Category: Data

Here are the top winners and losers of FY18

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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What a year it has been!

Let’s start with the developed markets. The US Dow Jones and Japanese index did well this year while the French and German indices were subdued.

In the Emerging Markets, the Brazilian index was the standout performer, up more than 30% from a year ago. But in dollar terms, it rose only around 23%, showing weakness in the local currency and chomping the gains of Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs).

The Chinese market was a relative underperformer, declining nearly 2% from a year ago. However, the Chinese yuan rallied, resulting in the market ending in positive territory in dollar terms.

Terrible Last Quarter

Indian markets were confronted with a raft of factors all through the year. The rollout of Goods and Services Tax (GST) in the first half of the fiscal and long terms capital gains (LTCG) tax in February’s Budget 2018 were particularly disturbing. If these weren’t enough, the US Fed rate hike and a couple of rate hikes by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) as well as the $2 billion Nirav Modi fraud scam that engulfed a bunch of PSU banks weighed on the Indian markets.

Then came news of President Donald Trump’s decision to impose tariffs on steel and aluminium imports to the US. It roiled the markets in the last couple of months.

The string of bad news explains why, after three good quarters, the last quarter turned out to be a disappointment. The decline of around 350 points in the Nifty is actually a reflection of these events.

Despite the bad news, Indian markets gained around 11%. We have had better years though. In the past five years, only one financial year ended in losses.

Index Watch

Let’s now look at how the indices fared.

The realty index and metal index made significant gains. IT turned out be a surprise performer, gaining around 17%. The small-cap and mid-cap segments too did well.

The dud list was made up of PSU banking stocks and the pharmaceutical index. Of the five biggest NIFY losers, three belong to the pharmaceutical segment. Lupin, in particular, fell 45%.

In the list of gainers, Bajaj Finance rallied more than 50% while Hindustan Unilever, despite its “expensive” tag, gave returns of more than 45%.

The big winners in the F&O markets were Jubilant Foodworks and NIIT Technologies, which doubled the money of investors. Titan, which will be a part of the Nifty from the next fiscal, was another stellar performer.

Other winners include Ashok Leyland, which gave nearly 70% returns, and KPIT (70%).

The big losers were Reliance Naval, which is down more than 50%, and HDIL, which lost more than 50% of its market capitalisation. MCX lost 40 % in the last fiscal.

That said, plenty of stocks gave investors hefty returns. Stocks such as HEG, Goa Carbon and Graphite made investors happy.

To sum up, despite a series of challenges that surfaced towards the end of the year, the markets have done quite well.

Elon Musk forms several ‘X Holdings’ companies to fund potential Twitter buyout

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Thursday’s filing dispelled some doubts, though Musk still has work to do. He and his advisers will spend the coming days vetting potential investors for the equity portion of his offer, according to people familiar with the matter

KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow

Petrol, Diesel at record highs as Delhi looks to curb air pollution

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Transport fuel prices in Delhi hit record highs on Sunday along with the roll out of the Euro-VI grade petrol and diesel as the latest measure to tackle air pollution in the national capital.

Under the dynamic pricing system for auto fuels, state-run oil marketing firms announced Sunday’s price of petrol in Delhi at Rs 73.73 a litre, which marks a four-year high, and of diesel at an all-time high of Rs 64.58. Both fuels were raised by 18 paise a litre each.

Petrol in Delhi had previously hit a high of Rs 73.06 on September 14, 2014. The diesel rate on Sunday at Rs 64.58 is at its highest ever here, having previously touched Rs 64.22 on February 7, 2018.

Announcing the Indian Oil Corp’s (IOC) preparations for supplying the Euro-VI emission norm-compliant BS-VI fuels in place of the earlier Euro-IV grade, IOC Director (Refineries) B.V. Rama Gopal said on Saturday that though massive investments had been made to supply the improved fuel, Delhi consumers are not being passed on any of the additional cost of production for the time being.

“Rest assured we don’t have plans of passing on the cost to consumers. There are no plans to recover from customers immediately,” he told reporters here, adding that a mechanism for recovering the cost would be worked out when the whole country shifts to Euro-VI grade fuel.

The April 2020 deadline for the country to implement BS-VI grade fuels had been advanced for Delhi to April 1, 2018, in view of the extremely high levels of air pollution.

Gopal also said the Euro-VI fuel and lesser grade cars and two-wheelers, presently available, would result in 10-20 percent reduction in particulate emission in Delhi but for full benefit, the vehicles too need to have Euro-VI engines.

Global benchmark, Brent crude was on it peak at $115 per barrel in June 2014, before the oil crash of 2014. Brent has since recovered and is now ranging in between $60 per barrel to $70 per barrel. Brent was trading at $65.20 per barrel at 0657 GMT on Monday.

Elon Musk forms several ‘X Holdings’ companies to fund potential Twitter buyout

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Thursday’s filing dispelled some doubts, though Musk still has work to do. He and his advisers will spend the coming days vetting potential investors for the equity portion of his offer, according to people familiar with the matter

KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow

Achieving new highs, IPOs: The year it was for Indian markets in FY 17-18

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Benchmark Indian indices, the Nifty and the Sensex underperformed compared to its Asian peers such as Hong Kong’s Hang Seng, and Japan’s Nikkei indices, India Infoline, a financial service company said.

Nifty 50 and Sensex soared to new highs of 11,130 (Jan 29, 2018) and 36,283 (Jan 29, 2018) respectively for the first time.

Concerns over political uncertainty over future elections added to woes, while falling credit quality, and a rising number of defaulters contributed to the decline in indices.

Nifty PSU Bank sector performed poorly following the news of constant unveiling of fraud in the banking system.

“Globally, rising interest rate scenario in the US, rising bond yields, trade war between the US and China, not forgetting risk of an inverted yield curve is an early sign of the US economy entering into recession, which increases the risk of a decline in the business cycle,” IIFL said.

Implementation of Goods and Services Tax (GST), Real Estate Regulatory Authority (RERA) in real estate and better earning season for corporates supported gains, in addition to the moderate consumer price index (CPI) inflation stood positive for the market

Initial Public Offerings:

Nearly 190 companies started trade on the bourses in the financial year 2017-2018 with a total worth of about Rs. 74,000 crore.

About 13 companies had an issue size of Rs. 1,000 crore which include companies such as:

> General Insurance Corporation of India at Rs. 11,373 crore
> New India Assurance at Rs. 9,600 crore
> SBI Life Insurance at Rs. 8,386 crore
> Bandhan Bank at Rs. 4,473 crore

While most of these IPOs have given high returns, some IPOs listed at a discount and added to losses.

Here are the top companies which listed at a premium in FY 2017-18.

Here are the top companies which listed at a loss in FY 2017-18

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Elon Musk forms several ‘X Holdings’ companies to fund potential Twitter buyout

3 Mins Read

Thursday’s filing dispelled some doubts, though Musk still has work to do. He and his advisers will spend the coming days vetting potential investors for the equity portion of his offer, according to people familiar with the matter

KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow

India to have 478 million internet users by June 2018, says report

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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The number of mobile internet users in India is likely to reach 478 million (47.8 crore) by June 2018, a report jointly published by the Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) and KANTAR-IMRB said.

“The number of mobile internet users increased by 17.22 per cent from December 2016 to reach 456 million users by December 2017,” said the report titled “Mobile Internet in India 2017.”

The report attributed the popularity of mobile internet in the country to its affordability. Widespread use of smartphones, tablets and computers have led to an increase in the number of people getting access to the internet.

“Expenditure on voice has been steadily decreasing from 2013; and with the popularity of VOIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) and video chatting, the expenditure on voice services has decreased drastically in recent times,” the report said.

“This, in turn, means that there is a rise in proportion of data expenditure in comparison to voice (services) expenditures for most users,” it added.

The report estimated that urban mobile internet users rose 18.64 percent year-on-year, to 291 million, while the number of rural users rose 15.03 percent, to 187 million in December 2017.

These numbers are expected to rise in the near future with the rise in mobile payments on platforms such as PayTM,  and growth of online marketplaces such as Amazon and FlipKart.

The study, however, predicts a slowdown in internet penetration in urban India where penetration is at 59 percent already. Growth is expected in rural areas where mobile internet penetration is at 18 percent.

The difference in internet penetration mirrors other economies such as China, where internet users are divided by large regional discrepancies.

For example, while more than 75 percent of Beijing has access to internet connectivity, only 30 percent of the population of the South-Western province of Yunnan has internet access.

Elon Musk forms several ‘X Holdings’ companies to fund potential Twitter buyout

3 Mins Read

Thursday’s filing dispelled some doubts, though Musk still has work to do. He and his advisers will spend the coming days vetting potential investors for the equity portion of his offer, according to people familiar with the matter

KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow

Data tariffs fall 93% in last three years, says Telecom Department

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Mobile Internet rates plunged by 93% while data usage per user surged over 25 times in three years to 2017, the Department of Telecom (DoT) said today.

“Cheapest tariff globally — Rs 33 per GB in 2014 to Rs 21 per GB as on September 2017, tariff reduction of 93 per cent,” DoT said in a tweet today.

The data war started following the entry of Reliance Jio in 2016. The company this year slashed the prices to as low as Rs 4 per GB per day.

With falling mobile Internet rates, data usage also grew multi fold.

“Average data usage per subscriber grew 25 times from 62 MB per month in 2014 to 1.6 GB per month in 2017,” DoT tweeted.

The mobile data consumption in India is now the highest in the world at 1.3 million GB per month–more than combined data usage in the US and China, the DoT said.

The penetration of smartphones in the country more than doubled from 190 million to 390 million and Internet users increased by about 66% from 251 million to 429 million (in June 2017) between 2014-17.

The broadband access in the country increased from 61 million subscribers in March 2014 to 325 million subscribers in September 2017, the DoT said.

According to latest performance indicator of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, there were 445.9 million Internet subscribers at the end of December 2017.

The DoT data showed that during the three-year period, the mobile base stations in the country more than doubled from 7.9 lakh in May 2014 to 16.8 lakh by 2017-end.

Telecom operators Bharti Airtel and Reliance Jio have committed to investing Rs 74,000 crore for the expansion of mobile networks by the end of 2018/19 fiscal year.

Elon Musk forms several ‘X Holdings’ companies to fund potential Twitter buyout

3 Mins Read

Thursday’s filing dispelled some doubts, though Musk still has work to do. He and his advisers will spend the coming days vetting potential investors for the equity portion of his offer, according to people familiar with the matter

KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow

Closing Bell: Benchmark indices close higher, off day’s lows; Sensex closes at 33,136 points, Nifty below 10,200 levels

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Elon Musk forms several ‘X Holdings’ companies to fund potential Twitter buyout

3 Mins Read

Thursday’s filing dispelled some doubts, though Musk still has work to do. He and his advisers will spend the coming days vetting potential investors for the equity portion of his offer, according to people familiar with the matter

KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow

The Online Cab Industry – How it Stacks up!

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Ashkal Javed used to work in the sales and marketing department of a telecom company before he quit his job to become a driver for an online cab aggregator. The promise of earning one lakh rupees a month and upgrading his lifestyle seemed lucrative. However, things did not go as they were expected. “Incentives have reduced drastically and I can’t even pay my EMIs now,” shares Javed.

Javed is just one of those many online cab drivers who are struggling to make their ends meet. Low fare bookings, fall in driver incentives and preference towards bookings on company owned cars are some of the concerns that these cab drivers have raised in the ongoing strike.

A quick analysis of the daily commuter market in India shows that of the total 130-150 million trips, about 2 million are through online cab aggregators. Data by RedSeer Management Consulting shows that online daily trips are expected to increase more than 50% to 5.4 million by 2020.

Over the last couple of years, players like Ola and Uber have been working on cashing-in on this massive opportunity. Armed with an innovative business model, these aggregators built a strong network of driver partners to penetrate into this developing market. “The offer was too tempting. High incentives, zero commission and huge monthly earnings lured me into becoming a driver partner. I used to earn a minimum of Rs 70,000 a month in the early days,” says Rasul Sheikh, a cab driver, adding that his monthly income went down by 50%.

Data from RedSeer Management Consulting also draws a comparison of monthly take home between Online and Offline (black and yellow) players. In 2017, the average take home for an offline player stood at a flat 17,000 rupees. For online cab drivers, monthly payouts have fallen from 27,000 rupees in the January to March 2017 period to 19,000 in the July to September period.

With the focus on profitability and reduction in cash burn, aggregators have been trimming spending on driver incentives. In October to December 2016, 60 per cent of the gross booking value was spent by cab aggregators as driver incentives. This number has dipped to 16 per cent in just one year. However, consultants say that driver incentives are likely to stabilise at this level.

Commenting on the strike and driver protests, an Ola Spokesperson said, “Interest of our driver partners and customer convenience are of paramount importance to us. While, we have seen a slight improvement in our services in Mumbai, however for the situation to improve significantly it is imperative that intimidation of driver partners and vandalism of their cars by vested interests be stopped. New economy companies like us are counting on the police for normalcy to return. ”

An Uber spokesperson said, “We regret the disruption caused to our rider and driver community by a small group of individuals. We remain committed to serving the city, ensuring driver partners can continue to access stable earning opportunities, while giving riders a convenient option to get around their city.

The Hon’ble Bombay High Court issued an injunction prohibiting unions, their leaders and anybody else from obstructing the activities of Uber driver partners. We welcome this, and hope that it will enable drivers to stay behind the wheel, something many have been telling us they wish to do.

We have been listening to our driver partners all along and are committed to ensuring that Uber remains an attractive entrepreneurial opportunity for them. While the authorities have taken steps to ensure minimal disruption to our rider and driver communities, we hope that they will continue to enforce the order passed by the High Court.”

In light of this scenario, the key challenges that these cab aggregators continue to face are managing growth versus profitability and balancing driver demands with customer satisfaction.

Elon Musk forms several ‘X Holdings’ companies to fund potential Twitter buyout

3 Mins Read

Thursday’s filing dispelled some doubts, though Musk still has work to do. He and his advisers will spend the coming days vetting potential investors for the equity portion of his offer, according to people familiar with the matter

KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow

India’s CAD likely at 1.7% this fiscal, says report

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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India’s current account deficit is expected to be around 1.7% of GDP in this financial year, largely owing to higher oil prices, says a report.

With the December quarter’s current account deficit worsening to 2% of GDP, Bank of America Merrill Lynch raised its current account deficit (CAD) forecast for this financial year and for the next fiscal.

The global financial services major has raised its CAD forecast by 10 bps to 1.7% of GDP in 2017-18 and by 20 bps to 1.9% of GDP in 2018-19.

According to data released by the Reserve Bank on Friday, the CAD rose to 2% of the GDP at $13.5 billion in the December quarter, up from $8 billion or 1.4% in the year-ago period, on the back of higher trade deficit.

On a cumulative basis, CAD more than doubled to 1.9% of GDP in the April-December 2017 period.

“Looking ahead, we see three pressures on India’s balance of payments: higher oil prices will stick the current account deficit at a relatively higher level; FPI equity flows in equities should remain tepid given high equity market valuations; and flows to the Chinese market will likely pick up with A shares entering the MSCI,” the Reserve Bank report said.

The report further noted that the trade deficit has improved to $12 billion in February from $16.3 billion in January. “This should contain the March quarter CAD to $7 billion,” it added.

Elon Musk forms several ‘X Holdings’ companies to fund potential Twitter buyout

3 Mins Read

Thursday’s filing dispelled some doubts, though Musk still has work to do. He and his advisers will spend the coming days vetting potential investors for the equity portion of his offer, according to people familiar with the matter

KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow

Real estate sees a 40% drop in housing sales in the last 5 years, says ANAROCK report

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Residential market trends have dropped by 40%, indicating that 2013-2014 was the last year when things looked vibrant for the sector.

The data compiled by the consultancy firm ANAROCK, shows that housing sales have dropped significantly in the 2015-2016 period.  Only 2.7 lakh units, on an average, were sold across top 7 cities of India during the period. This recorded a drop of 17% from the average sales of 2013-14 period.

In 2013-2014, an average of 3.3 lakh units were sold annually. Thereafter, with too many project launches facing off with decreasing demand, unsold inventory began piling up across the top 7 cities of India.

The real estate sector was hit after the announcement of demonetisation on November 8, 2016. Right after demonetisation, the Modi government announced the rollout of the new tax regime in July 2017, the Goods and Services Tax (GST).

In May, the real-estate regulator- RERA Act was brought to force. The Act is in the interest of the home buyers and it became a mandate for the investors and real estate players to register under the Act.

Post the announcements, the real estate sector was battered with all three norms which shook up the sector. The following year, only around 2 lakh units were sold across the top 7 cities of India.

The country took a while to cope with the new reform. During that period,  larger cities such as NCR and MMR recorded a massive drop of 68% and 27% respectively in average sales. This is because the sector was driven by investor activity. Other cities inclined towards investment in real estate, Bengaluru and Chennai,  also saw average sales decline by 17% and 45% respectively.

Market speculation has played havoc with the real estate sector, according to the ANAROCK report. The fallout of speculative activity in the previous years is still being felt.

The reduced buyer confidence due to project delays and diversion of capital also contributed significantly to the decline in housing sales in some parts of the country. The report points that RERA is gradually reversing this aspect. However, most cities will continue bearing the brunt of the speculative activity even in the near future.

Elon Musk forms several ‘X Holdings’ companies to fund potential Twitter buyout

3 Mins Read

Thursday’s filing dispelled some doubts, though Musk still has work to do. He and his advisers will spend the coming days vetting potential investors for the equity portion of his offer, according to people familiar with the matter

KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow

Only 5% of adult Indian population successfully establish own business, says GEM India Report

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Only five percent of the adult Indian population engaged in “early-stage entrepreneurial activities”, establish their own business, making it one of the lowest rates in the world, finds Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) India Report 2016-17.

The survey which was conducted among 3,400 respondents aged between 18 and 64 years stated that only 11 percent of India’s adult population was engaged in “total early-stage entrepreneurial activity (TEA), out of which, more than 50% have low-growth expectation.

The report prepared by Gandhinagar-based Entrepreneurship Development Institute of India (EDI) and its associates also suggested that the business discontinuation rate of the country is among the highest, 26.4 percent. In 1.3 percent cases, bureaucratic hurdles led to the discontinuation.

Whereas, seven per cent of businesses failed due to financial crisis, 6.5 per cent due to personal reasons, 16.9 per cent because of lack of profit and 58.4 per cent due to ‘other’ reasons.

According to the report, around 4 percent of the population accounts for “nascent entrepreneurs” who are believed to be active in setting up businesses. Whereas, seven 7 percent are the owner-managers of businesses existing for less than 3.5 years.

Among the BRICS economies, Brazil has the highest numbers with 17% established business ownership rate and South Africa, the lowest with 3 per cent.

China has a slightly higher rate of 8 per cent.

(With inputs from PTI)

Elon Musk forms several ‘X Holdings’ companies to fund potential Twitter buyout

3 Mins Read

Thursday’s filing dispelled some doubts, though Musk still has work to do. He and his advisers will spend the coming days vetting potential investors for the equity portion of his offer, according to people familiar with the matter

KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow