1. Flipkart, Amazon Claim Huge Boost From Festive Season Sales
Flipkart and Amazon India, the country’s largest online retailers, have surpassed sales from last festival season’s sale events by a considerable margin, driven by strong demand for smartphones and televisions.
Flipkart’s sales doubled from last year, the online retail firm said in a statement on 24 September evening. Flipkart claimed it accounted for at least 70 percent of total e-commerce sales in India during its five-day Big Billion Days sale which concluded on 24 September, indicating it had beaten Amazon by a wide margin.
Amazon India declined to comment on its performance in comparison to Flipkart.
(Source: Livemint)
2. IUC Charge Cut May Trigger a Faster Shift to VoLTE Services
The 57 percent cut in interconnect usage charge and decision to scrap it altogether from January 2020 is likely to drive incumbent telecom operators such as Bharti Airtel, Vodafone India and Idea Cellular to rapidly launch and expand calling over VoLTE technology, and unveil more bundled offers to protect their turf, said analysts and industry experts.
This could trigger a faster shift to data services from voice, which accounts for about 80 percent of revenue at present, they said.
The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India last week slashed IUC to 6 paise per minute, with effect from 1 October. IUC is paid by a mobile carrier where a call originates to the mobile network where it terminates.
(Source: The Economic Times)
3. FinMin Wants RBI to Lower Rates, Boost Domestic Demand
Ahead of the monetary policy review by the Reserve Bank of India early next month, the Finance Ministry is hoping for a further cut in key rates to boost domestic demand.
“Inflation has picked up in the last one month but all the analyses we had done was based factoring in a rise in inflation. The medium-term inflation target is kept at 4 percent,” a Finance Ministry source said.
The comments come ahead of the bi-monthly monetary policy review on October 3 and 4. To spur growth, the Monetary Policy Committee, at its last review in August, had reduced the repo rate by 0.25 percent to 6 percent.
(Source: The Hindu BusinessLine)
4. 200,000 More Directors Disqualified for Holding Posts in Defaulting Companies
The Corporate Affairs Ministry has disqualified another 200,000 directors for holding posts in defaulting companies that have not filed their financial returns for the last three years or more, taking the total number to over 300,000, while cancelling the registration of another 10,000 companies.
These directors won’t be able to hold board seats in other companies as well and may have to resign soon from them, potentially impacting other firms as well.
While the current law does not provide for any appeal, the government is thinking of exercising “the review power to take any such plea into consideration,” PP Chaudhary, Minister of State for Corporate Affairs, told ET. “By operation of law, these directors are disqualified but we have to see under what provision of law we can examine this. If we need to frame a rule we will do it.”
(Source: The Economic Times)
5. GSTN Tweaked Features, Handled Robust August Return Filing: CEO
GST Network, the technology backbone of the Goods and Services Tax system, has tweaked some of the features on its portal over the past month to make the system more robust and allow glitch-free tax payment facility to nearly 35 lakh assessees, said GSTN CEO Prakash Kumar.
Of the total 87.33 lakh registered businesses on the GSTN, 68 lakh were eligible to pay taxes in August.
Of the total registered taxpayers, 24.56 lakh are new registrations, while 62.77 lakh have migrated from the earlier excise, service tax and VAT regime.
Kumar said the GSTN portal handled a load of 1.3 lakh tax returns, filing and payment, per hour on 20 September - the last day of filing of August tax returns.
(Source: PTI)
6. Indian Stocks See Net Outflows From FIIs So Far in FY18
Foreign investments in Indian stocks so far in this fiscal year, show net outflows as expensive valuations and tensions in Korean peninsula weighed on investor sentiment. US Federal Reserve’s unwinding plan also bothered investors, but asset managers say the impact of it is already factored in.
For the fiscal year to date, FIIs are net sellers of Indian shares to the tune of 450 million dollars, even as Sensex has climbed 7.77 percent in the same period. However, Sensex has declined 2.34 percent from the record high of 32,686.48, seen on 2 August.
“We have reduced a bit (of) India’s weight, because valuation level is on the high side and more importantly, because the outlook has become better in many other countries like China, Brazil and Russia,” said Hertta Alava, the Helsinki, Finland-based director of emerging market funds at FIM Asset Management Ltd.
(Source: Livemint)
7. Aditya Birla’s Acquisition Bid May Value Aleris Corp at $2.5 Billion
Billionaire Kumar Mangalam Birla’s Aditya Birla Group is readying a bid for aluminium maker Aleris Corp, according to two people directly aware of the development.
The group’s bid may assign a 2.5 billion dollars enterprise value for Cleveland, Ohio-based Aleris, the people cited above said on condition of anonymity.
The offer, which may come as soon as the first week of October, will include an investment of close to 1 billion dollars through equity and debt, and refinancing of the company’s debt of around 1.5 billion dollars, said one of the two people.
Birla’s decision to pursue Aleris comes at a time when demand for aluminium products from industries such as automobiles and aerospace is growing at a fast pace amid favourable metal prices
(Source: Livemint)
8. Growth Likely to Revive in Coming Quarters: SBI Chief
India’s biggest lender State Bank of India (SBI) expects the country’s economy to rebound in another couple of quarters, and its chief says that banks need more funds to be able to provide loans to businesses when the pace of growth eventually quickens.
“Plans are getting off the table, with a number of infrastructure projects being tendered out. Growth should come in a quarter or two,” SBI chairperson Arundhati Bhattacharya said in Kolkata on 24 September. “The government now needs to do some heavy lifting,” she added.
Bhattacharya said that some traction is being seen in sectors such as roads and fertilisers, but the benefits would reflect in banks’ credit books with a lag.
(Source: The Economic Times)
9. Godrej Agrovet Looking at $1.27 Billion Valuation in IPO
About 50 Godrej group employees have bought shares worth around $1.5 million (Rs 8.5 crore) in a so-called pre-initial public offering (IPO) round of Godrej Agrovet Ltd, two people aware of the development said. The pre-IPO round saw employees from various group firms including Godrej Consumer Products Ltd, Godrej Properties Ltd, Nature’s Basket, Godrej Tyson Foods and Godrej and Boyce Manufacturing Co. Ltd, the people cited above said.
“Ahead of filing its red herring prospectus (RHP) with the registrar of companies, Godrej Agrovet Ltd closed a pre-IPO round wherein several of the group’s senior employees have bought shares worth close to $1.5 million,” said one of the two people cited above, requesting anonymity. The company filed its RHP on 22 September, the person added.
(Source: Livemint)
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