Top headlines: Mistry family in talks for funds, Google ups lending biz

Economic Affairs Secretary Tarun Bajaj says he is certain that a V-shaped economic recovery will take a year. That and more on what's news this morning.

Mistry family in talks with investors to raise Rs 4K cr, aims to cut debt

The billionaire Mistry family is in talks with several investors to raise up to Rs 4,000 crore by selling part of its stake in Sterling and Wilson Solar (SWSL), and also with Canadian financial powerhouse, Brookfield, to raise debt against its Tata Sons shares. The proceeds of the funds raised will be used to reduce the group’s debt and repay dues to SWSL, said a source close to the development. The group was earlier planning to raise funds by selling its land parcels across India, but due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the land sale plan has been postponed till valuations improve, the source said. Read More..

Disclosure violations: Sun Pharma, top execs seek Sebi's consent settlement

Drugmaker Sun Pharmaceuticals (Sun Pharma), its key managerial staffers, and directors have filed a consent plea before the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) for settling a dispute pertaining to alleged violations of disclosure norms involving its key distributor and subsidiary Aditya Medisales (AML). Sebi has initiated adjudication proceedings against the pharma major and its directors under Section 15 of the Sebi Act, which deals with penalty. Read More...

Covid-19 crisis: Revival in rural demand overstated, say economists

The often-repeated theory of demand generation in the rural economy due to the government’s intervention may be overstated, feel economists, even though they cite different reasons for their thesis. A recent note brought out by Credit Suisse says that net gain from the government support measures may be just Rs 7,500 crore a month, which constitutes 0.9 per cent of the rural gross domestic product (GDP). Read More...

Lessons learnt: Delhi, Mumbai show the way on how to tame the Covid curve

With Covid-19 cases rising steadily in India, Delhi and Mumbai, which have turned a corner in fight against coronavirus, could show the way forward in tackling the pandemic. While daily Covid cases have dropped significantly in Delhi — from over 3,000 in June to around 1,000 during the last week, the daily growth rate of cases has come down to 1 per cent for both cities. The drop in the curve, experts say, is partially because of the pandemic playing itself out, and partially because of the two cities finally getting their act together by ramping up the testing capacity and implementing stricter quarantine norms. In Mumbai, the success of contact tracing in the densely populated slum like Dharavi has been a lesson in enhancing community involvement in controlling the pandemic in such areas. Read More...

RBI may go for further 25 bps rate cut in August policy meeting: Experts

The Reserve Bank is likely to go for a minimum 25 basis points cut in key lending rate in the forthcoming monetary policy review in view of the pressing need to revive the coronavirus-hit economy, feel experts. The Monetary Policy Committee (MPC), headed by RBI Governor, is scheduled to meet for three days beginning August 4 and will announce its decision on August 6. The central bank has been taking steps proactively to limit the damage to the economy caused by the outbreak of Covid-19 pandemic and subsequent lockdowns to prevent the spread of the disease. Read More...

Disconnect between financial markets and real sector growing: RBI report

Some segments of the financial markets may have moved faster than economic realities suggest, thanks to the stimulus measures taken by global central banks, and this may pose a challenge to financial stability. The Financial Stability Report (FSR), while warning about such concerns in a broad context, did not directly mention India, but the situation is not very different here. Perhaps that is why Reserve Bank of India (RBI) governor Shaktikanta Das emphasised this point. There has been a “growing disconnect between the movements in certain segments of financial markets and real sector activity,” Das wrote in his foreword to the report. Read More...

Fraudulent IGST refunds: Exporters to face stern action, say reports

Finance ministry sources said on Sunday that stern action would be taken against the exporters who fraudulently claimed integrated goods and services tax (IGST) refunds totalling Rs 2,020 crore. Sources in the Central Board of Indirect Tax and Customs (CBIC) said that after feeling the heat, some 'fake', 'risky' exporters were lobbying with some prominent trade associations to allege that genuine exporters were being harassed by being asked for over 1,500 documents each for verification purposes. However, this is not true. Read More...

Aditya Puri sells 7.42 million shares in HDFC Bank for Rs 843 cr

Private sector lender HDFC Bank’s Managing Director (MD) Aditya Puri has sold 95 per cent of his shareholding in the bank valued at Rs 842.7 crore. Puri held 0.14 per cent stake (or about 7.8 million shares in the bank), of which he has sold 7.42 million shares between July 21 and July 23. Puri has been the longest serving MD of a private bank in India. Puri has been at the helm of HDFC Bank for the past 26 years, since its inception in 1994. Puri will hang up his boots this October as he will reach the maximum age limit of 70 for a chief executive officer of a private bank. Read More...

Google foraying into digital lending space by roping in fintech players

Tech giant Google is foraying into the digital lending space, which is set to become a $1-trillion opportunity in the next five years, according to sources. Its digital payments app GPay is forming partnerships with fintech firms and has already onboarded ZestMoney to offer credit to consumers, signalling a larger interest to tap the financial services market in the country. Bengaluru-based ZestMoney is now integrated on GPay’s digital store’s Spot platform to offer credit to customers. Read More...

With renewed focus on US, EU and UK, India looks to reset FTAs, exit fruitless deals

India is eyeing a major reset of its free trade agreements, including exiting those that have brought few tangible benefits to the country and have instead hurt domestic industry, government officials said. “All options are on the table… There is a view that if any trade agreement has not worked out as expected, we should also look at exiting such a deal,” one official said, adding that a final call on the future strategy for such arrangements would be taken at the highest level. Most trading arrangements have a clause for a review or exit. There is renewed focus on trade deals with the US, the European Union and the UK, which are key markets for Indian exporters and are keen to diversify their sourcing. India opted out of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership deal in November and the trading arrangement with the 15-member grouping that includes China remains off the table for now, another official said according to the Economic Times.