Business News at 09:30 am on 30th October 2023

Let’s begin. Incidents of stubble burning after paddy harvesting in Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Delhi, since September 15, have declined by 34 per cent to 10,422 till Sunday compared to the same period last year. According to the Consortium for Research on Agroecosystem Monitoring and Modelling from Space, Indian Agricultural Research Institute, Delhi, Punjab has reported 5,254 paddy straw burning incidents, which is 56% less than last year, while Haryana has reported 1,094 incidents so far, less by 40 per cent on year. The official also stated that due to the government incentives in paddy straw management, the crop residue burning incident will decline through the season. All this augurs well for the air quality in the national capital region.
Now some big news from the industry sector. Reliance Broadcast Network, which is undergoing bankruptcy proceedings, has received two bids – from Radio Mirchi and Sapphire FM – of Rs 251 crore each for its radio channel Big FM. Radio Mirchi, a part of Entertainment Network India, has submitted the bid in a consortium with Radio Orange of Nagpur. The other bid for the former Anil Ambani group company is from Haryana-based Sapphire FM, sources close to the development said. Both the bidders have offered to pay within 30 days. Sources say that the lenders have initiated discussions with the two resolution applicants to revise their bids upwards. The lenders expect a total recovery of as high as 55-60% against the total admitted claims of Rs 578 crore.
In some more industrial news, Knight Frank, in its latest edition of the Asia-Pacific Prime Office Rental Index for Q3 2023, noted that the demand for office space in India’s largest occupier markets remained strong, with over 700,000 sqm of office space leases during the quarter. Delhi-NCR is the sixth most expensive office space rental market across the APAC region. Hong Kong SAR continued to be APAC’s most expensive office market during the quarter. Strong occupiers’ demand for setting up Global Capability Centres constituted most of the demand, which made up for slower demand from flex space operators. According to Nasscom, India will have over 2,500 GCCs by the end of the decade.
Meanwhile, Savings under many centrally sponsored schemes and central-sector schemes, coupled with buoyancy in revenue, will give enough firepower to the Centre to meet additional expenses in existing or new schemes, without breaching the fiscal deficit target for the current financial year, a senior official told FE. Efficient cash management could enable savings of Rs 2-2.5 trillion from the budgeted expenditure for the current fiscal, making the sum available for extra allocation to some of the existing schemes like MGNREGS and new schemes that may be rolled out, he said. There could be also savings of around Rs 0.5 trillion from the Rs 10 trillion capex budget for FY24.
Moving on. India has proposed that the World Trade Organisation clearly define what constitutes goods and services in relation to cross-border electronic transmissions such as content streaming. The suggestion, made by senior Indian officials at a meeting of WTO member countries in Geneva last week, is aimed reaching a multilateral agreement to put import duties on at least the “goods” component of such cross-border trade, a senior official said on the condition of anonymity. The official added, quote, “For example, when a streaming platform like Netflix is showing a film in India, the film is a product but the membership that Netflix is taking to show it is a service. So it is very difficult to make that distinction between goods and services,” unquote.
On to banking. Jaipur-headquartered AU Small Finance Bank on late Sunday announced it will acquire Rajeev Yadav-founded Fincare Small Finance Bank, subject to regulatory approvals from the Reserve Bank of India, Competition Competition of India and shareholders of the two companies, according to exchange filing by AU SFB. As per the agreement, shareholders of Fincare Small Finance Bank shall receive 579 equity shares of AU Small Finance Bank for every 2,000 shares held. Further, the ‘Appointed Date’ of the merger shall be February 1, the notice said.
Lastly, let’s look at the stocks which you need to watch out today. These include RIL, Dr Reddy’s Labs, UltraTech Cement, and IDFC First Bank among others. Reliance Industries, India’s largest company by market capitalisation posted its second quarter of FY24 earnings with profit at Rs 17,394 crore, up 27.4% on-year as against Rs 13,656 crore during the corresponding quarter of last year. Pharma major Dr Reddy’s Laboratories on Friday posted Q2 profit at Rs 1,482.20 crore, up 30% in comparison to Rs 1,114.20 crore during the corresponding quarter of FY23, surpassing estimates. It posted revenue from operations at Rs 6,902.60 crore, up 9% as against Rs 6331.80 crore during the quarter ended September 2022.