Business Today November 6, 2016

This time last year, most of the consumer-facing companies you talked to had many tales of gloom and doom. While rural demand had crashed after two successive years of bad rains, even the urban demand was tepid at best. The Consumer Price Index had started climbing steadily even as the Wholesale Price Index was in negative territory. Developers had put malls on hold. Most of the organised physical retailers showed little growth, though online sales were booming, perhaps because of the discounts they gave. Companies in most sectors talked about a flat retail demand for their products. One year later, things have changed quite dramatically for the better. The automobile sector is experiencing its best year in half a decade – and its sales started climbing several months before the…

Sun’s Long-term Fortune Strategy This refers to your cover story on pharmaceuticals (Fixing the Ranbaxy Problem, October 23). The author has explained in detail how Sun Pharma has tried to progress after the purchase of Ranbaxy. No doubt Sun Pharma chief Dilip Shanghvi has taken drastic steps to boost profitability, even at the cost of downsizing and lower sales in the near future. However, Shanghvi may have a tough time in expanding into the US market, unless the US FDA issues related to Ranbaxy are resolved. So, only time will tell about Sun’s long-term strategy. Biswaranjan Mishra, Gurgaon Indian Business This refers to your interview of KPMG’s Global CEO John B. Veihmeyer on developments in the global economic sphere (Businesses want more consistency in regulations across borders, October 23).…

QUOTE “India to seal border with Pakistan by December 2018” – Rajnath Singh, Union Minister of Home Affairs, announced after meeting state chief ministers amid growing tensions between the two neighbours following the Indian Army’s surgical strike after the Uri terrorist attack “Dealing with stressed assets will require skill and creativity” – Urjit Patel, Governor, Reserve Bank of India, on dealing with the bad loans problem of banks with a more pragmatic approach. Patel also hinted at transferring stressed assets to a bad bank entity 65,250 crore, is the biggest ever black money disclosure under the Income Declaration Scheme by 64,275 declarants, yielding 29,362 crore in taxes to the government IMF BOOST The International Monetary Fund expects India to grow 7.6 per cent in 2016/17, up from its earlier projection…

21-22 ROMANCING BRANDS WHAT: CII Brand Summit WHEN: 21-22 October, Bengaluru WHAT TO LOOK FOR: The CII event aims to establish a thought leadership by understanding various branding strategies and approaches in a world that is embracing technology, e-commerce, social media and information explosion, and prepare for the next wave of branding in changing scenarios 26-27 CHANGING RELATIONSHIP WHAT: Services Trade and Regulatory Reforms in Asia WHEN: 26-27 October, Kolkata WHAT TO LOOK FOR: Government officials from 10 Asian countries will participate in this event organised by the Asian Development Bank to help understand the challenges in existing policies, regulations and institutional frameworks, and how trade liberalisation can promote services trade and act as a catalyst for structural transformation in Asia 31-01 SPACE POLICY FORDEVELOPMENT WHAT: Regional Space Applications Programme…

WHO OWNS THE INDIAN STOCK MARKET Promoters include both Indian and foreign FIIs include foreign venture capital investors, foreign portfolio investors, foreign financial institutions and foreign bodies. DIIs include mutual funds, insurance companies, provident funds and other financial institutions. Others include American Depositary Receipts, Global Depositary Receipts and shares held by custodians THE TOP 10 OWNERS Top 10 promoters of companies listed and traded on BSE owned almost 20% of the market as on June 30, 2016. -77.7% Bharat Financial Inclusion Ltd^. saw the highest percentage decline in promoter holding between June 2015 and June 2016 29.8% Ashok Leyland^ saw the largest percentage increase in promoter holding between June 2015 and June 2016 11.3% VERSUS 7.9% The average return# of 68 companies where promoters increased their stake was more than the…

Call it fine tuning or relaxing the bad loan resolution rules, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) under Governor Urjit Patel has been quick to make financial restructuring for large over-leveraged corporate houses a bit easier. Within a month of taking over the reins from Raghuram Rajan, who, time and again, challenged the high and mighty for taking the banking system for a ride, Governor Patel seems to follow a pragmatic approach, as he calls it, to deal with the growing stress in the banking system. The banking money locked in stressed loans is a major worry as it is not only impacting banks’ profitability, but also eating away capital. In just three years, the gross NPAs of banks have jumped from 3.4 per cent to 7.6 per cent. The…