Apr-May fiscal deficit at Rs 73,201cr : UTVi

Apr-May fiscal deficit at Rs 73,201cr

Fiscal deficit between April and May moved up to Rs 73,201 crore or 54.9% of the annual target. The deficit figure has already crossed the halfway stage for the entire year because of increased social spending.

The government has set a fiscal deficit target of Rs 1,33,000 lakh crore or 2.5% of gross domestic product for the 2008/09 fiscal year - lower than 2.8% in the previous year.
Fiscal deficit is the difference between the government's total expenditure and total receipts. The gap is financed by borrowings from the Reserve Bank of India and the markets


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Current a/c deficit narrows in Jan-March
Mumbai: The country's current account deficit narrowed to $1.04 billion in the January-March quarter from a revised deficit of $5.12 billion in the December quarter, the Reserve Bank of India said on Monday.

The deficit for the financial year ended March 2008 widened to $17.4 billion, or 1.5% of gross domestic product, from $9.8 billion, or 1.1 percent of GDP, in FY07.

The Reserve Bank of India said the balance of payments surplus in the March quarter fell to $24.99 billion from a surplus of $26.74 billion in the December quarter.

The trade deficit on a balance of payments basis narrowed to $23.8 billion in the March quarter from $25.1 billion in October-December.Net invisible receipts, which includes exports of software services and remittances by overseas Indians, were $22.8 billion in the quarter, up from $20 billion in the previous quarter.

"The current account deficit for January-March quarter suggests that the usual seasonal increase in invisibles has not kept pace with the rise in trade deficit this year, largely due to rising oil import bill," said Sonal Varma, an economist at Lehman Brothers.

India imports about 70% of its oil needs, and oil is the country's largest import.
Varma said oil prices and weakening demand for exports would widen India's trade deficit further, forecasting the current account deficit to widen to 3% of gross domestic product in FY09 from 1.5% in FY08.

Earlier this month, Arvind Virmani, the finance ministry's chief economic advisor, said there was only a very low probability the current account deficit would exceed 2.5 percent of GDP over the next four years."India should still get sufficient capital inflows to cover the current account deficit, but the overall balance of payments surplus is likely to moderate to $18 billion in FY09 from $92.2 billion," Varma said.

A current account deficit indicates the economy is drawing upon the savings of other economies to fund its investment.



Source: UTVi.com

VC, PE Updates

VCCircle.com

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“Private Market Valuations May Correct Over 3-6 Months”: KP Balaraj
Hinduja Foundries Gets $20M From Farallon’s PE Fund Amansha
Nitesh Shetty’s Serve & Volley To Secure Large Funding For OOH Biz

Subhiksha Acquires “Obscure” Listed Firm To Get Itself Listed
Iceland’s Kaupthing To List $80-M India Infrastructure Fund On AIM
Citi BPO & Infra Outsourcing Arm On Block, IBM Lead Contender: Report
Lufthansa-GMR JV For MRO Biz Grounded; GMR In Search Of Partners
Deutsche Bank Shifts Amrit Singh From London As India M&A Head

Temptation Foods In Hostile Bid To Acquire Basmati King Kohinoor
Sun Pharma Preparing For A Hostile Bid For Israel’s Taro
Religare Wants To Raise $250 Million; Another Acquisition In The Offing?
Axis Bank Invests Rs 250 Crore For A Minor Stake In India’s First Private Hill Station
UK’s Ashmore Launches $3 Billion Emerging Markets Fund
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IndiaPE.com

IVCF launches three new funds
AT&T may buy Maxis' 74 pct in India's Aircel
Canaan to invest more in India
Lehman, Sachs, ICICI to pick 20% in OOH ad co
PE investments take a beating

PE firms review plans after Ranbaxy deal
PE Investment in realty seen at over $13 b
Digicable acquires 51% in CableComm
Subhiksha to acquire Chennai based company
Unitech to raise $1 bln from PE funds

Citi looking to sell Indian BPO and tech units
Unitech to offload 26% in telecom arm
PE firms seen taking fund-of-funds route
PE firms line up $2 bn for maritime logistics
Star, Balaji to part ways soon


Source: Above sites.

Sensex plummets 341 points

Sensex plummets 341 points

The market witnessed the second crash today after witnessing a fall of 620 points on Friday. Following a steep fall in global stock markets led by fears of a hike in crude oil prices, the Sensex resumed on a bearish note at 13,791, 11 points below its last close of 13,802. By mid-morning trades, the Sensex shed around 400 points on across-the-board selling pressure. The market started to deteriorate further towards the close, as fresh bout of selling saw the Sensex plummet over 350 points and touch the day's low of 13,406.

The Sensex dropped 2.47% and was down 341 points for the day at 13,462. The Nifty shed 96 points at 4,041.The market breadth was heavily tilted in favour of the losers as 2,103 stocks declined, while only 546 stocks advanced and 42 stocks remained unchanged on the BSE.

All the sectoral indices were battered on the BSE except information technology (IT), fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) and health care (HC) stocks. The BSE Realty index lost heavily and dropped 6.81% followed by the BSE consumer durables (CD) index (down 4.71%), the BSE Oil & Gas index (down 4.03%), the BSE Power index (down 3.55%), the BSE capital goods (CG) index (down 3.46%) and the BSE Bankex index (down 3.43%).

The second-rung benchmark indices the BSE mid-cap index and the BSE small-cap index tanked over 3% each.Only 8 stocks from 30 Sensex stocks managed to end in the green. Among the major losers Reliance Infrastructure tanked by 11.47% at Rs751.05. ACC slumped by 9.80% at Rs512, Ambuja Cement shed 6.83% at Rs73.50, Grasim Industries crumbled by 6.66% at Rs1,815. DLF dropped 6.60% at Rs389, Reliance Communications slipped by 6.58% at Rs433.10, Tata Motors plunged 5.03% at Rs416 and Mahindra & Mahindra fell by 5% at Rs477. Other front-line stocks also declined by over the range of 0.50-4% each.

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Other Deadpresident blog stories:

Post Session Commentary - June 30 2008

Sensex down 960 points in two trading sessions

GSPL / Unitech / Idea Cellular
Hotel Leela / Axis Bank / Mindtree
Unitech, Bharat Electronics, GSPL, Reliance Indust...
SBI increases home loan rates
Asian Markets Ends June On A Cautious Note

Source: Deadpresident blog.

Stocks you can pick up : ET

Stocks you can pick up

'Core' picks can bring you value

'Rupee to test 47-level vs USD'

Source: ET

Sensex seen heading to 12k level

Sensex seen heading to 12k level
Having lost over one-third of its value in less than six months, stock market seems to have more pain in store for investors with experts seeing the benchmark Sensex heading back towards 12,000 level in the next few months. The continuing crude oil rally and unabated selling by FIIs are unlikely to let the market see a near-future uptrend, while domestic factors like inflationary pressures and rising interest rates are also playing spoilsport, analysts believe.

International brokerage and equity research major CLSA analyst and renowned portfolio manager Christopher Wood has told his clients in the latest June edition of his famed "Greed and Fear" report that the Senses dropping back to a 12,000 level could not be ruled out in the wake of surging oil prices and continuing selling activities by foreign investors. "Certainly, a re-test of the 12,000 level on the Sensex cannot be ruled out in these circumstances.

And that will be accompanied by a further weakening in the rupee," Wood said. Striking a similar note, research and analytics firm Evalueserve's Chairman Alok Aggarwal wrote in a whitepaper that Sensex could drop to 12,000 level in the near term if the present financial crisis does not subside, crude oil continue to trade upward and FII outflow continue unabated.

"We now believe that the Sensex could drop to 12,000 in the near term, the Rupee could depreciate by another 5-6 per cent against the US dollar, and the GDP growth could slow down to approximately six per cent by the fourth quarter of this fiscal year," Aggarwal said. Agreeing to the probability of Sensex falling to 12,000 level, domestic brokerage firm Asika Stock Brokers' Research Head Paras Bodhra said corporate earnings could also be a major driving factor in the coming months.

The Sensex can fall to 12,000 level during the next 3-6 months, but it depends on the corporate results season, Bodhra said, adding if the earnings turn out too bad then the index may drop to this level. "It is quite a possibility, as macro problems may trickle down to micro levels, leading to a deterioration of fundamentals, he noted. These projections are in sharp contrast to the Sensex seen heading towards 25,000-point mark till a few months ago when bulls were in the driving seat.

If the bears keep extending their reign on the bourses and pull back the barometer to 12,000-level, it would wipe off all the gains recorded in about past two years ago. The benchmark index Sensex had touched the 12,000 level for the first time in September 2006. However, amid a continuing bearish phase continuing for about six months now, the Sensex has fallen over 7,000 points from its all-time peak of 21,206.77 points, scaled on January 10.

It settled at 13,802.22 points on Friday after a 620-point fall amid concerns over surging crude oil prices and inflation. CLSA's Wood noted in his 'Greed and Fear' report that a further rise in the oil price would continue to be particularly bad news for India, despite RBI's increasingly pre-emptive monetary tightening stance. The RBI last week announced hike in the repo rate and the cash reserve ratio (CRR) by 50 basis points each to 8.5 per cent and 8.75 per cent, respectively. These steps are expected to suck out an estimated Rs 15,000-20,000 crore liquidity from the banking system and have been seen as a contributor to the recent fall in overall turnover in the equity market.

Some analysts, however, expect a drop in the Sensex to the psychological 12,000-level to trigger a strong buying opportunity for foreign investors. "Any such decline to that level is viewed as a massive long-term buying opportunity in India and the rest of Asia," Wood said. However, due to selling by foreign investors, a clear risk of a further move down to the 12,000 level on the Sensex still remains, given the parabolic oil risk, he added. CLSA noted that a further rise in oil can only be bearish for the Asia-Pacific region, since there would be growing focus on the deteriorating terms of trade for Asian economies and the resulting need for higher interest rates to fend off potentially destabilising currency depreciation.

FIIs have, so far, sold a net $ 6.2 billion worth of Indian stocks this year, against a net purchase of $ 51 billion between the beginning of 2003 and the end of 2007. "There is then clearly every risk that foreigners sell more," CLSA said. It, however, ruled out that the Indian stock market would underperform dramatically from the current levels as RBI has become more proactive than some other Asian central banks which may have to play catch up.


Source: ET

BL : Stock Research Reports

HCL Infosystems: Buy
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Source: http://www.businessline.in. We thank (will be grateful to) the owners of the above articles/sites/sources/Govts for allowing/referring this. We are just providing the link/information of business updates from the leading sources for the benefit of readers. Viewers are strictly advised to take own decision in Stock buying and make verification about the information. Blog is not responsible for any faulty information .

Corporate Results: Unitech, GDl, Panacea, ONGC, Allgargo, Religare, Patel Engg, Tatachem, CBI etc

Unitech FY08 cons net profit stood at Rs 1661.86 cr
Bhagyanagar India Q4 net profit at Rs 7.7 cr
Panacea Biotech Q4 net profit at Rs 24.9 cr
Global Vectra Q4 net loss at Rs 9.2 cr
JK Paper Q3 net profit at Rs 15.8 cr

Allcargo Global Q4 cons net profit at Rs 26.1 cr
Gateway Distriparks Q4 cons net profit at Rs 15.1 cr
Religare Enterprises Q4 net profit at Rs 21.92 cr
Tata Steel FY08 cons net profit up at Rs 12349.8 cr
ONGC FY08 cons profit up at Rs 19,872.26 cr

Jet Airways Q4 net loss at Rs 221.2 cr
Tata Chemicals FY08 net profit at Rs 964 cr
Patel Engg FY08 cons net profit at Rs 151.9 cr
Central Bank Q4 net profit at Rs 127.2 cr

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other results:
Webel Sl Energy Systems reports net loss of Rs 1.03 crore in the March 2008 quarter
Hindustan Organic Chemicals net profit declines 92.94% in the March 2008 quarter
Man Industries India net profit rises 4.49% in the March 2008 quarter
Sarda Energy & Minerals net profit rises 1807.39% in the March 2008 quarter
Numeric Power Systems net profit rises 115.05% in the year ended March 2008



Source: http://www.indiaearnings.com , www.capitalmarket.com . We thank (will be grateful to) the owners of the above articles/sites/sources/Govts for allowing/referring this. We are just providing the link/information of business updates from the leading sources for the benefit of readers. Viewers are strictly advised to take own decision in Stock buying and make verification about the information. Blog is not responsible for any faulty information .

Nano roll out by Durga Puja : UTVi

Nano roll out by Durga Puja

Tata Motors on Saturday said its ambitious Nano project was facing cost overrun but maintained the Rs 1 lakh car could be rolled out from its Singur facility by Durga Puja.

Ravi Kant, MD, Tata Motors, after meeting West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadev Bhattacharjee, told reporters that the entire project had been reworked at the plant site at Singur due to floods last year which had led to the cost escalation.

"We have already sunk in Rs 2000 crore", Kant said, adding earlier the project cost was pegged at Rs 1700 crore.

Stating that Tata Motors was fully committed to the Singur project, Kant said if everything went well as planned, then the Nano car would be rolled out from the plant during Durga Puja.
"We hope to start trial production during July or August" he said.

Asked whether there was a possibility of Nano being rolled out from any other plant of Tata Motors, Kant said, "Nano will be produced in West Bengal".Kant had visited the Singur plant yesterday to review progress and held long discussions with suppliers and vendors.



Source: http://www.utvi.com. We thank (will be grateful to) the owners of the above articles/sites/sources/Govts for allowing/referring this. We are just providing the link/information of business updates from the leading sources for the benefit of readers. Viewers are strictly advised to take own decision in Stock buying and make verification about the information. Blog is not responsible for any faulty information .

Heavy selling pulls stocks down

Heavy selling pulls stocks down

Mumbai, June 27 The ‘Friday syndrome’ hit the equity market for the second week in a row, as investors, gripped by fears of galloping inflation, resorted to heavy selling.

This week, besides the high inflation figure of 11.42 per cent, there was more depressing news: oil price hit the record $142 a barrel. The US and other overseas markets fell sharply and political uncertainty at home over the Nuclear deal further dampened the market sentiment.
The benchmark index closed below 14,000-levels at 13,802, losing 620 points from its previous close.

NSE’s Nifty index dropped 179 points to 4136.65.
On last Friday, the Sensex had lost 516 points after the inflation climbed to double digits at 11.05 per cent from 8.75 per cent in the previous week.

Chain reaction
“It’s a chain of events that is pulling the market down – high inflation means high interest rate and higher input costs. Commodity prices are rising and access to capital is becoming difficult whether it is equity or debt,” said an analyst.
The market opened with a huge negative gap of 294 points , taking a cue from the heavy fall in the overnight US market and the weak opening of the Asian markets. Sensex fell to a low of 13,760 intra-day as inflation numbers came in.
Interest rate-sensitive sectors such as bank, auto and realty faced heavy selling. Bankex shed maximum of 5.34 per cent among the BSE sectoral indices, followed by Auto index (5.26 per cent), Realty index (4.45 per cent). None of the sectoral indices could escape the selling pressure.

FIIs selling out
In the current market, finding the bottom is becoming difficult. FIIs maintained their net selling position (Rs 703.11 crore), a trend witnessed over the past one month, while the domestic institutions again went for value-buying (Rs 305.71 crore as per the BSE-NSE data.) FIIs have sold equities worth Rs 10,000 crore so far in June with today’s provisional figures along with Rs 9349.60 crore worth of selling recorded by SEBI as on Thursday.The domestic mutual funds have bought equities worth approximately Rs 3,000 crore.
Large cap stocks were among those severely hit. As compared to the 4.30 per cent fall in the Sensex, BSE Midcap index fell by 3.19 per cent and the Small-cap index by 2.68 per cent.

Other stories:
Sonia lifts the curtain on polls
Unitech Q4 net down 50%
India, Pakistan agree on stand on pipeline talks
Demand for cement seen softening
Bears keep their date with Fridays


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