BQuick On April 10: Top 10 News Stories In Under 10 Minutes

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This is a roundup of the day’s top stories in brief.

1. Jet Airways: Deadline Extended

Lenders to Jet Airways (India) Ltd. extended the deadline for submission of an Expression of Interest in the airline, minutes before it ran out.

• A person directly familiar with the matter said that two potential investors had expressed interest.
• He declined to specify whether this interest was in the form of a formal EoI or name the parties interested.
• An official for SBI Capital Markets said he would not deny or confirm whether any EoIs were received.
• BloombergQuint had earlier reported that no bid had been received.
• Shortly before the deadline was set to end, SBI Capital Markets said that the last date to submit queries is being extended to April 11 and the final date for submitting EOIs is now April 12.
• The investment banking firm said that bidders can submit their interest over email, but hard copies of the EOI, along with supporting documents, would need to be submitted by April 16.

SBI and SBI Capital also issued clarifications allowing bidders to restructure debt.

2. Wipro: Another Buyback?

Wipro Ltd. will consider a third buyback proposal to reward shareholders.

• This proposal will be discussed at its board meeting scheduled to be held on April 16, according to an exchange filing of India’s third-largest software services provider.
• A buyback can be done only once in 12 months.
• Wipro repurchased shares worth Rs 2,500 crore in 2016 and Rs 11,000 crore in 2017.

Here’s how much Wipro can buy back based on its net worth.

3. A March To Remember For Portfolio Managers

India’s top portfolio managers returned best gains in 15 months in March as equity markets rebounded from February lows.

• The top 50 portfolio management firms with assets of over Rs 1,11,400 crore gave an average return of 6.5 percent over the previous month in March, according to the data disclosed to the market regulator.
• So far in 2019, the top portfolio managers returned average gains of 1.7 percent even as their assets—about 70 percent of the investments managed by 50 out of 332 such firms—increased nearly 9 percent.

Here are the outperformers and underperformers.

4. CLSA’s Nandurkar Raises Nifty Target

India’s stock benchmark NSE Nifty 50 Index is likely to cross 12,000 in the next few months, according to CLSA’s India strategist.

• Mahesh Nandurkar revised the target higher based on rising investor confidence, improving liquidity and earnings optimism.
• The foreign brokerage had an earlier year-end target of 11,000.
• The growth will be mainly driven by the banking and financial industry, he said.

Nandurkar expects India Inc. to post a 15-20 percent earnings growth this fiscal.

5. Sensex Falls, U.S. Stocks Rise

Indian equity benchmarks ended lower after a volatile trade.

• The benchmark indices were dragged by Housing Development Finance Corporation Ltd. and HDFC Bank Ltd.
• The S&P BSE Sensex ended 0.91 percent or 353.87 points lower at 38,585.35.
• The NSE Nifty 50 Index closed below 11,600 after declining 0.75 percent.
• Eight out of 11 sectoral gauges compiled by the NSE ended lower.

Follow the day’s trading action here.

U.S. stocks edged higher with the dollar, while Treasuries advanced as investors weighed key developments that continue to raise doubts about the strength of the global economy.

• The S&P 500 sought to rebound from its first loss in nine days, with an unexpectedly soft inflation reading potentially boosting the Federal Reserve’s new wait-and-see approach to rate hikes.
• Minutes from the central bank’s last policy meeting when it struck a freshly dovish tone are due at 2 p.m. in New York.
• The dollar advanced versus the euro after the European Central Bank reiterated its warnings that global risks continue to batter the region’s economy as it signaled no rate hikes for the rest of 2019.
• The pound edged higher as the European Union looked likely to delay Brexit for up to a year at its emergency summit in Brussels.
• West Texas Intermediate crude increased 0.5 percent to $64.30 a barrel.

Get your daily fix of global markets here.

6. Vodafone Idea Rights Issue: Band-Aid Solution?

India’s largest telecom company plans to raise as much as Rs 25,000 crore from its latest rights issue at less than a tenth of its valuation to pare debt and fight disruption brought about by the newest entrant in the sector.

• The promoters of Vodafone Idea Ltd.—Vodafone Plc. and Aditya Birla Group—valued the company at nearly Rs 92,000 crore, or Rs 130 per share, nearly two years ago when the merger between Vodafone India and Idea Cellular Ltd. was announced.
• The company now looks to raise funds from existing investors at Rs 12.5 per share in the two-week long issue which opens on April 10.
• The issue is priced at a discount, allowing existing investors to boost their holdings at a lower price, but Deven Choksey, managing director of KRChoksey, said the stock won’t generate returns soon.

Vodafone-Idea has a mountain of debt and the issue will only reduce it by a fifth.

7. Auto Sales Recover, But...

Auto sales rose in March led by demand for two-wheelers and inventory levels fell, aided by production cuts after volumes declined in February.

• Sales increased across categories month-on-month, with two-wheeler volumes jumping 10 percent, according to the data released by Federation of Automobile Dealers Associations.
• Two-wheeler inventory nearly fell by half over the previous month. Inventory had piled up in February as sales fell across categories.
• Still, volumes declined over March last year, signalling that the slowdown is far from over.
• And FADA acknowledged that the recovery in March was largely because of the production cuts by the automakers.

FADA expects sales to stay in the current range till elections conclude.

8. Supreme Court Allows Use Of Leaked Documents In Rafale Case

The Supreme Court, in a unanimous judgment, allowed new evidence to be taken into the record for the hearing of a review petition in the Rafale case.

• A three-judge bench led by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi dismissed the preliminary objections by the central government concerning admission of the confidential documents concerning the purchase of 36 Rafale fighter jets.
• The apex court is yet to announce a date for hearing the review petition.

The petitioners sought to include fresh documents which, according to them, revealed irregularities in the deal.

9. Vedanta Could Face Lawsuits In U.K.

More than 1,800 Zambian citizens can sue Vedanta Ltd. and its subsidiary in England over alleged pollution in Zambia, the U.K. Supreme Court ruled today.

• The citizens of Chingola district in Zambia initiated a suit against Vedanta and Konkola Copper Mines in a U.K. court in 2005, alleging that their health and agriculture was damaged due to the discharge of toxic matter from the company’s mine into their waterways.
• Vedanta and Konkola Mines challenged the jurisdiction of U.K. courts to hear the case, which was dismissed by the high court and court of appeals in 2017.
• The company then appealed these ruling before the nation’s highest court.

The court said there are two ‘access to justice’ issues in Zambia. Find what they are.