev, both senior vice presidents engineering, have stepped down from their positions.
• HCL posted a net profit of ₹2,070 crores for the Q3, an increase of 7.8% from a year earlier. Revenue rose to ₹11,814 crores, an increase of 14.2% on YoY basis.
• Muthoot Microfin, a unit of Muthoot Pappachan Group, has raised ₹130 crore growth capital from US-based private equity fund Creation Investments Capital Management LLC as it plans to expand its network and reach across the country.
• AirAsia India’s Chief Financial Officer Ankur Khanna, who was summoned by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in connection to alleged financial wrongdoing at the airline under its earlier head, has resigned barely 10 months after joining the airline.

 

Wednesday- 25th January 2017

• A Fidelity-managed mutual fund has cut dow its valuation of Flipkart shares by 36.1% at $52.13 per share. This will result in the valuation of India’s most valuable internet company at $5.56 billion.
• Maruti Suzuki posted a 47.5% increase in net profits for Q3 at ₹1,744.50 crores owing to strong demand for higher-priced mid-segment models Baleno and Vitara Brezza.
• BSE Ltd’s IPO for $182million has been oversubscribed by 51 times by the last day of the sale, helped by attractive valuations and expectations of robust growth for stocks in the coming years.
• The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) has raised ₹8,500 crores from Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) for 30 years at an interest rate of 7.22% per annum to construct bypasses on national highways and road expansion projects.

 

Thursday- 26th January 2017

• Vodafone has given a contract worth up to $500 million to Nokia for 4G network deployment and expansion, covering 10 of the country’s 22 telecom zones.
• TRAI issued a statement stating that the congestion level on Reliance Jio Infocomm’s network has improved as Idea Cellular and Vodafone are meeting the required norms and providing adequate points of interconnect (PoI) to the new entrant.
• Moody’s Investors Service has downgraded Reliance Communications from B1 to B2 on fears that its debt levels and consequent leverage will remain high for the next six to nine months amid continuing financial pressures.

 

Friday- 27th January 2017

• The RBI has turned down a plea by Election Commission to raise the weekly withdrawal limits for poll expenses. It was proposed to raise the limit to ₹2,00,000 per week to aid the candidates.
• Vijay Mallya may be ousted as the chairman of United Breweries if he does not secure a stay from the Bombay High Court against the Securities and Exchange Board of India’s order barring him from accessing capital markets and holding any position as director in any of the listed companies.
• ITC Ltd reported 5.7% jump in net profit at ₹2,646.73 crores for the third quarter, while revenue from operations grew by 4.7% at ₹13,569.97 crores, owing to continued pressure on the cigarette industry and the demonetization drive.
• The market posted its highest weekly gains in eight months as strong Q3 results alleviated investor concerns over the impact of demonetization. Benchmark indices rose a little over 3.5% this week, their biggest weekly gains since May 2016.

 

Source: The Economic Times
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