The Sensex and the Nifty have opened this morning on a negative note witnessing a correction from all-time highs.
Join us as we follow the top business news through the day.
EU sets out search ranking guidelines for Google, Microsoft platforms
Alphabet unit Google, Microsoft and other tech giants will have to be more transparent in how they rank online search results, under European Commission guidelines out on Monday.
The guidelines, which take immediate effect, will be followed up next week by the publication of draft rules that could eventually impose further restrictions on the tech sector.
Smaller rivals and some companies have long complained about arbitrary and opaque practices tech giants employ that affect how their products and services are ranked in search results, especially when that means they are placed far below the bigger companies.
Google's online search practices have landed it total fines of more than 8 billion euros ($9.71 billion) over the period 2017-19 from EU antitrust regulators who found it had unfairly pushed its own products to the disadvantage of competitors.
Workers vote for work-from-home
Rupee depreciates 11 paise to 73.68 against US dollar in early trade
The stock sell-off is putting pressure on the rupee.
PTI reports: "The rupee depreciated 11 paise to 73.68 against the US dollar in opening trade on Thursday tracking muted domestic equities and a rebound in the American currency.
At the interbank forex market, the domestic unit opened at 73.68 against the US dollar, registering a fall of 11 paise over its previous close.
On Wednesday, the rupee strengthened by another 3 paise to mark its seven-week high of 73.57 against the US dollar.
A rebound of the US dollar, Brexit deal impasse and the Reserve Bank of India’s presence in the market weighed on investor sentiments, Reliance Securities said in a research note.
On the other hand, dollar inflows into local equities and strong Chinese yuan could keep depreciation bias limited, the note added.
Meanwhile, the dollar index, which gauges the greenback’s strength against a basket of six currencies, fell 0.10 per cent to 90.99.
Traders said the US dollar rebounded against the basket of currencies amid lack of progress over the additional US fiscal stimulus to ease the economic blow from the COVID-19 pandemic.
On the domestic equity market front, the 30-share BSE benchmark Sensex was trading 315.65 points lower at 45,787.85 and the broader NSE Nifty fell 109.10 points to 13,420.
Foreign institutional investors were net buyers in the capital market as they purchased shares worth Rs 3,564.23 crore on a net basis on Wednesday, according to provisional exchange data.
Brent crude futures, the global oil benchmark, rose 0.47 per cent to USD 49.09 per barrel."
Discretionary consumption will bounce back in 2021: CEA
Chief Economic Adviser Krishnamurthy Subramanian expects discretionary consumption to bounce back in 2021, along with spending on sectors affected by social distancing norms, given the promise of COVID-19 vaccines bringing the pandemic under control.
The CEA also said the advent of the Joe Biden administration and a change in the U.S.’ stance on trade would benefit India.
“There are two key areas that we would be watching — climate change and trade. I expect the Biden administration to go back to the traditional, more long-run thinking on this and that would be good for the world. India, especially, would be benefiting from the change in stance on trade because it has always played by the rules in the world order,” Dr. Subramanian said. “I do expect India to work closely with the Biden administration to bring about more prosperity to the world,” he said in a discussion on ‘Who will lead the global recovery?’ at the 2020 Milken Institute Asia Summit on Wednesday morning.
The use of vaccines could help hasten herd immunity and the pandemic was likely to come under control in the coming year, he said.
Indian shares slip from record highs, agrochemical firm UPL plunges
A moderate correction in stocks after the long bull run.
Reuters reports: "Indian shares came off record highs on Thursday and the Nifty snapped seven sessions of gains, led by a 10% slide in agrochemical maker UPL following a report of promoters siphoning money.
The NSE Nifty 50 index fell 0.44% to 13,470.05 by 0356 GMT, while the benchmark S&P BSE Sensex was down 0.38% at 45,928.14. The indexes had hit record highs in 14 of the previous 21 sessions, driven mainly by news of progress in coronavirus vaccines.
India's drugs regulator on Wednesday said it needed more data to make a decision on emergency authorisation for vaccines developed by AstraZeneca and Bharat Biotech.
UPL Ltd was the biggest loser on the Nifty, falling as much as 10% after the Economic Times reported that a whistleblower claimed promoters of the company had siphoned money.
Cement stocks ACC Ltd, Ambuja Cement and UltraTech Cement slid 1.9%-3.0% after Reuters reported late Wednesday that India's antitrust body conducted raids at the companies' offices.
Asian shares were also lower on uncertainty about U.S. stimulus and after Britain's medicine regulator issued an anaphylaxis warning on Pfizer's vaccine after some adverse reactions."
Lack of reforms hurting India, democracy making reforms difficult: BJP spokesperson
BJP’s national spokesperson on economic affairs Gopal Krishna Agarwal on Wednesday said the lack of critical reforms after 1991 has made Indian industry unfit to compete globally for now and appeared to back the NITI Aayog CEO’s comments on democracy making reforms difficult.
Citing the resistance to the government’s farm sector reforms, Mr. Agarwal said that everybody agrees that the agriculture sector needs to open up to stay competitive. “But still we see the reforms are being hindered currently… Our land reforms are pending, the 2013 land law is not very conducive to industry,” he said.
“We have to go for large-scale improvements in the factors of production and there has to be consensus. Today also, NITI Aayog CEO (Amitabh Kant) said – in democracy, it is so difficult to make any reform. Otherwise, why are those economic reforms are still pending? How much capital a political party can spend on reforms?” Mr. Agarwal asked.