BQuick On Oct. 9: Top 10 Stories In Under 10 Minutes
Top news, must-read stories and columns—all served up in less than 10 minutes.
This is a roundup of the day’s top stories in brief.
1. TCS’ Brief Coronation
Tata Consultancy Services Ltd. surpassed Accenture for the first time in a year to become the world’s most valuable information technology company, but only briefly.
As of Thursday’s close, the market capitalisation of the Tata Group flagship stood at $144.7 billion compared with Accenture’s $143.75 billion, according to Bloomberg data.
But TCS failed to hold the top spot as its stock fell 0.45% on Friday, taking its market cap down to $140 billion.
Find out more in this chart of the day.
2. Unconfirmed Bids, Glitches May Result In Vedanta Delisting Failure
The delisting of Anil Agarwal-led Vedanta Ltd. has seen a change in fortune in the late evening hours of Oct. 9.
At about 3:30 p.m. the metals major looked set to receive more than the 134.12 crore shares needed for its promoter to cross the 90% threshold required for a successful delisting.
At that time, public shareholders had tendered 137.1 crore of the total 169.73 crore shares held by them, though some bids were pending confirmation from custodians.
The bidding was to have closed then but due to glitches earlier in the day, on account of which some shareholders reportedly faced trouble in tendering shares, the Bombay Stock Exchange extended the bidding till 7 p.m.
By 7:35 p.m., the BSE website showed that only 125.47 crore shares were confirmed to be tendered and bids worth 12.31 crore shares were yet to be confirmed.
The reasons for why they remain unconfirmed are yet to be clear.
3. MPC Pauses, RBI Steps Up
India’s Monetary Policy Committee kept interest rates unchanged at its latest meeting, as it opted to look through the current high inflation scenario, stressing that its objective remains to revive growth in a durable manner while maintaining inflation within the targeted range of 4 (+/-2)%.
As Dovish A Pause As It Can Get
Not only was the benchmark repo rate left unchanged at 4%, the committee also said its stance will stay 'accommodative' going into the next financial year.
Growth Outlook
In its first forecast since the Covid crisis began, the Reserve Bank of India said it expects the economy to contract 9.5% in FY21, with risks tilted to the downside.
Inflation Outlook
The central bank also said that inflation risks are broadly balanced as it projected consumer prices to be between 4.5-5.4% in the second half of FY21.
Calming The Bond Markets
RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das said that “financial stability and orderly evolution of yield curve is a public good” as he attempted to calm the bond markets.
The words came with actions, although the RBI hasn’t exactly pulled out all the stops yet, writes Ira Dugal.
Ensuring Liquidity
The central bank also introduced on-tap targeted long-term repo operations while doubling the size of open market auctions to keep liquidity flowing.
Supporting States
RBI has also decided to buy state government bonds for the first time and support higher borrowings.
Boosting Home Loans
Providing relief to the real estate sector, the central bank eased risk weights on individual home loans to boost lending.
Round-The-Clock Payments
And it also allowed the real-time gross settlement, or RTGS, facility to run round-the-clock starting December.
4. Nifty’s Best Run In 11 Months
Indian equity markets clocked gains for the seventh session, extending the winning streak to the best since November.
The S&P BSE Sensex ended 0.8% higher at 40,509.
The NSE Nifty 50 ended at 11,914, with gains of 0.7%.
The Sensex and Nifty are now 2% away from turning positive for the calendar year.
Follow the day’s trading action here.
6. Demand For JLR’s Bonds Comes At A Steep Cost
Jaguar Land Rover Automotive Plc saw very strong demand for its latest bond offering, but at a cost.
The British carmaker sold $700 million of notes on Wednesday, $200 million more than originally announced, but it came with a 7.75% coupon, the highest in the company’s capital structure.
Issuance has become increasingly costly for the company over the past two years.
Now, the challenges posed by the pandemic have made its latest deal even costlier.
7. Assessing RERA: Three Years On...
Homebuyers across India took recourse to the Real Estate Regulatory Act for resolving their problems in the three years since the stricter housing law was rolled out.
But the law hasn’t been uniformly implemented across the country as it’s been interpreted differently on many issues by states that have the power to notify their own rules.
So far, more than 52,000 projects and 40,517 agents have registered under RERA.
More than 46,000 complaints having been disposed of by real estate regulatory authorities across the country.
Here are some of the key issues most debated since the Act was implemented.
8. India’s Active Covid Caseload Drops Below 9 Lakh
Active coronavirus cases in India continued to fall, in a positive turn for the country with the second most cases in the world, falling below the 9 lakh-mark for the first time in a month.
India added over just over 70,000 fresh cases in 24 hours taking the total tally past 69 lakh, according to health ministry data.
Active cases now stand for 13% of India’s Covid-19 cases.
Track the latest updates on the Covid-19 pandemic in India, here.
Globally, cases passed 3.65 crore while deaths topped 10.6 lakh.
China joined a World Health Organization-backed vaccine effort, stepping in to fill a void in global health leadership after U.S. President Donald Trump spurned the programme.
Europe’s leaders are ramping up efforts to force tougher local restrictions amid a surge in coronavirus cases across the region.
Follow the global spread of the virus here.
9. How India Should Deal With Biden And Harris
Conceptualising trade as an amalgam of business contracts, the way the Donald Trump and Narendra Modi have, won’t satisfy Joe Biden or Kamala Harris, writes Raj Bhala.
It’s entirely conceivable that a Biden-Harris Administration will support an Indian trade policy shift to Aggressive Regionalism.
Also in line with a Biden-Harris Administration is Modi’s engagement in the 2016 Paris Agreement.
India can look forward to a balanced discussion of all its concerns on trade.
But, honesty also will mean the U.S. will articulate its discomfort with powerful, favored Indian monopolies.
10. And The Winner Of The Nobel Peace Prize Is...
The World Food Programme was awarded the 2020 Nobel Peace Prize as the fight against hunger takes on greater urgency in a world shaped by conflict and the coronavirus pandemic.
The organisation is being honored “for its contribution to bettering conditions for peace in conflict-affected areas and for acting as a driving force in efforts to prevent the use of hunger as a weapon of war and conflict,” the Norwegian Nobel Committee said on Friday.
Read more to see how the WFP threw itself at the hunger crisis, despite almost running out of money.