The meeting of the Monetary Policy Committee has been put off by a day on account of the state holiday declared in Maharashtra following the demise of Bharat Ratna Lata Mangeshkar. The MPC meet will now be conducted from 08-Feb to 10-Feb and the policy will be presented on 10th instead of 09th. February 07th has been declared a public holiday by the Maharashtra Government as a mark of respect. She passed away in the early hours of Sunday 06-February following hospitalization for over a month in Mumbai.
Adani Group incorporated its new subsidiary for a data centre in Mumbai. There will be similar data centres located in 5 other cities also. It may be recollected that Budget 2022 had accorded infrastructure status to data centres. The data centres will be housed under Adani Connex Private Limited, a JV between
Adani Enterprises and Edge Connex Europe. Adani Connex will undertake to develop, operate, maintain data centres, IT/ITES/Cloud services etc. Data centres provide the necessary secured data architecture.
Foreign portfolio investors pulled out Rs.6,834 crore from Indian markets in the first week of February. FPIs were net sellers of Rs.3,627 crore in equities and Rs.3,173 crore in debt. In the month of Jan-22, FPIs were net sellers in equities to the tune of $4.46 billion while in the last 4 months they sold $10 billion of equities. The end of ultra-loose monetary policies in the US combined with input inflation challenge in India led FPIs to exit India in droves. However, domestic institutions have been net buyers in this period.
Cogent E-Services Ltd filed DRHP with SEBI for its proposed IPO. As part of the IPO, Cogent E-Services will raise Rs.150 core by way of fresh issue and there will also be an offer for sale (OFS) of 994.68 lakh equity shares by promoters. The company may also do a private placement of shares worth Rs.30 crore ahead of the IPO, in which case the size of the issue will be reduced accordingly. Cogent is a CX solutions provider offering omnichannel solutions along various customer interaction touchpoints across different verticals.
In the first step to bring oil into the GST mainstream, the GST Council will debate bringing ATF under GST in the light of rising global fuel prices. This was confirmed by the Finance Minister. It may be recollected that while GST came into effect in July 2017; crude oil, natural gas, petrol, diesel and ATF had been kept out of the GST purview. There has been a demand from airlines to include ATF under GST to bring down the ATF prices. Brent Crude at $93/bbl has put tremendous pressure on beleaguered aviation companies.
Paytm reported widening of net loss at Rs.778 crore in the Dec-21 quarter. It had reported a net loss of Rs.482 crore in the sequential Sep-21 quarter. Paytm has lost over 50% from the issue price and has been one of the worst post listing performers. However, operating revenue were up 89% yoy at Rs.1,456 crore on the back of growth in merchant payments through MDR, new device subscriptions and loan disbursements. Paytm sits on cash of Rs.10,215 crore. Its GMV grew 123% yoy at Rs.250,000 crore in Q3.
Indian government may go slow on the sale of stake BPCL in the absence of competitive bids according to the DIPAM Secretary, Tuhin Kant Pandey. The government wants to hive off its 52.98% stake in BPCL but the Unions are against it. Lenders are also averse to the government selling its stake as it would bring an end to the guarantees. Vedanta is willing to pay up to $12 billion for the deal, which is a lot better than the current valuations of BPCL. Budget 2022 has already indicated that BPCL sale will only happen in FY23.
Anil Agarwal of Vedanta group is evaluating a potential merger of his indebted holding company with cash-rich Vedanta Ltd. The global commodity boom had fuelled a rally in Vedanta Ltd with its market cap doubling last year to $17 billion. Vedanta Resources had tried to hike its stake in Vedanta Ltd in 2020 but the deal fell through after LIC rejected the offer price as being too low. In the last few years, the Vedanta group had several brushes on corporate governance, especially with group holding company structure.