Nifty continues winning run, valuations race ahead of pre-Lehman highs

The benchmark indices continue to scale new highs on Dalal Street, driven by foreign capital inflows and higher valuations. Early this week, when the Nifty50 made a fresh lifetime high, the index price-earnings multiple beat the previous high reached during the pre-Lehman crisis rally in 2008. Read more here

You are the biggest stakeholders in the economy, PM Modi tells traders

Five years ago, then Gujarat chief minister and Bharatiya Janata Party’s Prime Ministerial candidate Narendra Modi wooed traders from all across the country with the promise of trust, ease of doing business and a better tomorrow. On Friday, Modi returned to the party’s key vote bank, seeking another term while setting the target to take India to 50th rank in Ease of Doing Business in five years and committing a policy for small traders. Read more here

R Venkataramanan quits Ratan Tata's investment arm RNT Associates

R Venkataramanan, the former managing trustee of Tata Trusts, has resigned from RNT Associates Private Limited, the personal investment vehicle of Tata group patriarch Ratan Tata.

According to a Ministry of Corporate Affairs filing, Venkataramanan quit the firm as director on March 29. Since 2014, RNT Associates, along with UC-RNT Fund, has been investing in a series of new-age companies in India and overseas. Read more here

IT's raining jobs: TCS, Infosys, Wipro added 7 times more staff in FY19

Aggregate employee addition by the top three Indian IT services companies jumped close to seven times in FY19 as these firms went into an overdrive hiring fresh talent as well as rebadging employees of client organisations.

Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Infosys and Wipro together did a net addition of 64,805 (after taking into account the attrition) in the financial year ended March 31, 2019, when compared to an addition of 9,864 in FY18 and 48,350 in FY17. Read more here

Govt working to directly transfer fertiliser subsidy to farmers

After the direct benefit transfer (DBT) of fertiliser subsidies to producers, the government is working on its next goal: Transferring these subsidies directly to the bank accounts of farmers.

The finance ministry and NITI Aayog are working on a proposal to shift DBT in fertiliser from the producer to the consumer. Read more here

At 21%, Reliance Industries' petro-retail growth outpaces the industry

Reliance Industries’ (RIL’s) growth rate in petrol and diesel retail volumes was higher than that of the industry during the March quarter.

This growth, however, has not been able to match RIL’s consumer retail momentum.

For the January-March 2019 quarter, RIL said its petrol retail volumes grew by 21 per cent. Read more here

Bankers weigh all options to save Jet Airways without getting hit

Bankers are scrambling to find a viable option through which money can be infused in Jet Airways. But they are also not willing to take more risks, given their past experience.

Besides, Supreme Court scrapping the February 12, 2018, order of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) meant that banks can no longer convert Jet’s debt into equity at a nominal rate, but will have to do it now according to a formula set by the market regulator Sebi. Read more here

CBDT's taxation proposal to hit loss-making foreign companies: Experts

Loss-making multinational companies with a permanent establishment (PE) or business connection in India could be adversely hit if the income tax department’s recent proposals are implemented. Read more here

First-year premium of life insurers up 11 per cent in FY19; LIC retains top slot

The first-year premium of life insurers increased by 10.73 per cent to Rs 2,14,673 crore in FY19 from Rs 1,93,866 crore in FY18. This marks about 300-basis point decrease in the growth, reports the Hindu Business Line. Read more here

More IT companies could have faced cyber attack, says blog

Cyber attackers may have targeted IT majors Infosys, Capgemini and Cognizant to access data of third-party company resources, reports the Economic Times, citing cyber security blog KrebsOnSecurity. Read more here