POPULARITY
दिल्ली विधानसभा चुनाव से पहले अरविंद केजरीवाल ने आज राजधानी में पुजारी-ग्रंथी योजना लॉन्च की, विदेश मंत्री एस. जयशंकर की कतर यात्रा का आज दूसरा दिन, दिल्ली में क्राइम पर लगाम कसने के लिए पुलिस ने नया कदम उठाया, सरकार ने बिलेटेड इनकम टैक्स रिटर्न फाइल करने की आखिरी तारीख को आज से बढ़ाकर 15 जनवरी किया, IRCTC का वेबसाइट और मोबाइल ऐप आज फिर से डाउन और भारतीय क्रिकेट टीम के उपकप्तान जसप्रीत बुमराह और ऑलराउंडर नीतीश कुमार रेड्डी का नाम मेलबर्न क्रिकेट ग्राउंड के ऑनर बोर्ड पर दर्ज किया गया. सुनिए शाम 4 बजे तक की बड़ी खबरें सिर्फ 5 मिनट में.
ICC ने जारी किया चैंपियंस ट्रॉफी 2025 का शेड्यूल, हैदराबाद थिएटर भगदड़ मामले में अभिनेता अल्लू अर्जुन से पूछताछ, चुनाव नियमों में बदलाव को सुप्रीम कोर्ट में चुनौती, यात्रियों को हर्जाना देने वाली योजना IRCTC ने बंद की, दिल्ली-NCR में GRAP-4 खत्म, विनोद कांबली को जल्द ही अस्पताल से मिलेगी छुट्टी, खेल रत्न विवाद पर सामने आई मनु भाकर की प्रतिक्रिया, हिमाचल में तीन राष्ट्रीय राजमार्ग समेत, 177 सड़कें बर्फबारी से बंद और तुर्की में में हथियार बनाने वाली फैक्ट्री में धमाका, सिर्फ 5 मिनट में सुनिए शाम 7 बजे तक की बड़ी ख़बरें.
संसद परिसर में पीएम नरेंद्र मोदी और गौतम अडाणी का मुखौटा पहने सांसदों ने किया प्रदर्शन, राजस्थान और हरियाणा के दौरे पर पीएम मोदी, राहुल नार्वेकर को चुना गया महाराष्ट्र विधानसभा का निर्विरोध अध्यक्ष, IRCTC की वेबसाइट अगले एक घंटे के लिए ठप, जेवर में बन रहे इंटरनेशनल एयरपोर्ट पर आज पहली बार फ्लाइट लैंड करेगी और रूस ने सीरिया की स्थिति पर चर्चा करने के लिए यूएन सुरक्षा परिषद की तत्काल बैठक बुलाई. सुनिए दोपहर 1 बजे तक की बड़ी खबरें सिर्फ 5 मिनट में
This isn't your usual Daybreak Friday episode. Considering it's the end of the year, we thought we'd ask the reporters in our newsroom to talk to us about the stories they liked best. This week, we have Rounak Kumar Gunjan and Aakriti Bhalla on the show. They share two of their favourite stories — The first is a fascinating story by Rounak about how a tiny discount caused an uproar inside IRCTC or the Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation. The second is by Aakriti about how Pepsico managed to make Sting the energy drink of India.Tune in. P.S. We want to know how and where you shop. When was the last time you went to a shopping mall? What did you buy? Write to us on WhatsApp. Our number is 8971108379Curious about the story Rounak mentioned on the show? Check it out here.Daybreak is produced from the newsroom of The Ken, India's first subscriber-only business news platform. Subscribe for more exclusive, deeply-reported, and analytical business stories.Listen to the latest episode of Two by Two here
Welcome to CNBC-TV18's Marketbuzz Podcast. Here are top developments from around the world ahead of the trading session of November 5 -Yesterday, the Nifty 50 ended sharply lower on the back of US poll uncertainty and a poor second quarter results show. The index even broke below the October consolidation low of 24,073 and even closed below the mark of 24,000. -Majority of the losses came from banking names that were the top contributors to the downside, along with Reliance Industries. 40% of the 309-point drop that the Nifty saw on Monday came from HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank, Reliance Industries and Axis Bank. -With Monday's fall, the Nifty is down nearly 9% from its record high of 26,277, which it had hit on September 27. The overall session led to an erosion of ₹6.5 lakh crore in investor wealth. -However, this morning, the GIFT Nifty was trading at discount of nearly 50 pts from Nifty Futures Monday close, indicating a start in the red for the Indian market. -During Tuesday's trading session, which will also be the weekly expiry for the Financial Services index, stocks like ABB India, Bata India, Gland Pharma, IRCTC, JK Paper, KEC International, P&G Health, Raymond and Amara Raja will be reacting to their results that were reported after market hours on Monday. -Dr. Reddy's and Titan are the two Nifty names reporting results during Tuesday's trading session, along with a host of broader market names like GAIL, Berger Paints, Mankind Pharma, JK Tyre, Manappuram Finance, eClerx Services and CCL Products. -Asian equities were set for a mixed day amid increasing risk-off sentiment, as the clock ticked down to a tight US presidential election and the Federal Reserve rate decision. -In the run-up to Tuesday's vote, equity traders decided to stay on the sidelines as a flurry of polls showed Americans remained narrowly split between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris. The likelihood of a disputed result may eventually drag the vote count out for weeks or even months. For many, that means one thing — a potential rise in volatility. -Overnight, the US markets ended lower to start the new week on a risk-off note as uncertainties over the US Presidential Election outcome and the Fed rate decision kept investors on the edge. The Dow Jones fell over 250 points, recovering from the lows of the day as at one point, the index was down over 400 points. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite swung between gains and losses, eventually ending the session with a 0.3% cut each. -Apart from US polls, there are additional catalysts likely to move the market. Election Day will quickly be followed on Thursday by the Fed decision and Jerome Powell's press conference, where he'll give details on the central bank's interest-rate path. A big chunk of US firms are due to report earnings. Tune in to the Marketbuzz Podcast for more news and cues
For many in the Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC), this year's Union Budget announcement was a damp squib.On 23 July, several officials from the ticketing-and-catering arm of Indian Railways waited for over an hour, with the collective hope that Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman would quash the discounts on UPI payments. The reason behind their discontent is that the discount has cost IRCTC an arm and a leg. The company has lost Rs 40 crore in revenue. But despite all of the pushback, this year's Budget did not mention revoking the mandate anywhere. So, what's going on? And why isn't the government backing down?Tune in to find out. P.S. The Ken podcast team is looking for a talented podcast producer and an audio journalist. If you fit the bill or know someone who does, please apply!
Welcome to CNBC-TV18's Marketbuzz Podcast. Here are top developments from around the world ahead of the trading session of August 13 -On Monday, while the dip got bought into, similar to what the trend has been over the last few sessions, the Nifty could not sustain at higher levels as the recovery got sold into. The market remained fairly resilient to any potential concerns arising from the latest report from US-based short-seller Hindenburg Research. -Tuesday's session will see a lot of stock specific moves, particularly HDFC Bank, that may determine the trajectory of the Nifty during the session. India's largest lender will see an increase in weightage in the MSCI Global Standard Index but in two tranches. Nuvama Alternative is anticipating inflows worth $1.8 billion in the first adjustment that will take place on August 30. -Tuesday's session will see more PSU earnings reactions like Hindustan Copper, RCF, IRFC, HUDCO, along with other names like Vodafone Idea, Camlin Fine Sciences, Ami Organics, Campus Activewear, DOMS Industries, ITI etc. -Three Nifty stocks - Hero MotoCorp, Apollo Hospitals and Hindalco report results on Tuesday, along with broader market names like Emcure Pharma, Dish TV, Dilip Buildcon, IRCTC, Muthoot Finance, Piramal Enterprises, HEG, among others. -Other than that, shares of state-run Rail Vikas Nigam Ltd. will be included in the MSCI India Index, which is part of the MSCI Global Standard Index as part of its latest reshuffle. Six other stocks besides RVNL, namely Vodafone Idea, Dixon Technologies, Oil India, Prestige Estates, Oracle Financial and Zydus Lifesciences have also found a place in the MSCI India Index as part of the latest rejig. Bandhan Bank is the only Indian stock that will be excluded from the index. -Asian stocks rose this morning, fully recovering their losses from last week's rout, bolstered by an advance in Japanese shares. Japan's equities rose after a holiday, as a weaker yen supported exporters. MSCI's Asia-Pacific gauge rose as much as 1% to erase losses from last week's tumble. The S&P 500 closed little changed ahead of US inflation data later Tuesday and Wednesday. Treasuries held Monday's gains. -Oil remained near the $80 level it hit on Monday, as the US sees an Iranian attack against Israel as increasingly likely. Israel's sovereign debt was cut by one notch by Fitch Ratings, which kept a negative outlook on the credit as continued military conflict weighs on the country's public finances. Tune in to the Marketbuzz Podcast for more cues
Marketbuzz Podcast: Indian markets may see a gap down start according to the GIFT Nifty. Watch out for stocks like Aditya Birla Fashion, IRCTC, NBCC and more.
No other payment aggregator has been able to pull off what Phonepe has in less than a year. Its nearly 50 per cent market share is obviously a huge draw for new merchants. And in the last couple years, its been able to onboard some pretty big names like Bharti Airtel and IRCTC. But the bigger the client, the more ruthless their demands. At the end of the day, they are only loyal to the aggregator that promises them the lowest prices and highest success rates. So how does PhonePe make sure that it stays on top? And where does that leave everyone else? Tune in.Correction: The host mistakenly referred to NPCI as NCPI towards the end of this episode. We apologise for the error.Daybreak is produced from the newsroom of The Ken, India's first subscriber-only business news platform. Subscribe for more exclusive, deeply-reported, and analytical business stories.P.S. Daybreak episodes drop daily now :)
Introducing Prime's special series on ‘Fintech in India - Past, Present and the Future'. This is the 1st episode titled ‘India Fintech 1.0 - Pre Aadhaar & Smartphones' in a 3 part series.In this special series of episodes, Sanjay Swamy, our Managing Partner speaks with industry stalwarts Srikanth Rajagopalan and Anshul Rai. Srikanth is currently the CEO of Perfios Account Aggregation (AA), an off-shoot from the Perfios legacy. Anshul is the Co-Founder and ex CEO of Happay, his claim to fame is Happay's celebrated exit to CRED for $180M. Watch this episode to learn firsthand experience from 2 of India's first mobile payments entrepreneurs Sanjay (mChek) and Shrikant (ngpay). They share memorable anecdotes and valuable lessons on frugal innovation such as how IRCTC and Telcos helped solve distribution at scale. This episode ends as a great segue to the 2nd generation of Fintech in India that will be highlighted in episode 2, stay tuned! Enjoyed the podcast? Please consider leaving a review on Apple Podcasts and subscribe wherever you are listening to this.Follow Prime Venture Partners:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/primevp/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/Primevp_in This podcast is for you. Do let us know what you like about the podcast, what you don't like, the guests you'd like to have on the podcast and the topics you'd like us to cover in future episodes.Please share your feedback here: https://primevp.in/podcastfeedback
Beyond the nostalgia associated with meals on trains, quite often, there are also horror stories. In fact, even a recent Parliament Panel report pointed out how food quality on Indian trains is compromised. The IRCTC (The Indian Railways Catering and Tourism Corporation) has been trying to figure out how to make food a more enjoyable experience on trains and more importantly, a solid source of revenue. A decade ago, IRCTC launched its e-catering services. It now has a network of nearly 500 restaurant partners and close to 20 food aggregators. Catering makes up for more than 40% of IRCTC's revenue every year. And its seems it will only go up because in the last few months, IRCTC has also tied up with two of the country's food delivery giants, Zomato and Swiggy.But while IRCTC has big dreams of catering to the 20 million passengers who take the train everyday, delivering food on trains is a logistical nightmare.Tune in.Daybreak is produced from the newsroom of The Ken, India's first subscriber-only business news platform. Subscribe for more exclusive, deeply-reported, and analytical business stories
Welcome to CNBC-TV18's Marketbuzz Podcast. Here are all the important cues ahead of March 6 trading session - The Gift Nifty indicated a gap down start for the domestic market as of 7:30. -The last three trading sessions have seen the Nifty continue to trade in a narrow range and remain in consolidation mode. Since the rally on Friday, the index has not exhibited any signs of moving higher towards 22,500 or slipping from their record highs. For now, Nifty seems to be consolidating above 22300. - NBFCs or non-bank lenders continue to be a key focus. After IIFL Finance, now Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has barred JM Financial Products from financing against shares and debentures. Therefore, NBFCs could continue to be under pressure on sentiment overhang. - Both foreign and domestic investors bought in cash. While DIIs bought ₹1,834 crore, FIIs bought ₹574 crore in the cash market. -Asia-Pacific markets fell across the board this morning, mirroring a tech slide on Wall Street overnight led by Apple. Apple shares slipped almost 3% in U.S. trading after a report from Counterpoint Research found iPhone sales plunged in China in the first six weeks of 2024. Investors monitored shares of Apple suppliers in Taiwan and South Korea. -Hong Kong's Hang Seng index rebounded from Tuesday's losses to rise 0.26%, while China's CSI 300 index was down 0.18%. Japan's Nikkei 225 dipped 0.37%, falling below the 40,000 mark, while the broad-based Topix edged 0.1% higher. -U.S. stocks slipped for a second session Tuesday, dragged by steep declines in major tech names such as Apple. The indexes slipped from record high territory. The Nasdaq Composite fell 1.65% as technology stocks fell the most. The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 1.04% while the S&P 500 fell 1.02%. Meanwhile, the U.S. jobs data is due later this week. -In cryptocurrencies, bitcoin was slightly up but stayed below a record high reached in a volatile overnight session. -Oil has fallen nearly 1% to near $82 per barrel whereas Gold has hit fresh highs amid the risk-off environment. -Stocks to track: Zomato, JM Financial, Samvardhana Motherson, Havells India, REC Board, Bharti Airtel, Coal India, Wipro, Indiabulls Real Estate, JSW Energy, NHPC and IRCTC.
Small investors are savvier; look what they did with small-cap stocks International airlines vie for the Indian globetrotterTata Motors business divisions come to a fork in the roadShould Nvidia employees with stock options sell or stay put?Ask me anything: Inside the race to build desi GPTsWelcome to Top of the Morning by Mint, your weekday newscast that brings you five major stories from the world of business. It's Tuesday, March 5, 2024. My name is Nelson John. Let's get started:Concluding the day marked by range-bound trading, Indian benchmark indices ended Monday with marginal gains. The Nifty 50 reached a new all-time high of 22,440 in early trading but subsequently pared some of those gains. At the end of the session, Nifty was up 0.12 per cent while Sensex closed marginally up by 0.09 per cent. Retail investors are getting smarter day by day. With a rally in small and midcap stocks over the last three quarters of 2024, these investors who trade directly on the exchanges, had a gala time. Companies such as BSE, Birlasoft, Zensar Tech, Sonata Software, and RBL Bank saw their stock prices jump anywhere between 23 per cent to 415 per cent in the nine months through December. At the same time, retail investors cut their stake in these companies by 4 to 11 per cent. This means, these investors who typically invest only up to 2 lakh rupees, are getting in at low points and selling at mega profits. Mint's market correspondents Ram Sahgal and Mayur Bhalerao examine how retail players are riding the small cap wave.Global airlines are looking at India with hopeful eyes. After witnessing a surge in the domestic market last year, airlines are upbeat on foreign fliers from India. The upcoming summer season is adding to the momentum. International carriers like Emirates, Singapore Airlines, Qantas, Cathay Pacific, and Etihad, among others, are expecting a significant increase in demand from India. They are adjusting their networks to accommodate this anticipated growth. According to the ratings agency ICRA, international passenger traffic for domestic airlines is projected to exceed the peak levels recorded in the fiscal year 2024. January 2024 itself saw 6.52 million passengers flying abroad, 17 per cent more than last January. Data from online travel portal ixigo attests to the growing number of outbound flights from India, reports Anu Sharma, Mint's aviation correspondent. Ixigo saw a 2.5 times increase in searches for international travel in April and May this year, compared to 2023. Most popular destination in these searches you wonder? These are countries that have recently made travel for Indians visa free such as Kenya, Thailand, and Malaysia.One of India's automobile behemoths is going to see a massive change in its corporate structuring. Tata Motors is going ahead with a demerger into two separate publicly traded companies. The company's board greenlit the demerger proposal on Monday. This division will segregate the Commercial Vehicles business and its related investments from the Passenger Vehicles sector, which includes passenger vehicle, EV, and Jaguar Land Rover verticals. So if you are a shareholder in Tata Motors, how will this affect you? All shareholders of the company will retain stock worth the same value in both companies following the demerger. The demerger is a logical next step after the previous split of the passenger and electric vehicle segments in 2022. The decision is expected to boost the independence of each business unit, which will also allow them to implement strategies more efficiently.Software company Nvidia has had a stellar run on the US stock market. Since the start of the year, its share price has gained more than 70 percent. Since last year, it has surged by a whopping 240 percent. The reason? Its dominance over supply over hardware and software needed to make artificial intelligence a reality. Such a performance in the markets has created many millionaires among its staff who hold employee stock options. Mint Money's Shipra Singh speaks to some Nvidia employees from India and talks to them about their newfound wealth — and how they plan to use it. Moreover, since these are US stocks, some might be tempted to not disclose them to the taxman. Shipra writes that this isn't advisable, as it opens them up to scrutiny under the Black Money Act.LLMs or large language models are the generators behind most of the AI chatbots floating around. LLMs excel in understanding and generating human-like text in the language that they are trained in. But How do you design an LLM for a country like ours, with hundreds of languages being spoken? This is where Indian GPTs come into the picture. While OpenAI's ChatGPT is largely trained on English, companies developing Indian language LLMs face the daunting challenge of training their systems in languages that are not extensively digitised. Indian companies have already started the uphill task of making accessible AI chatbots for all. Take ‘Ask Disha' for example - IRCTC's chatbot aimed at helping passengers. Chennai Police has a similar project — ‘AI Police', a virtual assistant. These chatbots work on an LLM called BharatGPT, which is designed by Bengaluru's AI startup CoRover. Mint's executive editor Leslie D'monte takes a deep dive into the emerging world of Indian LLMs. He also writes about the mammoth task that Indian companies face - creating an AI, accessible to all Indians. We'd love to hear your feedback on this podcast. Let us know by writing to us at feedback@livemint.com. You may send us feedback, tips or anything that you feel we should be covering from your vantage point in the world of business and finance.
Welcome to A Century of Stories presented by IDFC FIRST Bank!This week, Kunal Vijayakar takes us on a ride through the illustrious history and remarkable evolution of the Indian Railways. From its inception in the early 1800s to the modernization efforts and technological advancements of today, we delve into significant milestones such as the inaugural passenger journey in 1853, innovations such as air-conditioned trains and online ticketing via IRCTC, and the introduction of the semi high-speed Vande Bharat Express trains.The Indian Railways play a pivotal role in connecting the nation's diverse landscape and fostering economic development. This episode celebrates the Indian Railways as a symbol of progress, innovation, and national pride.Tune in for this and much more!New episodes out every Monday!Open IDFC FIRST Bank savings account : https://www.idfcfirstbank.com/personal-banking/accounts/savings-account?utm_source=ig&utm_medium=content&utm_campaign=June&utm_content=COSKnow more about Zero Fee Banking :https://www.idfcfirstbank.com/getmorefromyourbank?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=centuryofstories&utm_campaign=cosepi1&utm_term=Aug23Follow ‘A Century of Stories' official Instagram handle at @acenturyofstoriesSubscribe to A Century of Stories YT channelListen to A Century of Stories across Audio PlatformsApple Podcasts | Spotify | Google Podcasts | Gaana | Amazon Music | Jio SaavnFollow our host Kunal on Instagram at @kunalvijayakarAnd don't forget to rate us!Data Sources:[https://artsandculture.google.com/story/a-history-of-indian-railways-national-rail-museum/cAVh7RwiKiTtKg?hl=en][https://www.orientrailjourneys.com/blog/history-of-indian-railways][https://www.pw.live/exams/railway/history-of-railways-in-india/][https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Railways]See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
In this episode of Market Minutes, Lovisha Darad discusses about key factors that will shape market direction on February 23. After Nifty hit an all-time high of 22,252 on February 22, is the benchmark poised to claim another record high despite higher volatility? Some of the top stocks to watch in trade are Vodafone Idea, IRCTC, Bajaj Auto, and Bandhan Bank. Also, catch Dnyanada Vaidya of Axis Securities on Voice of the Day segment. Market Minutes is a morning podcast that puts the spotlight on hot stocks, key data points, and developing trends.
Hello and welcome to CNBC-TV18's daily markets podcast. Here's a snapshot of all that you need to know before the February 15 trading action -In the previous session, the Indian market defied the negative cues from global peers and made a smart recovery during intra-day trading to settle at day's high led by gains in State Bank of India, Bank of Baroda, and other PSU banks. At close, the BSE Sensex rose 267 to settle at 71,822.83 and the Nifty50 gained 96 points to end at 21,840. - Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) net sold shares worth Rs 3,929.60 crore, while domestic institutional investors (DIIs) purchased Rs 2,897.98 crore worth of stocks on February 14, provisional data from the NSE showed. -Will Nifty 50 retest the 22000 or 22100 levels? Analysts say with the third quarter earnings season almost over, the focus will now shift to global cues and economic data points. And that the market may see a gradual up move on the back of strong fundamentals. - Overnight in the US, all three major indexes regained some ground after the sell-off on February 13, following hotter-than-anticipated inflation reading. The S&P 500 advanced almost a percent while the Nasdaq Composite climbed more than a percent. The Dow Jones was up 0.4%. -In morning trade, Asian markets rebounded after mostly falling in the previous session. This is even as GDP numbers from Japan showed that Asia's second-largest economy had entered a technical recession. -All eyes will be on US retail sales data, jobless claims and industrial production data that will be released in the evening -Stocks to track: Utkarsh Small Finance Bank, Hindustan Unilever, IRCTC, Paytm, M&M, Muthoot Finance, Gland Pharma, Glenmark Pharma and Sun TV. -Trends in the GIFT Nifty indicate a positive start for the broader index in India, with a gain of 80 points or 0.37 percent. The Nifty futures were trading around the 21,993 level. -Results: EPACK Durable and R Systems International -Nifty's weekly options expiry is also due today. Tune in to the Marketbuzz Podcast fore more cues
Hello and welcome to CNBC-TV18's daily markets podcast. Here's a snapshot of all that you need to know before the February 14 trading action - US inflation data came out higher than expected. US CPI data rose by 0.3% on a monthly basis, while on an annual basis it was up 3.1%. Core prices, which exclude volatile food and energy components, rose 0.4% month over month and 3.9% from a year ago. Core CPI was expected to have increased 0.3% in January and 3.7% from a year earlier, respectively. - Overnight in the US, the hotter-than-expected inflation data saw all three major indexes lose ground, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average falling 1.35%, clocking its worst session since March 2023 on a percentage basis. The S&P 500 slid 1.37%, while the Nasdaq Composite fell 1.8% to settle at 15,655.60. - Asia-Pacific markets tracked Wall Street losses. Hong Kong's Hang Seng index led losses in Asia, plunging 1.7% at the open as the city returns to trade after the Lunar New Year holiday. Japan's Nikkei 225 retreated from 34-year highs, falling 0.78%, while the Topix saw a larger loss of 1.21% - Oil held a seven-day run of gains as traders digested contrasting outlooks from OPEC and the IEA, as well as a mixed US stockpiles report. - Brent was near $83. Although OPEC's top official said global oil demand is set to grow strongly, the Paris-based International Energy Agency flagged comfortable markets this year. - The domestic stock market in the previous session closed at day's high amid volatility, regaining half of Monday's losses. The Nifty50 index held onto 21,700. The midcap index also recovered sharply, gaining about 1,000 points from lows. The Sensex rose 482.70 points or 0.68% at 71,555.19, and the Nifty gained 127.30 points or 0.59% at 21,743.30. - The Nifty Bank index also shed previous session losses and settled 1.38% higher at 45,502.40. The PSU sector has bounced back after witnessing profit booking over the last few trading sessions. - Meanwhile, foreign investors were net buyers, buying ₹376 crore, in the cash market on February 13, while domestic investors also bought ₹274 crore in equities. - Adani Group companies, IRCTC, Zee Ent, Nalco, Oil India, Deepak Nitrite, BPCL, Bharat Electronics - Gift Nifty was trading in the negative territory this morning indicating a start below 21700 level for Nifty. Tune in to the Marketbuzz Podcast for more cues
Hello and welcome to CNBC-TV18's daily markets podcast. Here's a snapshot of all that you need to know before the February 13 trading action -The domestic stock market failed to hold opening gains on February 12, weighed down by broad-based profit booking. Small- and mid-caps extended their slide on rising concerns over high valuations. The NSE Nifty 50 index settled 0.76% or 166.45 points lower at 21,616.05, while the S&P BSE Sensex closed 0.73% or over 500 points lower at 71,072.49. -Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) net bought shares worth ₹126.60 crore, while domestic institutional investors (DIIs) purchased ₹1,711.75 crore worth of stocks on February 12, provisional data from the NSE showed. -Following the February 2024 quarterly review, NMDC, GMR Airports, Union Bank, BHEL and Punjab National Bank have entered the MSCI Global Standard Index. Apart from the new additions, the index provider has also increased the weights of Zomato, DLF, MRF, Hindalco, Interglobe Aviation, Dr Reddy's, Hero Motocorp, HDFC AMC, Lupin, Astral, One97 Communications and Bandhan Bank. - On Wall Street, the S&P 500 ended down slightly after hitting a fresh intraday record high. The MSCI world stock index was flat after touching its highest level since January 2022. -US' January consumer price index report is due later today, while the U.S. producer prices report is due later in the week. Investors are also eager to see Thursday's U.S. retail sales report for January. -The Asia-Pacific markets mostly rose this morning as more markets return to trade from the Lunar New Year holiday, including South Korea and Singapore. Japan's Nikkei 225 rose 1.82% on its open, crossing the 37,000 mark. Should the Nikkei sustain its gains and close above this mark, it will reach a 34-year high. Markets in China are closed for the week, due to the Lunar New Year holiday. Hong Kong is closed Tuesday, but is set to resume trading Wednesday. - Bitcoin has hit the $50,000 level for the first time in more than two years as the world's largest cryptocurrency was buoyed by expectations of interest rate cuts later this year and last month's regulatory nod for U.S. exchange-traded funds designed to track its price. -Results: Eicher Motors, Hindalco Industries, Siemens, Zee Entertainment Enterprises, IRCTC, Bharat Heavy Electricals, Bosch, National Aluminium Company, Gujarat Gas, Indiabulls Real Estate, Innova Captab, INOX India, Oil India, and Sula Vineyards among others. -Stocks to track: Coal India, JSW Energy, Steel Authority of India, Hindalco - Gift Nifty was trading 0.1% percent lower at 21,728 at around 7:30 am, indicating a flat start of the domestic market. Tune in to the Marketbuzz Podcast for more cues
The prime minister will be inaugurating the newly constructed Ram Temple in Ayodhya, Uttar Pradesh today. It's quite the event. In fact, PVR INOX, has even collaborated with a news channel to broadcast the ceremony live in more than 150+ cinemas in more than 70 cities across India. The who's who of business, from Adani, Ambani, Tata, to Bollywood celebrities and sports stars like Tendulkar and Kohli are expected to attend the inauguration.I dont think we have ever seen anything like this before and neither has the stock market.The state govt of Uttar Pradesh has set aside about $10 billion for a decade-long redevelopment plan of the town. Ever since, it's almost like a gold rush amongst investors for stocks in big or small companies associated with Ayodhya. From Taj Hotels and IRCTC to Praveg, a small luxury tent company–some in the stock market believe these companies are in all set to become some of the biggest beneficiaries of this Ayodhya gold rush.But experts are warning investors against this kind of blind faith. According to them, buying into event-related market swings does not make for a sound long-term investment strategy.Tune in.Daybreak is produced from the newsroom of The Ken, India's first subscriber-only business news platform. Subscribe for more exclusive, deeply-reported, and analytical business stories.
In this episode of Market Minutes, Harshita talks about the key factors to watch out for today before the domestic equity market open. Markets may react to the US Federal Reserve's move to keep key interest rates unchanged for a third straight time. US policymakers are forecasting three cuts in 2024. IRCTC is in focus as it eyes major expansion in non-railway catering business pan India. NBCC bags a work order worth Rs 1,500 crore from National Cooperative Development Corporation. Catch the global market setup, and also hear from Rajesh Pherwani of Valcreate PMS in the Voice of the Day segment. Market Minutes is a morning podcast that puts the spotlight on hot stocks, key data points, and developing trends.
Indian benchmark indices, Sensex and Nifty 50, are likely to start the trading session of November 8 in the green, after ending with minor cuts in the previous session. In morning trade, Brent crude fell around 4.2% or $3.57 in absolute terms to the lowest price since July. It is a positive for the Indian markets because the country is a net importer of crude. Stocks in Asia this morning rose after a rally in Big Tech pushed US stocks to their longest streak of gains in two years, with investors shrugging off the latest attempts from Federal Reserve speakers to tone down Wall Street's optimism. In the domestic market, Bata India, Lupin, Multi Commodity Exchange of India, Pidilite Industries, Power Finance Corporation, Tata Power Company, and United Spirits among others will report their quarterly earnings later in the day. Among other stocks to track are IndiGo, Power Grid, Shree Cement, IRCTC, and Apollo Tyres Tune in to the Marketbuzz Podcast for more cues
The Indian benchmark indices, Sensex and Nifty 50, are poised for a gap-down opening on November 7, following a festive mood in the previous session. On November 6, the domestic market saw a third consecutive day of gains, with Nifty 50 reaching a two-week high. Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) offloaded approximately Rs 549 crore, while domestic institutional investors (DIIs) purchased around Rs 595.7 crore. Asian stocks snapped a three-day winning streak in morning trade, slipping as the bond market's rally paused and investors reined in enthusiasm about a possible peak in global interest rates. In contrast, on Wall Street, the Nasdaq extended its winning streak for a seventh consecutive session, marking its longest such streak since January. However, the gain was modest at 0.3%, indicating a slight loss of momentum. S&P 500 futures and European futures both declined by 0.2%. Oil prices retraced most of their gains from the previous day due to concerns about weak demand in China. Investors are closely monitoring trade data scheduled for later in the day to assess demand from the world's second-largest oil consumer. Key stocks to watch in the domestic market include Nykaa, Gland Pharma, Bajaj Finance, IRCTC, Power Grid, and more. Tune in to the Marketbuzz Podcast for more cues
In this episode of Market Minutes, Sucheta Anchaliya talks about all the important factors to watch today from mid caps, US Consumer price index, IRCTC and NBCC India to global market setup. Also catch Aparna Karnik of DSP Mutual Fund in Voice of the Day segment. Market Minutes is a morning podcast that puts the spotlight on hot stocks, keys data points and developing trends
Join Max, Tony, Hank, Chops, SamMo and Sandy as they bring their ranting A-Game to the ICC World Cup ticketing and scheduling mess that doesn't seem to have an end in sight. The group gets serious wondering whether Hardik is a good captain, until they realise that he's not even the captain any more. They also lament Indian cricket's lack of structure, unlike Australia and England. And they identify the man who may solve India's problems as team director - Ilayaraja. Hehe. Kidding. That would have been an actually coherent choice. Follow us on twitter: 1. Bits and pieces: https://twitter.com/bnp_cricket 2. Max: https://twitter.com/maxdavinci 3. Tony: https://twitter.com/notytony 4. SamMo: https://twitter.com/sleepyhead148 5. Hank: https://twitter.com/mohank 6. SandyJi: https://twitter.com/sandeeplanjewar The shownotes are being rescheduled since the Hyderabad police will not be able to provide adequate security.
लोकसभा स्पीकर ओम बिरला ने संसद में जारी गतिरोध को खत्म करने के लिए सभी पार्टियों के नेताओं की बैठक बुलाई. मणिपुर पुलिस फेक न्यूज़ के मामले में कुछ लोगों को गिरफ्तार करने की कोशिश कर रही हैं. IRCTC की वेबसाइट और ऐप पर टिकटों की बुकिंग करीब 5 घंटे बाद दोबारा शुरू हो गई है, सुनिए शाम 4 बजे की ख़बरें
संसद में मानसून सत्र के चौथे दिन लोकसभा की कार्रवाई शुरू होने के 3 मिनट बाद ही 2 बजे तक के लिए स्थगित कर दी गई, विपक्ष मोदी सरकार के खिलाफ अविश्वास प्रस्ताव ला सकता है, दिल्ली राऊज़ एवेन्यू कोर्ट ने ने आज हरियाणा के पूर्व मंत्री गोपाल गोयल कांडा को एयर होस्टेस गीतिका शर्मा को खुदकुशी के लिए उकसाने के मामले में बरी कर दिया है, IRCTC की वेबसाइट और ऐप डाउन हो गए हैं. लोगों को सुबह करीब 9 बजे से टिकट बुकिंग में परेशानी आ रही है, पाकिस्तान के पूर्व प्रधानमंत्री इमरान ख़ान की मुश्किलें आज बढ़ सकती हैं. पाकिस्तान के चुनाव आयोग ने इमरान ख़ान के लिए गैर-ज़मानती वारंट जारी किया, रूस की राजधानी मॉस्को में डिफेंस मिलिट्री हेडक्वार्टर के पास हुए ड्रोन अटैक पर अमेरिका ने यूक्रेन का साथ नहीं देने का फैसला किया है, सुनिए दोपहर 1 बजे का 5 मिनट पॉडकास्ट.
In this episode of Market Minutes, Asha Menon talks on optimism in the US stock markets following the debt-ceiling deal and the cautiousness the other markets are still displaying. Meanwhile, Indian Railways' ticketing vertical gives reason to cheer. Market Minutes is a morning podcast that puts the spotlight on hot stocks, keys data points and developing trends (with inputs from Shivam Shukla)
In this episode, find out about Poonawalla Fincorp's plan to sell the housing subsidiary to the TPG subsidiary, also find out about Arham Tech to list today Business Term of the Day: 5G
Thieves in Bihar have dug a tunnel under the rail yard and stolen vintage rail engines and sold them as scrap. Catch the lads as they go after their favourite punching bag, the IRCTC and look at this rather strange beast with gooey-eyed wonder. But it all ends well, because as always they have a fake-solution for all the world's troubles. + Music credit – Simon D'Souza + Slide into our DMs https://www.instagram.com/farfromfact/ Paypal paypal.me/farfromfact
IRCTC घोटाले में बिहार के डिप्टी सीएम तेजस्वी यादव की जमानत कोर्ट ने बरकरार रखी है. केदारनाथ से 2 किमी. दूर एक नीजि हेलिकॉप्टर क्रैश हो गया जिसमें 6 लोगों की मौत हो गई है. बिलकिस बानो रेप केस के 11 दोषियों की रिहाई के खिलाफ दाखिल जनहित याचिका पर सुप्रीम कोर्ट में सुनवाई होगी. राष्ट्रीय जांच एजेंसी ने आतंकी कनेक्शन को लेकर छापेमारी की है. सुनिए दोपहर 1 बजे की ख़बरें.
IRCTC घोटाला मामले में सीबीआई ने बिहार के डिप्टी सीएम तेजस्वी यादव के खिलाफ दिल्ली कोर्ट का रुख किया है.केंद्रीय गृह मंत्री अमित शाह ने हैदराबाद में दिव्यांगजनों को मुफ्त दिव्यांग सहायता उपकरण और अन्य सामान वितरित किए. दिल्ली के डिप्टी CM मनीष सिसोदिया ने वक्फ बोर्ड के अध्यक्ष अमानतुल्लाह खान की गिरफ्तारी पर भाजपा पर निशाना साधा है. केरल के कोच्चि में एक प्राइवेट हॉस्पिटल ने देश में पहली बार एक पेशेंट का फुल आर्म ट्रांसप्लांट करने में सफलता हासिल की, सुनिए शाम 4 बजे की बड़ी ख़बरें
IRCTC Indian Railway Catering Tourism Corporation --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/prakash50/support
In today's episode for 25th August 2022, we see how IRCTC landed itself in a soup last week.
A recently issued tender floated by the IRCTC seems to indicate its intention to monetise traveller and freight passenger data. While digital rights advocates are alarmed at this news, officials from the online ticketing agency claim that these reports are false. What's the real deal? Tune in!
Led by the IT giants Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) and Infosys, the top listed companies by market capitalisation have reported net increase in employees to their total headcount in FY22, according to analysis from the annual reports. Of them, TCS closed the year ended March with all-time high net addition of 103,546 employees, while Infosys hired 85,000 fresh college graduates, with a net addition of 54,000 employees. IT companies are battling high attrition, fueled by a sharp rise in demand for automation and digitalisation across all industry sectors. The software behemoths are compensating the same with high fresher recruitments. Meanwhile, oil-to-telecom conglomerate Reliance Industries recorded the highest net addition during FY22 with 107,000 employees. In the banking services, HDFC Bank and ICICI Bank added 21,486 employees and 7,094 in the financial year respectively. The hiring outlook is strong too in the near term. According to a teamlease report, the corporates “intent to hire” showed a substantial increase of 7% for the ongoing July-September quarter to 61% and it might hit 70% in the coming quarters largely driven by hiring from tier-2 cities. Now, if we look at most of the listed PSUs, employee headcount has shrunk in FY22. This was the trend observed across sectors. Employment in PSUs is categorised as ‘on-roll' and ‘off-roll'. Managerial staff, supervisory and non-executive employees fall under the on-roll category. Casual and contract workers are classified as ‘off-roll' staff. India's largest state-owned bank State Bank of India headcount was lower at 244,250 in FY22, compared with 245,652 in FY21. Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) too saw its employee strength drop marginally to 31,254. Meanwhile, BPCL employees fell to 8,594 in FY22 from over 9,000 in the previous fiscal. Meanwhile, Coal India and GAIL too saw its employee count drop. Indian Railways' ticketing and tourism arm IRCTC and SBI Life Insurance are the only companies among the top 15 PSUs that have reported an increase in the employee strength in FY22. According to a report in a national daily, the fall in employee count has been coming down for many years. SBI saw its employee numbers go up when there was a merger with five other small banks in 2017-18. ONGC and NTPC had reported employee increase or hired many years ago. So, what explains this phenomenon and why are PSU companies not hiring or increasing their headcount? [Byte of Radhicka Kapoor, Senior Visiting Fellow, ICRIER]
1. दररोज 25 हजार लोकांचा भूकेमुळं मृत्यू; UN अहवालातून धक्कादायक खुलासा2. ... तरच SC/ST कायदा लागू होईल, कर्नाटक उच्च न्यायालयाचा मोठा निर्णय3. Shivsena Rebel: भुजबळांनी पक्ष सोडू नये म्हणून बाळासाहेबांनी कोणते प्रयत्न केले होते?4. रेल्वे स्टेशनवरील विक्रेत्यांच्या मनमानीवर IRCTC कडून लगाम, दिले कडक कारवाईचे निर्देश5. भाजपने पहिला डाव टाकला... राज्यपालांना पत्र पाठवलं6. तारक मेहता का उल्टा चष्मा: अभिनेत्रीनं केली निर्मात्यांची पोलखोल; म्हणाली..7. कोविड-19 लसींमुळे भारतात 42 लाखांहून अधिक मृत्यू रोखले गेले8. चर्चेतील बातमी - अजित पवारांचा राग अजुनही कमी झालेला नाही, आमदार शहाजी पाटील ऑडिओ क्लिप व्हायरल*रिसर्च अँड स्क्रिप्ट - युगंधर ताजणे
Equities fought volatility and surged last week, as stocks danced to the tunes of global cues, domestic news flow and corporate earnings. Among indices, financials lead from the front, while a steep cut in excise duty on fuel prices and capping of sugar exports, saw stocks from these sectors react negatively. Eventually, the BSE Sensex moved in a band of 1,500 points, and finally ended the week with 1 per cent gain. The NSE Nifty, on the other hand, was up 0.5 per cent, while the Bank Nifty surged nearly 4 per cent. However, despite last week's gains, the benchmark indices may end the current month on a negative note, marking their biggest declines in May since 2012. The BSE benchmark Sensex and the Nifty were down close to 4 per cent so far this month, primarily dragged down by the persistent FII selling. Foreign investors have, now, been net sellers for eight straight months and have net sold stocks worth more than 52,000 crore rupees so far this month. According to VK Vijayakumar of Geojit Financial Services, FPI selling is showing mild signs of exhaustion. DII and retail buying together with overwhelming FPI selling along with short covering can trigger a near-term rally. High quality large-caps can stage a rally, says Vijayakumar, adding that leading banks are safe bets. Against this backdrop, Business Standard's Avdhut Bagkar shares how the banking stock is placed on the charts. Going ahead, markets will look at Q1CY22 GDP number, slated to be announced on Tuesday, for fresh cues on the economic recovery. As per a Reuters poll of economists, India's economic recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic likely stumbled again in the first quarter of this year primarily due to Omicron-related restrictions and higher inflation. ‘Growth in Asia's third-largest economy was pencilled in at 4.0% for the January-March quarter from the same period a year ago, down from 5.4% in Q4 2021. If realised, that would be the slowest in a year and a third consecutive quarter of weaker growth'. Amid these triggers, technical charts suggest that the NSE Nifty managed to close above its 20-DMA for the first time since April 13, 2022. The Nifty may look to target the trendline resistance around 16,750 in the near term. On the downside, the index can expect support around 16,200-level. As we draw curtains on the Q4 earnings season, stocks like Aurobindo Pharma, Delhivery, IRCTC, Jindal Steel and Sun Pharma could see some action ahead of earnings on Monday.
Equities fought volatility and surged last week, as stocks danced to the tunes of global cues, domestic news flow and corporate earnings. Among indices, financials lead from the front, while a steep cut in excise duty on fuel prices and capping of sugar exports, saw stocks from these sectors react negatively. Eventually, the BSE Sensex moved in a band of 1,500 points, and finally ended the week with 1 per cent gain. The NSE Nifty, on the other hand, was up 0.5 per cent, while the Bank Nifty surged nearly 4 per cent. However, despite last week's gains, the benchmark indices may end the current month on a negative note, marking their biggest declines in May since 2012. The BSE benchmark Sensex and the Nifty were down close to 4 per cent so far this month, primarily dragged down by the persistent FII selling. Foreign investors have, now, been net sellers for eight straight months and have net sold stocks worth more than 52,000 crore rupees so far this month. According to VK Vijayakumar of Geojit Financial Services, FPI selling is showing mild signs of exhaustion. DII and retail buying together with overwhelming FPI selling along with short covering can trigger a near-term rally. High quality large-caps can stage a rally, says Vijayakumar, adding that leading banks are safe bets. Against this backdrop, Business Standard's Avdhut Bagkar shares how the banking stock is placed on the charts. Going ahead, markets will look at Q1CY22 GDP number, slated to be announced on Tuesday, for fresh cues on the economic recovery. As per a Reuters poll of economists, India's economic recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic likely stumbled again in the first quarter of this year primarily due to Omicron-related restrictions and higher inflation. ‘Growth in Asia's third-largest economy was pencilled in at 4.0% for the January-March quarter from the same period a year ago, down from 5.4% in Q4 2021. If realised, that would be the slowest in a year and a third consecutive quarter of weaker growth'. Amid these triggers, technical charts suggest that the NSE Nifty managed to close above its 20-DMA for the first time since April 13, 2022. The Nifty may look to target the trendline resistance around 16,750 in the near term. On the downside, the index can expect support around 16,200-level. As we draw curtains on the Q4 earnings season, stocks like Aurobindo Pharma, Delhivery, IRCTC, Jindal Steel and Sun Pharma could see some action ahead of earnings on Monday.
The Initial Public Offering (IPO) of India's largest life insurer LIC is finally here, albeit at a reduced size. The IPO is a pure offer for sale where the government is selling a 3.5% stake, down from its earlier plan to sell 5%. It plans to raise Rs 21,000 crore at the upper end of the price range of ₹902-949 per share. That will still overshadow Paytm's Rs 18,300 crore issue. The IPO price values LIC at around Rs 6 trillion or 1.12 times its embedded value of Rs 5.4 trillion at the end of December. The embedded value is a measure of future cash flows in life insurance companies and a key financial metric for insurers. When LIC filed the draft red herring prospectus (DRHP), experts had pegged its valuation at two to three times its embedded value, based on the valuation of its domestic private sector peers. However, market volatility due to the Russia-Ukraine war may have changed the dynamics. Listed private life insurance companies like HDFC Life, SBI Life and ICICI Prudential Life trade between 2.1 to 3.1 times their embedded value. The average market cap to EV ratio of the three is 2.6 times. If we apply the average multiple, LIC's value would be Rs 14 trillion. The IPO valuation is almost 60% below this level. However, it is in line with the multiples commanded by global peers which are anywhere from 0.21 to 1.89. Analysts highlighted that LIC had a lower Value of New Business (VNB) margin of 9.9% in FY21 compared with private players, who have VNB margins of 22-27% due to higher share of participation and group products. Disinvestment secretary Tuhin Kanta Pandey justified the valuation and timing of the IPO at Wednesday's press conference. IPO is the first step of long-term value creation for shareholders, he says. The 3.5% is an optimal size in current market conditions, he said, adding that the valuation flows from optimised positioning, marketing strategy, accessing investors and market window. While the government said it has decided to go ahead with the IPO in May due to strong market demand and a "solid" anchor investor base, there also might be another reason. It has time till May 12 to launch the IPO without filing fresh papers with Sebi. If this window is missed, LIC would have to update the offer documents with the latest results and embedded value. The government was previously criticised for under-pricing the October 2019 IPO of the Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation, popularly known as IRCTC. At the top end of the price range, IRCTC fetched a market value of Rs 5,120 crore. The government divested around 12.5% of its stake in IRCTC during the IPO and sold another 20% in December 2020. Today IRCTC is valued at almost Rs 60,000 crore, an increase of 1070% since the IPO. Does the government risk a repetition of the IRCTC episode? According to Ashish Gumashta, CEO, Julius Baer India, govt is eyeing price discovery for LIC and it can't think of a better defensive bet than this at this time. He believes this size will not disrupt the primary market, and the valuation leaves something on the table for investors. Market strength of LIC and private players vary. Another expert echoed similar views. Deven Choksey, Managing Director, KR Choksey Investment Managers says the govt wants investors to come again for FPOs. He believes the valuation is sensible in current situation, but price to EV ratio could have risen to 2 if market conditions were right. The share price performance of India's current IPO record holder also offers a lesson on what happens when an issue is overpriced. Shares of Paytm, which listed in November last year, are down 73% from their IPO price. Experts feel that the conservative valuation for LIC at this stage is a sensible approach by the government, which has to consider global and local market conditions, long-term return expectations of retail investors and the nature of LIC's business c
Despite the worsening Ukraine-Russia crisis, global markets stabilised on Wednesday as sanctions announced by major economies, including the US, UK, Japan and Australia hit markets not with a bang, but a whimper. Instead of a sweeping package that crippled top Russian banks, cutting its financial transactions off the global economy, or personally singling out Vladimir Putin -- the US and its allies settled on a modest ‘first tranche' of penalties. Markets responded with a shrug, underwhelmed by the tit-for-tat approach. The sanctions targeted a pair of Russian banks, VEB.RF and Promsvyazbank as well as three members of Russia's elite with close ties to the Kremlin. The penalties also sought to freeze future purchases of Russian sovereign debt. Yet the sanctions hardly amounted to the economy-crippling measures the US and its partners long telegraphed if Russian troops were to roll across the border. Not surprisingly then, the BSE Sensex and the Nifty50 closed with tepid losses of 0.1% each, ending at 57,232 and 17,063 levels, respectively. However, the broader indices outperformed the frontline indices. The MidCap index on the BSE advanced 0.6% while the SmallCap index climbed 0.9%. The likes of Yaari Digital, Raymond, Orient Bell, Crompton Greaves, Oberoi Realty, Adani Power, IRCTC, and JSW Energy rallied between 3 and 20%. This bounce back comes after a sharp fall of over 10% at index level in the past one week, where 13 stocks from the Nifty Midcap100 pack and 18 from the Nifty Smallcap pack hit 52-week lows. So, does the reversal mean that the downtrend has bottomed out? Or is it just a dead cat bounce? Fundamentally, too, D-Street mavens say investors should stay away from the space as market situation remains volatile. They also say investing in large-caps could be a better option at the moment where balance sheet strength is strong. As regards today, the developing situation in Eastern Europe and monthly F&O expiry back home will guide the indices. That apart, stock-specific action, oil price movement and bond yields will also affect the market sentiment. Watch video
Brent crude is hovering around $92 per barrel-mark even as faint signs of progress in nuclear talks between the United States and Iran emerge. If US sanctions are lifted, Iran could export millions of barrels of crude and help to drive down red-hot oil prices. However, the move may not be enough to cool off the prices as tensions remain high in Eastern Europe. Crude prices have rallied about 20% this year and 16% in the past month, as tensions between Russia and NATO simmered over Ukraine. Technically, if WTI March holds $91.60 level, it could rise up to $93.60 levels. Analysts worry oil prices are headed higher, and can hit $125 a barrel by June 2022 given these tensions and a pick-up in demand over the months ahead. Platts Analytics, for instance, expects India's gasoline demand to grow about 5 per cent in 2022 after rising 12 per cent in 2021. "India's gasoline demand had already recovered back to above 2019's levels. The resurgence of COVID-19 in the country is expected to slow demand in Q1, but we still see growth for the whole of 2022 as the situation starts to improve. Mobility seems to be picking up as daily infections started to ease,” says JY Lim, Advisor, Oil Markets, S&P Global Platts Analytics But, rising crude oil prices may not be all that bad news, especially for companies that are engaged in drilling and extraction of oil. D-Street mavens are bullish on the road ahead for oil drilling companies such as ONGC, OIL India and Reliance Industries, who could gain from a rise in crude oil prices. Another sector that is likely to benefit is electric vehicles (EV), as people may opt to buy EVs instead of the ones that run on conventional fuel. Technical chartists, too, remain bullish on these stocks from a medium-term perspective and expect these stocks to gain between 10 and 15% in the next 6 – 8 months. A mild dip in oil prices and bond yields on Tuesday did cap downside in the markets yesterday as benchmark indices snapped their three-day losing run. The BSE Sensex index is now at 57,808 while the Nifty50 is at 17,267 as global headwinds keep investors on their toes. Today, investors will react to Q3 earnings of Bharti Airtel and IRCTC, announced post-market hours yesterday, and will eye quarterly results of ACC, Berger Paints, Nykaa and Tata Power among others. Watch video
Indian equity benchmarks are likely to make a strong start on Wednesday amid gains across global markets. At 8:22 am, Singapore Exchange (SGX) Nifty futures -- an early indicator of the Nifty index -- were up 71 points or 0.4 percent at 17,330.5. Corporate earnings will remain on investors' radar. A number of companies are due to report their financial results on Wednesday, including Aurobindo Pharma, Berger Paints, GMR Infra, Petronet LNG, PowerGrid, SAIL, Rail Vikas Nigam, Nykaa and Paras Defence.
Budget euphoria is slowly fading away on Dalal Street as global headwinds stare in the eye. Geo-political tensions involving Ukraine and Russia, coupled with fear of easy money drying up amid soaring inflation, are giving a rude reality check to stock market investors. Yesterday, the BSE Sensex plunged over 1,300 points in intra-day trade while the Nifty50 slipped below the 17,150 level. The Nifty 50 and BSE-Sensex tumbled for a third straight day and moved below the highs made on Budget-day. The indices ended nearly 2% lower at 17,214 and 57,621, respectively. With this, the markets have turned negative for the year, and are down 1 per cent YTD. U R Bhat, who is co-founder & director at Alphaniti Fintech, believes markets can fall another 3-5% from here on as an actual clash on the Russian border is not priced in at all. Brent crude prices are already up 16% in a month amid simmering tensions between Russia and NATO over Ukraine. Brent is above $93 per barrel-mark but a full-scale war can take it past the $100 per barrel mark, analysts worry. Most analysts, including those at Rabobank International and BofA Securities, see Brent hitting the $125 mark by June 2022. On their part, the benchmark indices – the S&P BSE Sensex and the Nifty50 – have slipped around 3% each in the past one month. On the contrary, the Nifty Energy index that comprises upstream players like Reliance Industries and ONGC has outperformed with a rise of nearly 6% as oil prices rose during this period. Going-forward, market mavens suggest investors to stay stock-specific and tread cautiously in the markets. These global factors will continue to dictate market trend on Tuesday as well. Domestically, investors will track the three-day RBI policy meeting, which will begin later today. That apart, December quarter result of prominent companies, including Bharti Airtel, Escorts, Indraprastha Gas, IRCTC and Godrej Consumer products will be on investor radar. Moreover, shares of Adani Wilmar will also debut on the bourses today. Watch video
Indian equity benchmarks are likely to make a positive start on Tuesday amid a mixed trend across other Asian markets. At 8:38 am, Singapore Exchange (SGX) Nifty futures -- an early indicator of the Nifty index -- were up 21.5 points or 0.1 percent at 17,235.5. Corporate earnings will remain on investors' radar. Bharti Airtel, Godrej Consumer and IRCTC are due to post their quarterly numbers later in the day.
The Union Budget for fiscal year 2022-23 triggered volatility on the bourses last week. While bulls took the baton and charged ahead during the initial part of the week, bears dragged the indices lower in the second half amid profit booking and wobbly global markets. The frontline S&P BSE Sensex and the Nifty50 eventually ended the week with 2.5% higher at 58,645 and 17,516, respectively. As per technical charts the 50-pack Nifty index may attempt to reclaim the 18,000-mark this week if it manages to conquer the immediate resistance level of 17,800. 17,400 remains a key support level. As regards Sensex, the 30-pack index may quote between 57,400 and 59,750. The index has support at 57,850 and resistance at 59,300. One of the key triggers this week will be the Reserve Bank of India's monetary policy outcome as the MPC will begin its three-day meeting later today. Analysts expect RBI's guidance to be dovish when compared to global peers, who have been guiding or announcing rate hikes as inflation become into a concern. They say, growth concerns amid spread of the Omicron variant and relatively benign inflation out-turns may provide the RBI with enough room to maintain its growth-supportive monetary policies. However, markets will eye the MPC's commentary as it tries to strike a balance between post-pandemic liquidity and bond yields. The yields on 10-year govt bonds have already risen to two-year high since the announcement of the Budget. Any decision to reduce liquidity may further push the yields higher, which may affect equities too. Against this backdrop, money market action along with rate sensitive stocks in the banking and real estate space will be in focus in early part of this week. The RBI will announce its policy outcome on Wednesday, Feb 9. That apart, stock-specific action will remain plentiful as results season enters its last leg. Policybazaar, TVS Motor, Union Bank of India, Bata India, Escorts, Indraprastha Gas, IRCTC, Berger Paints, Tata Power, M&M and Hero MotoCorp are some of the notable companies set to report their December quarter results this week. Meanwhile, in the primary market, the initial share of Vedant Fashions will close on Tuesday, Feb 8. So far, the issue has been subscribed less than 20 per cent. Globally, the meltdown in technology stocks on Wall Street will be tracked by market participants, along with oil prices and bond yield movement. Watch video
Top headlines · Sensex pares gains to end 77 points down; Nifty holds 17,100 · ONGC soars to 32-month high on improved outlook · Bharti Airtel rises 6% on Google's $1-bn investment plan, erases gains later · PSE stocks surge ahead of Budget; CPSE index gains 1% · Adani Wilmar IPO subscribed 1.08 times on day 2 The frontline indices started Friday's session on a positive note but ended the volatile week marginally in the red. The BSE Sensex started gap-up and gained 807 points to touch the day's high but a sharp sell-off in the last hour of trade dragged the index into the negative zone, down 77 points at 57,200. Its NSE counterpart, the Nifty50, ended with a loss of 8 points at 17,102. This was 271 points lower than its intra-day high. For the week, the benchmark indices were lower by 3% each. The indices' breadth was slightly skewed towards buyers, as 14 of the 30 Sensex constituents and 19 of the 50 Nifty constituents ended in the red. The losses were led by Maruti Suzuki, Tech Mahindra, Power Grid, Hero MotoCorp, ICICI Bank and Axis Bank. On the upside, NTPC, UPL, ONGC, Sun Pharma, IndusInd Bank, Tata Consumer Products, and ITC ended as top performers. In the broader markets, the BSE MidCap and SmallCap indices bucked the trend and ended 1% higher each, with LIC Housing Finance, Castrol India, Apollo Hospitals, Mindtree, Sun TV and HT Media rallying up to 18.5%. Kriti Industries, Mahindra Logistics, HG Infra, TVS Motor, RBL Bank, and IDBI Capital were the worst-hit stocks from the space. Sectorally, the Nifty IT index was a significant gainer. It ended with gains of 1%. With this, the index snapped its 8-day losing run. The IT pack was supported by strong Q3 results of Coforge and Birlasoft, which closed 7% and 1.6% higher, respectively. The Nifty Healthcare index was the other prominent gainer, up 1.5%, followed by Realty and FMCG. On the BSE, the CPSE index gained 1% with public-sector companies putting up a good show ahead of the Union Budget. Mangalore Refinery, Bharat Immunologicals, ONGC, NTPC, IRCTC, Concor, NLC India and NMDC were some of the top gainers on the index. On the other hand, Nifty Bank was the top loser, down 0.8% along with Financials and Auto indices. Among individual stocks, oil major ONGC touched a 32-month high on the BSE on improved outlook amid rising oil prices as higher oil realisations and modest production could spur the company's EBITDA in the December quarter. The Brent crude benchmark has topped the 90-dollar-a-barrel mark for the first time in seven years. Besides, the shares of telecom major Bharti Airtel rallied over 6% intra-day after it announced that internet giant Google would invest up to $1 billion in the company through equity investment and commercial partnership agreements. For the former, an investment of $700 million would be made by Google to acquire a 1.28% ownership in the company. Profit booking at higher levels, however, saw the counter erase these gains and close just 1.2% higher. Lastly, the IPO of edible oil major Adani Wilmar had been fully subscribed at 1.08 times on day 2 as of 4:15 pm. The retail investor portion was subscribed 1.79 times, while the non-institutional investor and qualified institutional buyer categories had been subscribed 0.85 and 0.32 times, respectively.
Global Policy Watch: Joan Didion On MoralityInsights on global issues of the day- RSJI want to write about the Andhra Pradesh cinema ticket price cap kerfuffle this week (read here for context). A regular reader, Prem Sagar, wrote to us last week giving us a picture of what was happening in Tollywood. All the great ingredients of a timeless PolicyWTF have come together there - good intentions, political games, conspiracy theories, a government order on price controls that Indira Gandhi would have been proud of and the inevitable unintended consequences. I wept with joy going through them all. But before that Joan Didion. The great chronicler of American life passed away a couple of weeks back. Why Joan Didion in a public policy newsletter, you may ask? Public policy is an interdisciplinary science. At the heart of it is understanding the public - the basis for its motives, its fears and insecurities and its wants. There was no one better than Joan Didion to show a mirror to a society in prose that was unsparing, sparse and crystalline. Didion didn’t go looking for grand narratives. There was no conscious painting of a big picture. She was intimate in her approach and got busy with the minutiae. But from that appeared something that made you rethink your priors. She wrote as she saw it. And she saw a lot. From the underlying vacuity of the unrest in colleges in the late 60s, the hollowness of the counterculture movement in California, the depravity hiding under Kennedy’s Camelot, the absence of any ideological truth bar nihilism among Black Panthers, the mendacity of Nixon and the arriviste pretensions of the Reagans. She covered them all with insight and acuity. Not many realise today that Didion grew up as a Goldwater conservative who wrote quite often in that conservative bible, the National Review during the late 50s and 60s where she reviewed films, eviscerated other authors and their books (her takedown of Salinger’s Catcher In The Rye is one for the ages), championed individual liberty and cautioned against the inevitable disorder that stems from collective self-righteous passions. No one was spared. Later in her life, she would turn that flint-edged gaze onto herself in her collection of essays ‘Where I Was From’ where she reflects on the myths and beliefs of the old California way that shaped her person. And on how wrong she could have been. Didion On MoralityAmong her essays, a particular favourite of mine is On Morality (in the anthology Slouching Towards Bethlehem) where she holds the word morality in her finger and turns it over and over again against the cold light of the day to make sense of it. I often think of it as a short cultural companion piece to Adam Smith’s The Theory of Moral Sentiments in its dissection of morality. She writes:“What does it (morality) mean? It means nothing manageable. There is some sinister hysteria in the air out here tonight, some hint of the monstrous perversion to which any human idea can come. “I followed my own conscience.” “I did what I thought was right.” How many madmen have said it and meant it? How many murderers? Klaus Fuchs said it, and the men who committed the Mountain Meadows Massacre said it, and Alfred Rosenberg said it. And, as we are rotely and rather presumptuously reminded by those who would say it now, Jesus said it. Maybe we have all said it, and maybe we have been wrong. Except on that most primitive level—our loyalties to those we love—what could be more arrogant than to claim the primacy of personal conscience?At least some of the time, the world appears to me as a painting by Hieronymous Bosch; were I to follow my conscience then, it would lead me out onto the desert with Marion Faye, out to where he stood in The Deer Park looking east to Los Alamos and praying, as if for rain, that it would happen: “...let it come and clear the rot and the stench and the stink, let it come for all of everywhere, just so it comes and the world stands clear in the white dead dawn.”She then agonises over the frequency of the word ‘morality’ appearing in politics, media and everyday lives. Like most timeless pieces, there’s both prescience and a definite universality in her analysis of morality. She puts her finger on the performative nature of those sermonising others in society:“You see, I want to be quite obstinate about insisting that we have no way of knowing—beyond that fundamental loyalty to the social code—what is “right” and what is “wrong,” what is “good” and what is “evil.” I dwell so upon this because the most disturbing aspect of “morality” seems to me to be the frequency with which the word now appears; in the press, on television, in the most perfunctory kinds of conversation. Questions of straightforward power (or survival) politics, questions of quite indifferent public policy, questions of almost anything: they are all assigned these factitious moral burdens. There is something facile going on, some self-indulgence at work. Of course we would all like to “believe” in something, like to assuage our private guilts in public causes, like to lose our tiresome selves; like, perhaps, to transform the white flag of defeat at home into the brave white banner of battle away from home. And of course it is all right to do that; that is how, immemorially, things have gotten doneYou don’t have to look too closely at that passage to find its echo in today’s India. She warns as she concludes the essay:“Because when we start deceiving ourselves into thinking not that we want something or need something, not that it is a pragmatic necessity for us to have it, but that it is a moral imperative that we have it, then is when we join the fashionable madmen, and then is when the thin whine of hysteria is heard in the land, and then is when we are in bad trouble. And we suspect we are already there.”The only thing constant about Joan Didion’s work over half a century was her honesty. She didn’t lie. She told us no stories to make us feel better or righteous. She changed her views of people and she changed herself. She didn’t belong to camps. She was fiercely her own person. She could not be appropriated. She was an original. RIP.PolicyWTF: The Disuse of Knowledge in SocietyThis section looks at egregious public policies. Policies that make you go: WTF, Did that really happen?- RSJ & Pranay KotasthaneOkay. Back to the A.P. Government’s decision to cap the price of film tickets in the state. Here’s the order. How many different ways can you say WTF while reading a government order? Let me count the ways.There’s a maximum ceiling rate of film tickets that’s set by a committee that was constituted vide G.O.Ms No.42, Home (Gen.A) Department, dt.09.03.2020 under the Chairmanship of Special Chief Secretary to Govt., Revenue Department. Whenever I read the word ‘vide’, I feel a surge of power flowing through me. Nothing says sarkaari power more than ‘vide’. Mere reading it makes you picture a Turkish towel on the backrest of your chair and a glass of water with a coaster on top of it. Now, this committee has divined the fixed rates for admission into cinema theatres based on geography (municipal corporation area, nagar panchayat area et al), on theatre type (Multiplex, Ac/Air Cool, non-AC) and on ticket class (economy, deluxe and premium). The prices range between Rs. 5 (gram panchayat, non-AC, Economy) to Rs. 250 (municipal corporation, multiplex, premium). The management is at liberty to charge lesser rates but before doing that they should inform the Licensing Authority and take an acknowledgement.Any violation of the maximum rates can lead to penal action. Of course!The theatre management must make provision for online ticketing. It gets better. The AP government is now planning to launch an online portal (like IRCTC) which will be the only portal that will sell cinema tickets in the state. Yes, there’s so much state capacity lying idle that we can now afford to have the government run the business of selling cinema tickets.The number of shows in a day is restricted to 4. Why? Because 4 is perhaps the lucky number of someone in administration. The maximum retail price of any item should not be exceeded while selling refreshments to the customers. Free drinking water and clean restrooms must be provided. Yeah. 75 years of independence and many governments later, the state hasn’t provided clean drinking water to homes of people but now it can demand private establishments to do so.A.P. Government short films must be screened for 120 seconds before the start of the show and for 30 seconds during the interval of the show. Good. Hopefully, the propaganda short films would be about how price caps on cinema tickets are helping Telugu biddas. The maximum retail price of any item should not be exceeded while selling refreshments to the customers. Free drinking water and clean restrooms must be provided. I know this is the same as #5 above. But this isn’t a typo on my part. The official government order has this point repeated twice at sections 2 (iv) and 2 (vi). I am assuming there’s a deeper meaning hidden here because I start with the assumption that the state can do no wrong. The entry and exit into the theatres should be such that traffic around the theatre does not stop or slow down. Sure. Because there are no traffic jams elsewhere in AP. Autobahns all over the state.Sufficient parking must be provided and the parking charges should be reasonable. Why not? Why leave parking out of all this?All The Wrong ReasonsI grew up with more than a handful of Telugu speaking friends around me (the late 80s and early 90s). Films were a bit more than entertainment to them than any other community in our small town. This meant they were often the ones who would rent a video player for 24 hours (fixed cost) and a movie marathon would ensue with whatever videotapes we could get our hands on. This led to the happy circumstance of me watching the greatest hits of Chiranjeevi and the entire canon of ‘Rowdy’ films (Rodwy Alludu, Rowdy Gari Pellam, State Rowdy, Assembly Rowdy et al). Those were the days. I digress. Anyway, so films are big in A.P. There are thousands of cinema theatres in the state with millions directly or indirectly employed. There’s a material impact on livelihoods because of a bad policy decision. But here we are.There are three reasons given for this move by the state government. One, the pandemic has been tough on people and the prices of tickets are prohibitively high. So, the government is doing this to make cinemas affordable for people. Two, there’s huge tax evasion by theatre owners and the state barely gets the tax revenues it should. Three, the YSRC government feels the film industry leans towards the opposition parties (TDP, Pavan Kalyan) and this is its attempt to bring it under their thumb. These are specious and plain stupid. Like we have written umpteen times here, the price isn’t set by someone who knows better. No one knows better. It is a signal that sends information to buyers and sellers. When supply or demand changes, market prices adjust to reflect the new reality affecting the incentives of buyers and sellers. Nobody needs to set this. It happens on its own in a market system. But this is an idea that never finds acceptance in India. The public often expects the government to set price caps and governments feel it is their duty to make sure ‘corporates’ aren’t gouging customers and making huge profits.Price Is Not For You To SetWe have written about this in edition #140 with an extract from Hayek’s landmark essay ‘The Use of Knowledge in Society’. The essay explains that the price system is a decentralised coordinating mechanism for society. As he wrote in the essay:“Assume that somewhere in the world a new opportunity for the use of some raw material, say, tin, has arisen, or that one of the sources of supply of tin has been eliminated. It does not matter for our purpose—and it is very significant that it does not matter—which of these two causes has made tin more scarce. All that the users of tin need to know is that some of the tin they used to consume is now more profitably employed elsewhere and that, in consequence, they must economize tin. There is no need for the great majority of them even to know where the more urgent need has arisen, or in favor of what other needs they ought to husband the supply. If only some of them know directly of the new demand, and switch resources over to it, and if the people who are aware of the new gap thus created in turn fill it from still other sources, the effect will rapidly spread throughout the whole economic system and influence not only all the uses of tin but also those of its substitutes and the substitutes of these substitutes, the supply of all the things made of tin, and their substitutes, and so on; and all his without the great majority of those instrumental in bringing about these substitutions knowing anything at all about the original cause of these changes. The whole acts as one market, not because any of its members survey the whole field, but because their limited individual fields of vision sufficiently overlap so that through many intermediaries the relevant information is communicated to all.”Every time the government interferes with the price system, the information residing in the price gets diminished. The real-world implications of this loss are all too familiar — price caps lead to shortages and poor quality, price floors lead to wasteful expenditure. Distorting prices costs lives.And it is funny but sad when the government complains of large scale tax evasion as the reason for doing this. The solution to tax evasion is simpler taxes, an efficient mechanism to collect them and a clean administrative machinery. To give more power to a corrupt and overbearing administration to lord over license distribution, do surprise raids and be all-powerful is to invite inspector raj all over again. The unintended consequences are already showing up. Cinema halls are shutting down because the prices are unviable. Distributors and exhibitors who are still reeling from the impact of pandemic and lockdowns on their business are exiting. Raids and fines have become common. Soon there will be an artificial scarcity of tickets created and a black market will emerge. The quality of production will go down because who will invest in a high-quality product when the profits are capped. Good content will go to OTT or its supply will go down. The state government will neither get more taxes and the people will lose out on quality entertainment. Everyone loses. We have seen this movie before. But governments never tire of showing this to us again and again. There’s never any cap on that.Addendum: — Pranay KotasthaneThe creator of the idiom “We’ve seen this movie before” obviously lived in a place where movie price tickets weren’t capped. Hat-tip to two readers of this newsletter for alerting us about this issue, which has been simmering over the last eight months. RSJ has already covered the important points of the saga. Nevertheless, this policyWTF was too inviting a rabbit-hole. So here are some more points to consider. Some personal context first. Like RSJ, I too have Telugu friends who love cinema dearly. Back in my college days, every hostel block had a “TV Room”. Except on cricket match days, only one other item ran on that TV: Telugu movies. So powerful was the pull of the movies that any person trying to locate a batchmate from Andhra Pradesh would begin their search from the TV Room. So I don’t find it surprising one bit to see journal papers with titles like Box-Office Revenue Estimation For Telugu Movie Industry Using Predictive Analytic Techniques. Or that both Telangana and AP have a ministerial portfolio for cinematography. Or that capping movie tickets would make for a popular policy.What should surprise us is how bad ideas regurgitate from state to state. AP is but just one of the many states that impose price caps for cinema tickets. Karnataka, Telangana, Tamil Nadu, all have their own versions of movie ticket price regulations. Based on news reports, I was able to compile this table.Not only do some states impose price caps, but they also impose price floors i.e. no theatre can show a movie for prices below the government-mandated price, even if they wished! Also, note that Kerala — a state one would expect to administer prices enthusiastically — doesn’t. Instead, that state prefers to collect higher entertainment tax and use the collections for other policy purposes.My colleague Anupam Manur had anticipated the unintended consequences of such policies way back in 2017 when the Karnataka government joined the bandwagon. Let me summarise the main points below.Since they can’t change ticket prices, theatre owners will be incentivised to showcase movies that are guaranteed to run full houses. Movies with time-tested stories and superstars win. Consumers lose as their choices shrink. (Someone should create a Herfindahl–Hirschman index to track how such price caps help incumbent production houses).Tickets will be sold in “black” to people who are willing to pay higher than the price cap. The price of complementary goods — popcorn, cola, parking — will increase.It will have the Bombay Rent Control Act effect — theatres will spend less on maintenance and safety. Some of them might close down due to low profitability, further reducing consumer choice. Increasing price caps in the future will become a centralised political question rather than a decentralised economic question. This is the case in TN where — much like the Central Pay Commission revision — price caps were hiked after a full 10 years in 2017.Reflecting on the CausesThere are three larger points to ponder why despite these obviously anticipable effects, controlling movie ticket prices remain popular. First, the inequality argument. “If actors can become billionaires due to astronomical signing amounts, why are they opposed to lowering down prices for the average cinema-goers?” This is a classic moralising stance completely devoid of economic logic. The causation actually flows the other way. It’s because there are enough and more people willing to buy tickets that producers are confident to remunerate actors better. Nevertheless, “protecting the interests of the common man” is an evergreen justification for terrible policies.Second, “protecting the culture” argument. While the linguistic organisation of states perhaps helped India stay together, state governments consider themselves not just as administrators of federal units but as custodians of local culture, language, and cinema. Besides capping prices, governments don’t bat an eyelid before making it mandatory to screen movies in the state language.Third, the fascination with low movie ticket prices. That one could see a movie in Tamil Nadu at ₹120, was seen as a matter of the state’s pride and neighbours’ envy for a long time. The question we really need to ask is — why should it be the government’s responsibility to equalise everyone’s chances for watching the “first-day, first-show” of a movie? Until we, the citizens don’t appreciate what we lose when prices are kept artificially low, governments will gleefully administer prices. Thus it’s not the first time that we’ve seen the fracas over movie ticket prices. In fact, it’s probably the first time that this policyWTF is facing spirited and united opposition from a cinema community. Hopefully, the movie stars will be able to impart some Economics101 gyaan to us all. My best wishes are with them.Announcement: Puliyabaazi with Jairam Ramesh on the 1991 Reforms— Pranay KotasthaneOver at Puliyabaazi, Saurabh and I hosted member of parliament and historian Jairam Ramesh for a chat on the politics of 1991 economic reforms. Having served as an officer-on-special-duty in Prime Minister Narasimha Rao’s office at the time, he closely witnessed — and shaped — several conversations around the reforms. I have quoted from his 2015 book To the Brink and Back: India’s 1991 Story on many occasions in this newsletter. So it was an absolute delight to discuss these topics with him. In particular, his story about getting his ideas on industrial delicensing approved by the cabinet tells a lot about the importance of narratives in public policy.Do not miss this episode and yes, do subscribe to the Puliyabaazi YouTube channel.India Policy Watch: Upgrading the Reform Narrative Insights on burning policy issues in India— Pranay KotasthaneMarketcraft is a brilliant new term I came across recently, courtesy of fellow traveller Rohit Chandra’s newsletter for The Morning Context. Rohit’s description of the term covers the main idea quite well:“Markets are not birthed spontaneously in the absence of the state; as political scientist Stephen Vogel has argued, most countries have actively constructed, governed and shaped markets in underdeveloped sectors rather than just blindly deregulating them, a process he calls marketcraft. While discarding the legacies of state ownership and Plan-based micromanagement may be part of marketcraft, so is creating an efficient legal system to resolve disputes, changing bureaucratic mindsets that tend to regard the private sector with suspicion, and creating a level playing field to prevent large corporations gaining excessive market power. Marketcraft is as much about building institutions as it is about doing away with previously interventionist regulation.”Caricatures of capitalism in India suggest that it is a system where matsyanyaaya reigns — rapacious businessmen run amok while the government is happy to sit out. Marketcraft instead emphasises that even the US — the poster child for free-market economies — is in fact, heavily governed. Not everything that Vogel writes applies to the Indian context but there’s one idea that resonated with me — the need to change the narratives we use for talking about reforms. Decades of dissing markets have resulted in a deep distrust for markets in India. The 1991 economic reforms have had limited success in changing this narrative. There is still more-than-enthusiastic support for price-fixing, bans, and government-run enterprises. Nothing scares people more than typeset phrases of the capitalist canon; “leave it to the market”, “trust markets”, “privatisation” are terms that evoke fear rather than hope. They conjure the image of being abandoned by one’s parents in a mela (the government is maai-baap after all). In response, policy analysts sing in the praise of markets using the same vocabulary that most Indians either find foreign or deeply distrust. Hence, it’s not surprising that reforms are episodic and often done through stealth rather than conviction. Since using standard free-market vocabulary is not quite effective, what we direly need are new narratives that make the case for reforms in a language India can understand. This table from Marketcraft gives an idea of how it could be done. There is merit in finding similar phrases that would make the language of reforms less alienating. Aatmanirbhar, Make in India are some good examples that could’ve been deployed for this purpose. Alas, they morphed into protectionism and industrial policy measures instead of building the case for markets. Another way to make reforms more palatable is to lay stress on the improvements in regulatory capacity when reforms are articulated. Take the case of the now-abandoned farm laws. The government spoke about the need to reduce intervention but failed to assuage farmers on dispute resolution. Moreover, replacing the jurisdiction of civil courts with a complex method under the full control of a bureaucrat fanned fear among the farmers. Crafting the right narratives is a much more difficult task than coming up with catchy slogans or spiffy abbreviations. It’s time we rise to that challenge.HomeWorkReading and listening recommendations on public policy matters[Paper] An economic guide to ticket pricing in the entertainment industry[Article] Anupam Manur’s article on why fixing movie ticket prices is a terrible policy.[Podcast] We’ve started a new 15-minute episode series on Puliyabaazi, where we discuss one public policy question every week. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit publicpolicy.substack.com
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The Value Investing Pod: The Best Podcast for Indian Investors
In this video, we discuss whether you should buy IRCTC, whether it will be multi-bagger, whether you should buy after the share split? Whether you should buy the stock? Will it go higher and why it is hitting upper circuits. Is IRCTC overvalued and what is the intrinsic value. Like, Comment and subscribe to the channel. JOIN OUR TELEGRAM CHANNEL: https://t.me/joinchat/Pu-u14yk2sVkY2E1 Follow us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/valueinvestingpicks
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