EU court upholds EU antitrust ruling against Google
Europe's second top court on Wednesday upheld an EU antitrust ruling and $2.8 billion fine against Alphabet unit Google, the first of a trio of cases that mark competition chief Margrethe Vestager's tough line against U.S. tech giants.
Vestager sanctioned the world's most popular internet search engine in 2017 for favouring its own price-comparison shopping service to give it an unfair advantage against smaller European rivals.
Germany will not immediately sign deal to make cars emission-free by 2035
Germany said it would not immediately sign the COP26 declaration to make all cars and vans emission-free by 2035 as there is still no agreement within the German government about fuels from renewable sources.
The German government has not agreed if combustion engine fuels from renewable sources can be part of the solution for zero-emission vehicles.
India-focussed offshore funds, ETFs log $95 mn outflow in September quarter
India-focused offshore funds and exchange-traded funds (ETFs) witnessed a net outflow of $95 million in the September-ended quarter, 2021, making it the 14th consecutive quarter of withdrawal.
This was significantly lower than the net outflows of $1.55 billion registered during the June-ended quarter, this year.
Sensex ends 81 pts lower; Nifty holds 18,000 level
Equity benchmark Sensex slipped 81 points on Wednesday due to losses in HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank and HUL amid a weak trend in global markets.
The 30-share index ended 0.13% lower at 60,352.82. Nifty fell 27.05 points or 0.15% to 18,017.20.
IndusInd Bank was the top loser in the Sensex pack, followed by Tata Steel, HUL, Asian Paints, Titan and SBI. On the other hand, Bharti Airtel, M&M, Sun Pharma, Reliance Industries and ITC were among the gainers.
Rupee slides 32 paise to close at 74.37 against US dollar
The rupee tumbled 32 paise to end at 74.37 against the US currency on Wednesday, weighed down by a muted trend in domestic equities and strength of the American currency in the overseas market. On Tuesday, the rupee had settled at 74.05 against the US dollar.
At the interbank foreign exchange market, the local currency opened at 74.11 and witnessed a high of 74.06 and a low of 74.42 against the US dollar in the day trade.
Gold gains ₹137, silver declines ₹160
Gold price in the national capital on Wednesday gained ₹137 to ₹47,311 per 10 grams amid rupee depreciation, according to HDFC Securities. The metal had settled at ₹47,174 per 10 grams in the previous trade.
Silver declined ₹160 to ₹63,482 per kilogram from ₹63,642 per kilogram in the previous trade.
In the international market, gold was trading lower at $1,827 per ounce and silver was flat at $24.30 per ounce.
FM to meet heads of banks, FIs next week; nudge them to expand credit to boost economy
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will meet heads of banks and financial institutions next week to remove friction in credit flow to productive sectors of the economy battered by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Besides, CEOs of top six private sector lenders and non-banking financial companies (NBFCs), including HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Cholamandalam Investment and Finance, Shriram Transport Finance and Tata Capital, would also be present.
Indian IT, Business Services market grows 6.4% to $6.96 bn in H1 2021: IDC
The Indian IT and Business Services market was valued at $6.96 billion and recorded a 6.4% year-over-year growth in the first half of 2021, research firm IDC said on Wednesday. The IT and Business Services market had registered a 5.1% growth in the January-June 2020 period, IDC said.
"The increase in growth rate was primarily due to the continued focus on digital transformation initiatives by enterprises in the country," the research firm added.
Airtel, Oracle extend alliance to bring cloud solutions to over 1 mn enterprise users
Oracle and Bharti Airtel have extended their partnership to drive growth of digital economy by bringing a slew of cloud solutions to over 1 million enterprise customers.
Oracle will leverage Airtel's data centre network to expand its cloud presence in India. Further Airtel Business will offer Oracle Cloud Infrastructure to its million plus enterprise customers. Oracle and Airtel would also set up a Cloud Centre of Excellence in Gurgaon with a dedicated team of specialists from both companies.
Paytm IPO, India's largest, subscribed just 67% by Wednesday noon
Indian fintech firm Paytm's initial public offering of up to 183 billion rupees was subscribed just 67% by noon on Wednesday, the last day of the issue period, indicating low demand for the country's largest stock market listing.
Paytm's offer of 48.3 million shares had received 3.3 million bids by 0730 GMT, according to stock exchange data.
Latent View Analytics IPO fully subscribed
The initial public offering of Latent View Analytics got subscribed by 1.5 times till 10:54 am on the first day of the bidding process.
The company's Rs 600-crore initial public offering (IPO) received bids for 2.62 crore equity shares, against an IPO size of 1.75 crore shares.
Latent view raised Rs 267 crore from anchor investors after it allocated 13,553,898 equity shares to 34 anchor investors at Rs 197 apiece.
Rupee slips to 74.16 against US dollar
The Indian rupee depreciated by 11 paise to 74.16 against the US dollar on a lackluster trend in the domestic equity market and the firm American dollar.
The rupee opened on a weak note at 74.11 and fell further to 74.16, an 11 paise decline from the last close.
The dollar index, which gauges the greenback's strength against a basket of six currencies, rose by 0.08% to 94.03.
Nykaa shares list at a premium of 79%
Shares of FSN E-Commerce Ventures, the parent company of fashion e-commerce platform Nykaa, opened at a 79.4% premium to their initial public offering (IPO) price.
FSN E-Commerce shares debuted at 2,018 rupees in pre-open trade, compared with the offer price of 1,125 rupees, giving the profit-making startup a market valuation of 954.37 billion Indian rupees.
PharmEasy targets $842 million IPO
Digital healthcare platform PharmEasy filed for an initial public offering (IPO) of up to 62.50 billion rupees ($842.43 million). PharmEasy's parent may also consider a further issue of equity shares via a private placement of up to 12.50 billion rupees.
Venture capital firm Naspers and entities related to global investment group CDPQ and private-equity firm TPG are among its investors.
China launches 4-billion-euro sovereign bond deal
China launched a sale of euro-denominated sovereign bonds to raise 4 billion euros ($4.62 billion).
It had raised $4 billion via a U.S. dollar bond sale three weeks back. China's Ministry of Finance is issuing the euro bond in three, seven, and 12-year tranches. By issuing sovereign offshore bonds, China is trying to integrate itself into the global financial system.
It issued euro bond sales last year and in 2019 when Beijing sold its first euro-denominated government debt in 15 years.
China's factory-gate inflation hits 26-year high
China's factory-gate prices rose at the fastest pace in 26 years in October, at a time when producers are grappling with soaring coal prices and other commodity costs due to a power crunch.
The producer price index (PPI) climbed 13.5% from a year earlier, faster than the 10.7% rise in September.
The jump was fueled by higher raw material costs and factory production cuts. However, the power crunch has eased to some extent after government intervention to stabilize the coal market.
Markets update | Sensex falls
The Indian equity benchmark indices opened lower amid weak global cues. At 9:16 IST, the Sensex fell 0.54% to 60,107.87 and the Nifty was down 0.52% to 17,950.60.
Asian markets fell after a rise in oil prices and Chinese factory prices added to worries that a U.S. inflation reading could lead to an increase in interest rates. Factory gate prices in China have risen 13.5% year-on-year to October.
MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan and Japan's Nikkei each dropped 0.2% as a long Wall Street rally paused and Nasdaq logged its first fall in a dozen sessions. S&P 500 futures also fell 0.2% in morning trade.
Oil climbs on crude stocks decline
Oil prices rose after U.S. crude stocks unexpectedly fell last week amid a rise in near-term travel demand with pandemic curbs easing.
U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures 0.3% to $84.38 a barrel and Brent crude futures surged 0.4% to $85.14 a barrel.
Tightening global oil inventories have resulted in rising crude prices during the past several months and the latest data from the American Petroleum Institute reinforced the view that supply remains constrained.
Today is the last day of the IPO of Paytm's parent firm. Nykaa's parent firm will list on stock exchanges. Besides, View Analytics IPO will open for subscription, and Sapphire Foods India IPO subscription will head into the second day. Zomato, Bank of Baroda and Kalyan Jewellers will report their second-quarter results today.
---- Edited by John Xavier
(With inputs from Reuters, PTI and other news agencies.)
