Business Corner

Healthcare an attractive segment for investors

Rising income levels, increased health awareness, improvement in treatment technologies, increasing penetration of health insurance has made healthcare sector as one of the fastest growing sectors in the country. The Government’s renewed focus on providing healthcare facilities has further put the spotlight back on this sector. Also, Government’s initiative, “Pharma Vision 2020” aims to make India a global leader efficient in manufacturing as it enjoys the cost-technology with the production cost around 40 per cent lower than the western countries. “Given the recent underperformance, many of the pharma stocks are available at attractive valuations, making a good case for investing. Further, the recent approvals for new medicines and US FDA clearances to select plants are expected to fuel a new wave of growth to the sector, thereby lifting the sentiment around the pharma sector,” said Pallav Tiwari, owner of Jayasha Sshare Consultant. “Also, when it comes to investing into healthcare, pharma is not the only universe of investment. Today, we have various companies related to health care allied activities, allowing investors a plethora of investable options,” added Tiwari. Other than pharma, diagnostics, hospitals, health insurance, companies into health food & beverages are some of the other allied companies operating under the healthcare umbrella, he added. In order to tap these opportunities, various AMCs are launching health care themed funds, including ICICI Prudential Pharma, Healthcare & Diagnostic (PHD) Fund. The NFO for this Fund will be open for subscription from June 25 to July 9, 2018 with minimum application amount of Rs 5,000.

Cil clocks robust rise in output and off-take in Q1

Coal output by Coal India Limited (CIL) raced ahead to a strong 15.2% growth during the quarter ended June 2018 while coal off-take clocked a robust 11.7% growth on a year-on-year comparison. All the subsidiary companies of CIL posted growth in production and supplies during the first quarter.

NMDC praises Master J Sai Agni Jeevitesh

N. Baijendra Kumar IAS, CMD, NMDC congratulated J. Sai Agni Jeevitesh from Hyderabad who won Bronze medal in “ASEAN age group chess championship” at Davoa city, Philippines recently. He is one among the nine players participated from India and he was the lone medal winner from India and he also achieved International Chess Title Norm. Earlier to this, Master Agni secured the first norm in Serbia during April 2018 and he has crossed Elo 2400 rating. NMDC has extended support to Master Sai Agni and is encouraging him to participate in international tournaments. NMDC supported Master Sai Agni earlier also for his European international level chess events.