1. Disney Seals The Deal With 21st Century Fox Inc for $52.4 billion
Walt Disney Co on Thursday agreed to buy the film, TV and international assets from Rupert Murdoch's Twenty-First Century Fox Inc for $52.4 billion as Disney seeks greater scale to tackle growing competition from Netflix and Amazon.com.
Under the terms of the all-stock deal, Disney acquires significant assets from Fox, including the studios that produce the blockbuster Marvel superhero pictures and the "Avatar" franchise, as well as hit TV shows such as "The Simpsons".
Fox shareholders will receive 0.2745 Disney shares for each share held. This translates to a value of $29.50 per share for the assets that Disney is buying, Reuters calculations based on Disney's Wednesday market closing price show.
(Read full story on The Quint)
2. Govt Exploring Opportunities to Make India USD 1 Trillion Economy
The government will explore new opportunities in various sectors like providing BPO service from home, digital healthcare and agriculture to achieve the target of making the country a USD 1 trillion economy.
"I have asked my ministry to work in detail over involving more women who can work from home for BPO," Law and IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad told reporters after meeting industry players to prepare a roadmap to make India USD 1 trillion economy.
The minister said that the suggestions given by companies across various sectors will be compiled by 15 January.
"We have also received suggestions from Dr Devi Shetty (Chairman, Narayana Health) that there can be bedless hospitals. He says if we can have e-commerce then why can't we have bedless hospitals where everything can be done on digital platform," Prasad said adding that government will explore opportunity in this area.
(Source: PTI)
3. Will Significantly Overtake Disinvestment Target: Jaitley
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley today said the government will "significantly overtake" the disinvestment target for the current financial year. Speaking at the AGM of industry chamber Ficci, the finance minister also said that Air India disinvestment plan is moving expeditiously and is on track.
The government has set an ambitious target of raising Rs 72,500 crore through disinvestment in the current fiscal. Of this, Rs 46,500 crore is to be raised through minority stake sale in PSUs and Rs 15,000 crore from strategic sales. Another Rs 11,000 crore is to come from listing of insurance companies.
Total disinvestment proceeds during the current financial year (as on 4 December, 2017) stands at Rs 52,389.86 crore.
"This is going to be the first year in history where we are going to significantly overtake disinvestment target itself. In India, privatisation and disinvestment is art of the possible thing and that happened all over the world," the minister said.
(Source: PTI)
4. GST Council To Meet For Earlier Rollout Of E-Way Bills
The Goods and Services Tax Council will meet on 16 December to discuss the nationwide rollout of e-way bills for transporting goods earlier than planned, two officials in the know told BloombergQuint requesting anonymity.
The meeting — to be held via video-conferencing — is aimed at exploring ways to boost GST revenues by plugging loopholes, the officials said.
In an earlier meeting on 6 October, the Council had decided that e-way bill — an electronic document generated on the GST Network portal — would be introduced in a staggered manner from 1 January, and will be rolled out nationwide from 1 April. The need to review the rollout timeline stems from revenue shortfall.
(Read full story on BloombergQuint)
5. Flipkart India Boasts 19 Percent Growth in Revenue
Flipkart India Pvt Ltd reported revenues of Rs 15,264 crore for the year ended 31 March 2017, representing a 19 percent growth rate over the previous year, according to documents filed with the Registrar of Companies and sourced through Tofler. The turnover of Flipkart India stood at Rs 12,818 crore in the financial year 2015-16.
The profit and loss figures for FY17 were not mentioned in the documents, which were reviewed by Business Standard. In the previous year, losses stood at Rs 826.7 crore for the unit.
As reported by Business Standard, the pot continues to boil for Flipkart on the shareholder front. Tiger Global, the largest investor in the company, has indicated that it wants a partial exit. Out of the $2.5 billion SoftBank committed to invest in the company in August, between $1.2 and $1.4 billion will go into buying out stake of other investors.
(Source: Business Standard)
6. ITI Board Okays Conversion of Rs 100 Cr Capital Grant Into Shares
State-run IT and telecom product maker ITI Ltd on Thursday said its board has approved conversion of Rs 100 crore capital grant, received from the government under a revival scheme, into 10 crore equity shares.
The shares have been allotted to the President of India in lieu of the amount received by the company from the government for revival.
In a regulatory filing, ITI said the board of directors have "considered and approved the conversion of Rs 100 crore, being Capital grant received from Government of India under BIFR proceedings, into 10,00,00,000 equity shares of Rs 10 each at par and allotted shares accordingly to President of India."
The receipt of capital grant of Rs 100 crore and the allotment of equity shares is made pursuant to a Board for Industrial and Financial Reconstruction (BIFR) order of 2013 sanctioning the revival scheme of the company, it added.
(Source: PTI)
7. Quess Corp's Arm Completes 45% Stake Buy in Simpliance
Travel services provider Thomas Cook, India's arm Quess Corp Ltd has completed the acquisition of 45 percent stake in Simpliance Technologies.
"Quess Corp Ltd...has completed acquisition of 45 percent equity stake in Simpliance Technologies Pvt Ltd on 14 December," the company said in a filing to the BSE.
Thomas Cook (India) Ltd (TCIL) is the leading integrated travel and travel related financial services company in the country offering a broad spectrum of services that include foreign exchange, corporate travel and leisure travel, among others.
TCIL's footprint (exclusive of its subsidiaries) currently extends to over 223 locations (including 21 airport counters) in 85 cities across India, Mauritius and Sri Lanka.
(Source: PTI)
8. PNB, Union Bank Raise Rs 7,000 Cr via QIP
Public sector lenders Punjab National Bank (PNB) and Union Bank of India have cumulatively raised Rs 7,000 crore through qualified institutional placement (QIP). The amount raised will augment the capital adequacy and help in business expansion of the banks.
PNB has raised about Rs 5,000 crore by selling 29.76 crore shares at Rs 168 per scrip, which is at a discount of 4.735 percent to the floor price of Rs 176.35. In a statement, Union Bank of India said the offer of QIP was oversubscribed and the bank has issued 12.93 crore shares aggregating to Rs 2,000 crore.
The investors include asset management companies, insurance companies and foreign institutional investors, it said.
(Source: PTI)
9. HDFC Bank Mulls Raising Funds Through Institutional Share Sale
India’s largest private lender HDFC Bank Ltd will mull raising funds through a qualified institutional placement on 20 December, which may also include a preferential issue to its parent HDFC Ltd.
The bank will consider raising funds through a mix of instruments like preferential allotment and American depository receipts, it said in a filing to stock exchanges. The board of the bank would further consider convening an extraordinary general meeting to get shareholders’ nod for the proposal, the filing added.
Mortgage lender HDFC Ltd, which holds 25.7 percent in the bank, will also consider raising capital on 19 December which would be used to subscribe to HDFC Bank’s preferential allotment, it said in a separate exchange filing.
(Read full story on BloombergQuint)
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