Lockdown fears weigh on Nifty, Sensex; Reliance gains

By Sachin Ravikumar
·2 min read
A broker trades on his computer terminal at a stock brokerage firm in Mumbai
A broker trades on his computer terminal at a stock brokerage firm in Mumbai

By Sachin Ravikumar

BENGALURU (Reuters) - Indian shares were flat on Monday as prospects of an early roll-out of COVID-19 vaccines were countered by fears in India over the impact of further lockdowns, although Reliance Industries rose after winning regulatory approval for a $3.4 billion deal.

A top U.S. health official said on Sunday the first coronavirus vaccines could be given to healthcare workers and others recommended by mid-December, boosting Asian stock markets on Monday.

In India, the Nifty was up 0.04% at 12,864.10 by 0510 GMT. The Sensex eased 0.05% to 43,860.60.

Reliance Industries, India's most valuable public company, advanced about 2% after the country's competition watchdog approved its deal to buy Future Group's retail assets.

Meanwhile, Maharashtra state, home to India's financial capital of Mumbai, could take a decision on a fresh lockdown within 8-10 days, the state's deputy chief minister reportedly said, citing a possible risk from large social gatherings during the just concluded festive season.

"If there's a lockdown, even in a small way, it cannot be a positive. India cannot afford more restrictions," said A.K. Prabhakar, head of research at IDBI Capital in Mumbai.

India, the world's second worst-hit nation by COVID-19, is likely to see its deepest economic contraction on record this fiscal year as businesses and incomes are hit by the pandemic.

On Monday, shares in several financial firms rose after a central bank committee recommended changes that could transform the country's banking landscape by paving the way for large industrial conglomerates to set up banks.

IndusInd Bank rose 4% and was the top gainer on the Nifty 50. IDFC First Bank jumped 7%.

Small finance banks also advanced, with Equitas surging 12%, while Ujjivan added 20%.

(Reporting by Sachin Ravikumar in Bengaluru; Editing by Subhranshu Sahu)

Latest Stories

  • Iowa congressman notorious for racist remarks asks Kamala Harris if she was descended from slave owners

    Outgoing Republican Steve King has long history of offensive remarks

  • Reporter Carl Bernstein names 21 GOP senators who 'repeatedly expressed extreme contempt for Trump'

    Political reporters in Washington, D.C., have been saying a lot of Republicans in Congress privately despise President Trump, but few have publicly criticized him — and likewise, few have publicly acknowledged his defeat to President-elect Joe Biden. Carl Bernstein, one half of the journalistic duo that uncovered President Richard Nixon's Watergate scandal, named 21 names on Sunday night, saying that in private conversations, these Republicans senators "have repeatedly expressed extreme contempt for Trump" and his fitness to be president.> The 21 GOP Senators who have privately expressed their disdain for Trump are: Portman, Alexander, Sasse, Blunt, Collins, Murkowski, Cornyn, Thune, Romney, Braun, Young, Tim Scott, Rick Scott, Rubio, Grassley, Burr, Toomey, McSally, Moran, Roberts, Shelby. (2/3)> > — Carl Bernstein (@carlbernstein) November 23, 2020The 21 senators he named include names you would expect, but also some surprises, like Sen. John Cornyn (Texas), Sen. Rick Scott (Fla.), and Senate Majority Whip John Thune (S.D.). The other 18 GOP senators are Rob Portman (Ohio), Lamar Alexander (Tenn.), Ben Sasse (Neb.), Roy Blunt (Mo.), Susan Collins (Maine), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), Mitt Romney (Utah), Mike Braun (Ind), Todd Young (Ind.), Tim Scott (S.D.), Marco Rubio (Fla.), Chuck Grassley (Iowa), Richard Burr (N.C.), Pat Toomey (Pa.), Martha McSally (Ariz.), Jerry Moran (Kansas), Pat Roberts (Kansas), and Richard Shelby (Ala.)."With few exceptions" — Romney and Sasse, mostly — "their craven public silence has helped enable Trump's most grievous conduct — including undermining and discrediting the U.S. the electoral system," wrote Bernstein, who's made his own feelings about Trump clear for a while. He had named 15 of those senators on CNN late last week, saying "many, of not most, of these individuals, from what I have been told, were happy to see Donald Trump defeated in this election, as long as the Senate could be controlled by the Republicans.Bernstein added that he is "much more concerned" now than at the end of Watergate, because "Nixon left — Republicans convinced him to go, and he did."More stories from theweek.com Ronna McDaniel has reportedly warned Donald Trump Jr., Kimberly Guilfoyle could succeed her as RNC chair 5 bruisingly funny cartoons about Rudy Giuliani's dubious legal strategy America is buckling

  • Man arrested in deadly attack at Nebraska Sonic restaurant

    Authorities arrested a 23-year-old man in an attack at a Nebraska fast food restaurant in which two employees were shot and killed, two were wounded and officers responding to a report of a possible bomb inside a moving truck in the parking lot arrived to find the vehicle on fire. Roberto Carlos Silva Jr., of Omaha, was booked into Sarpy County jail early Sunday on suspicion of first-degree murder and first-degree arson in Saturday night's attack at a Sonic Drive-in restaurant in Bellevue, the Omaha World-Herald reported. In a news release early Sunday, Lt. Andy Jashinske said Bellevue police received a call at 9:23 p.m. Saturday about a possible bomb in a U-Haul truck parked outside of the restaurant in the Omaha suburb.

  • Convicted spy Jonathan Pollard released from parole and due to move to Israel

    Jonathan Pollard, the former US Navy officer convicted of spying for Israel, has finished his parole and is expected to move to the Jewish state in the near future. Mr Pollard was one of the most prolific spies in US history and had shared thousands of classified documents with Israel during the Cold War. The US Justice Department’s parole commission decided on Friday to allow a travel ban on Mr Pollard to expire after he served 30 years in prison. According to the New York Times, he is the only American to ever be sentenced with life imprisonment for spying on behalf of an ally. The espionage affair strained US-Israel relations for decades. The decision to lift his travel restrictions is being seen as a parting gift to the Israelis from the Trump administration, which has heavily favoured Israel during its term. Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, has long pushed for the release of Mr Pollard and after granting him Israeli citizenship in 1995, and has tried to bring him to Israel as part of diplomatic negotiations. “The prime minister expects to see Jonathan Pollard in Israel soon, and together with all Israelis, extends his best wishes to him and his wife Esther,” Mr Netanyahu’s office said in a statement on Saturday night. Mr Pollard was a young civilian intelligence analyst for the US Navy and sold military secrets to the Israelis in exchange for thousands of dollars a month while he was working at the Pentagon in the 1980s. A year and a half into his espionage he was arrested by FBI agents in 1985 while trying to claim asylum at the Israeli embassy in Washington. The 66-year-old convicted spy was released from federal prison in 2015 after serving 30 years and placed on parole. A five-year travel ban was placed on him as well as parole conditions including a curfew, restrictions on what jobs he could take and a location tag. "We are grateful and delighted that our client is finally free of any restrictions, and is now a free man in all respects," Mr Pollard’s lawyers said. "We look forward to seeing our client in Israel." His lawyer, Eliot Lauer, told Channel 12 TV that Pollard was “ecstatic” and determined to move to Israel but that it would take some time because Pollard’s wife is undergoing medical treatment for cancer.

  • Republican Sen. Kelly Loeffler, a candidate in the Georgia runoff, tested positive for COVID-19 and is quarantining

    Loeffler is currently campaigning in a high-stakes race that could determine control of the Senate at the start of President-elect Joe Biden's term.

  • Ronna McDaniel has reportedly warned Donald Trump Jr., Kimberly Guilfoyle could succeed her as RNC chair

    There are members of the Republican Party who are worried that Ronna McDaniel's desire to remain as the chair of the Republican National Committee could mean President Trump will retain control of the group and, therefore, the GOP even after he's out of the White House, The New York Times reports. McDaniel is a close ally of Trump, and wary Republicans suspect she could allow Trump to mobilize the party against incumbents he doesn't consider loyal enough.But McDaniel has reportedly attempted to assure the doubters that she'll remain independent of Trump and his family, four Republicans told the Times on condition of anonymity. Besides, if it's not her, the risk of an even more pro-Trump chair could emerge, she reportedly told one party leader, warning that her successor could be someone like Donald Trump, Jr. or his girlfriend, Kimberly Guilfoyle.Aides to Trump Jr. and Guilfoyle have said neither is interested in the job, but the possibility could be enough for McDaniel to reel in the support she needs, given the party is concerned it could continue to lose its grip on suburban voters. Read more at The New York Times.More stories from theweek.com 5 bruisingly funny cartoons about Rudy Giuliani's dubious legal strategy America is buckling H.R. McMaster says Trump has 'doubled down' on Obama's mistakes in Afghanistan

  • Wisconsin police arrest 15-year-old boy for Mayfair Mall shooting, say 'bullets started flying' during altercation

    While witnesses described the shooter as a white man in his 20s or 30s, Wauwatosa Police Chief Barry Weber said the suspect is an Hispanic teenager.

  • AOC calls out Kyle Rittenhouse's $2 million bail release as 'protection of white supremacy'

    "Does anyone believe Rittenhouse would be released if he were Muslim," AOC wrote on Twitter.

  • Ethiopia army threatens 'no mercy' in assault on regional capital

    Ethiopia's military on Sunday warned of an all-out assault on Mekele, capital of the Tigray region, telling civilians to flee while they still can. "The next decisive battle is to surround Mekele with tanks," Dejene Tsegaye, a military spokesman, told state broadcasters on Sunday, threatening a siege of the city. He added a warning for Mekele's half a million residents: "Save yourself. A directive has been communicated for you to dissociate yourself from this junta, after that there will be no mercy." Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed - last year's Nobel Peace Prize winner - launched a military campaign against the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) on November 4, accusing it of attacking two federal military camps in the region, and of defying his government and seeking to destabilise it. On Sunday, Ethiopia said it would not talk to Tigrayan leaders to end the fighting. "We don't negotiate with criminals... We bring them to justice, not to the negotiating table," Mamo Mihretu, an aide to Mr Abiy, told the BBC.

  • H.R. McMaster says Trump has 'doubled down' on Obama's mistakes in Afghanistan

    Retired U.S. Army Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster, who previously served as President Trump's national security adviser, on Sunday called Trump's order to further reduce the number of American troops in Afghanistan by mid-January "abhorrent."CBS News' Margaret Brennan asked McMaster if Trump was "handing the Taliban a victory on the way out the door." McMaster answered in the affirmative, adding that Trump has "paradoxically doubled down on all the flaws of the Obama administration's approach to Afghanistan." As McMaster sees it, if the Taliban establishes control over large parts of Afghanistan, they will offer "safe haven" for terrorist groups, making the U.S. "far less safe" and more vunerabe to attacks.But the real issue, McMaster argues, is that the U.S. would be leaving after previously "empowering" the Taliban, citing the fact that U.S.-Taliban negotiations led to the Afghan government releasing 5,000 Taliban prisoners. "If we were gonna leave," he said. "Just leave." > AFGHANISTAN DRAWDOWN: @LTGHRMcMaster blasts @realdonaldtrump's plan to withdraw U.S. forces from Afghanistan as "abhorrent." > > "What happened is the prioritization of withdrawal over our interests led to us actually empowering the Taliban," he tells @margbrennan pic.twitter.com/UvDU2gHQWY> > -- Face The Nation (@FaceTheNation) November 22, 2020More stories from theweek.com Ronna McDaniel has reportedly warned Donald Trump Jr., Kimberly Guilfoyle could succeed her as RNC chair 5 bruisingly funny cartoons about Rudy Giuliani's dubious legal strategy America is buckling

  • Calls for Britain to give asylum to Pakistani Christian girl forced to marry Muslim man who abducted and gang-raped her

    Boris Johnson has been urged to grant asylum to a Pakistani Christian girl who was forced to marry a Muslim man accused of abducting and raping her at gunpoint. The family of the 14-year-old girl claims that she was kidnapped by Mohamad Nakash last year, who used blackmail and threats of violence to make her sign false papers consenting to marriage. In August, a judge's order that she be taken to a women's refuge was overturned by a higher court, which ruled the marriage was legal and returned her to Mr Nakash’s home. The girl then escaped and is now in hiding. But her lawyer claims that associates of Mr Nakash, who turned up en masse at the court hearings, have been trying to hunt her down. The British charity Aid to Church in Need, which campaigns on behalf of persecuted Christians worldwide, has now launched a petition asking the government to grant the girl asylum. “This shocking case is a chance for Britain to show its commitment to Christian welfare who so often feel abandoned by the West, ” said spokesman John Pontifex. The case has echoes of that of Asia Bibi, a Pakistani Christian woman who spent ten years on death row in Pakistan on trumped-up blasphemy charges.

  • Iran vows to crush any Israeli attempt to hit its 'advisory' role in Syria

    Iran on Sunday vowed to defeat any Israeli attempt to harm its role in Syria, saying the era of "hit and run" attacks by Israel there was over, days after Israel carried out air strikes on Syrian army and Iranian paramilitary targets in the country. Israel, which views Tehran as its biggest security threat, has repeatedly attacked Iranian targets and those of allied militia in Syria, where Tehran has backed President Bashar al-Assad and his forces against rebels and militants since 2012. On Wednesday, an Israeli military spokesman said eight targets were attacked, including an Iranian headquarters at Damascus international airport and a "secret military site" that served as a "hosting facility for senior Iranian delegations when they come to Syria to operate".

  • Biden chief of staff says inauguration ‘not going to be the same’

    Ron Klain said the inauguration ceremony will be altered to prevent the spread of coronavirus.

  • Thousands attack Brazil supermarket amid violent protests after black man beaten to death by security guard

    More than 1,000 demonstrators attacked a Carrefour Brasil supermarket in the southern Brazilian city of Porto Alegre on Friday after security guards beat to death a Black man at the store. The killing, which has sparked protests across Brazil, occurred late on Thursday when a store employee called security after the man threatened to attack her, cable news channel GloboNews said, citing the Rio Grande do Sul state military police. Amateur footage of the fatal beating and tributes to the Black victim were published on social media. He was identified in local media by his father as 40-year-old Joao Alberto Silveira Freitas. News website G1 later reported that an initial analysis by the state forensics institute indicated the cause of death could be asphyxiation. In a statement on Friday, the local unit of France's Carrefour SA said it deeply regretted what it called a brutal death and said it immediately took steps to ensure those responsible were legally punished. It said it would terminate the contract with the security firm, fire the employee in charge of the store at the time of the incident, and close the store as a mark of respect.

  • A high school teacher with an interest in cannibalism has been charged with murder after the discovery of bones with bite marks

    German prosecutors said Friday that the murder of a 44-year-old man shows signs of possible cannibalism.

  • What's with all the election audits?

    Seeking to cast doubt on the results of the presidential election, President Trump and his allies have zeroed in on a common process: postelection audits.

  • The women who served as a deadly duo for the Taliban

    Female assassins who lured an Afghan security official to his death with promises of sex before shooting him and dumping his body at a cemetery are among thousands of Taliban criminals freed as part of a fragile peace plan.

  • In Lebanon, army courts target anti-government protesters

    Khaldoun Jaber was taking part in an anti-government protest near the presidential palace outside Beirut last November when several Lebanese intelligence officers in plainclothes approached and forcibly took him away. The demonstration was part of a wave of protests sweeping Lebanon against corruption and misrule by a group of politicians who have monopolized power since the country’s civil war ended three decades ago. Jaber didn’t know it then, but Lebanese security forces targeted him because of his social media posts criticizing President Michel Aoun.

  • Iran expert: Biden would be 'crazy' not to use 'leverage' generated by Trump in nuclear negotiations

    President-elect Joe Biden has vowed to "make an unshakeable commitment to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon," and U.S. officials expect he'll be focused on easing tensions between Tehran and Washington once he's in the Oval Office next year, NBC News reports. But some experts think he should hold out for a bit before simply rolling back sanctions and rejoining the 2015 nuclear deal that President Trump exited in 2018, prompting Iran's decision to begin enriching its uranium again."From my point of view it would be crazy to rejoin the deal without getting something more out of it," David Albright, an expert on Iran's nuclear program at the Institute for Science and International Security, told NBC News. "Whatever you think of Trump — and I didn't like that he left the deal — he generated a tremendous amount of leverage on Iran, and not to use that just seems crazy. In that sense it's a gift to Biden."Biden is facing a ticking clock, however, given that Iran will be holding its elections in June 2021. President Hassan Rouhani, who is considered a moderate, was willing to back the 2015 agreement with the Obama administration, but his two-term limit is up, and there's no guarantee his successor will want to cut any sort of deal, NBC News notes. So, even if Biden were to adopt a more gradual approach and play hard ball, he'd likely have to do so within the first few months of his presidency. Read more at NBC News.More stories from theweek.com Ronna McDaniel has reportedly warned Donald Trump Jr., Kimberly Guilfoyle could succeed her as RNC chair 5 bruisingly funny cartoons about Rudy Giuliani's dubious legal strategy America is buckling

  • One arrested, three still at large in a South Beach fatal attack of a North Miami man

    The South Beach attack that ended with a North Miami man stabbed to death in Saturday’s first hours was about respect, Miami Beach police say they were told by the one person arrested.