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Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. The Nifty IT index has fallen sharply this month as AI disruption fears have hit investor confidence, erasing significant market value from tech majors. Broad sell-offs have been linked to developments in AI tools that could automate traditional IT services, triggering volatility across IT and tech-related stocks.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.To grab hold of the glossy dream of overseas education and eventual global employment, Indian parents have willingly liquidated family assets and taken out hefty education loans — all in the hope that earnings in dollars or euros would wipe out the debt.But in 2026, that fundamental equation stands fractured. With the Indian rupee hitting record lows of ₹96 against the US dollar, the financial math of studying abroad demands a hard reset.The equation has changed.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.The world is making a run on U.S. energy, setting American motorists and foreign buyers on a collision course.President Trump and his administration have successfully talked down and taken measures to contain American energy prices. That, combined with the fact that the country has a huge surplus, has prompted overseas buyers to buy huge volumes of U.S.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Rare earth metals are on the minds of all investors these days, and for good reason. Recent trade tensions have put China’s rare-earth monopoly into stark relief.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Coal is making a comeback.Countries around the world are returning to the highly polluting but reliable source of power after the Iran war effectively shut the Strait of Hormuz and cut off around 20% of global liquefied natural gas supplies.Taiwan is restarting idled coal-fired power plants and South Korea boosted the amount of electricity it generated from coal by more than a third last month. In Europe, Italy has put its coal plants on standby as it girds for a prolonged energy shock.Spot coal prices at Australia’s Newcastle port, a key supplier to Asia, have jumped 12% since the war started.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Jim Courier, former World No.1, called it the revenge tour. Last year, Jannik Sinner missed out on some of the biggest events on the tennis tour—Indian Wells, Miami, Monte Carlo and Madrid—since he was serving a three-month doping ban.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.India’s merchandise trade deficit was about $333 billion in 2025-26, 17.5% wider than the previous year’s. Reducing import dependence is critical and gold stands out as a major item in this context. As the world’s second-largest gold consumer, the country imported nearly 803 tonnes in 2024-25 but produced just 1.6 tonnes (0.2% of demand); last year’s figures would be comparable.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.It has been almost two decades since the late Shinzo Abe [former prime minister of Japan] stood in India’s parliament and told the assembled legislators that “it is incumbent upon us two democracies, Japan and India, to carry out the pursuit of freedom and prosperity in the region.” Abe defined their task as protecting freedom of navigation in what he was perhaps the first to call the Indo-Pacific. That task has gotten only more urgent as America withdraws—or, more recently, imposes blockades on crucial straits—and China pushes harder against the first island chain.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.India currently levies a 5% basic customs duty on raw cotton imports. The government had temporarily waived this duty between 19 August and 30 September 2025, and later extended this exemption to 31 December 2025.Addressing the media on the supply-chain scenario amid the war in West Asia, Bipin Menon, trade advisor in the textiles ministry, said on Tuesday that discussions were ongoing with the ministry of agriculture and the department of revenue on reducing or eliminating customs duty on cotton.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Geography may place India and New Zealand at distant points on the world map, but that distance has never defined their relationship. They have common democratic values, strong people-to-people ties and a deep cultural affinity, which includes their shared love for cricket. Much like their encounters on the pitch, India-New Zealand trade has traditionally resembled a Test match: steady and patient but often lacking in tempo, and has only picked up pace in recent years.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.KUANTAN, Malaysia—The Pentagon’s push to get its hands on the rarest of the rare-earth elements leads all the way to this small port city in Malaysia.Here, Lynas Rare Earths, an Australian company, has begun pumping out heavy rare earths, the elusive kind that China dominates.“No one had made a separated heavy rare earth outside of China in 20 years,” said Amanda Lacaze, Lynas’s chief executive. The company’s chief operating officer, Pol Le Roux, said it had actually been 30 years.When China cut off exports of heavy rare-earth elements during trade tensions last year, automobile factories in the U.S.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.NEW DELHI: India’s avocado demand is surging, but domestic supply is still playing catch-up, keeping the country reliant on imports even as local cultivation expands.Government data show imports have more than tripled in two years, rising to $42.27 million in FY26 (till February), from about $27 million in FY25 and $13.5 million in FY24. Domestic output, meanwhile, has increased more gradually—from about 6,000 tonnes in 2023 to around 9,000 tonnes in 2026, experts said.The mismatch highlights a widening gap: rising health-driven consumption is outpacing India’s nascent production base, forcing the market to lean on overseas suppliers even as farmers begin to scale up planting.The area under avocado cultivation has expanded over the years, with farmers in Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Sikkim and parts of Maharashtra responding to growing urban demand.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Japan has decided to ease restrictions on its sale of weapons to other countries, although this would be limited to the 17 with which it has defence tie-ups. As India is part of the four-nation Quad—with Japan, the US and Australia as other members—Tokyo’s move opens up a possibility worth close consideration by New Delhi. We could diversify our set of high-tech arms suppliers to include a non-hegemonic power with which we have had good relations for eight decades.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.India will continue to buy crude oil and cooking gas (liquefied petroleum gas or LPG) from Russia, even after the US’s one-month waiver of sanctions on such imports has expired, according to two people aware of the development.In early March, the US briefly waived sanctions on Russian oil and petroleum products that were already in transit, amid concerns over global supply disruptions linked to the West Asia war. The waiver will not be extended, US treasury secretary Scott Bessent said on Wednesday.The first person cited above said waiver on sanctions is the US’s prerogative, and India’s imports would not depend on it.

Three of India’s mid-sized IT companies—Persistent Systems Ltd, Hexaware Technologies Ltd and Firstsource Solutions Ltd—are looking to scale up their business and employ more people outside the US, which makes up more than three-fifths of their business. This mirrors the trend of their larger peers shifting their focus from the US to Europe and growth markets including Asia and South Africa.From acquisitions and large deals to strategic employee hubs, India, Australia, South Africa and West Asia are emerging as the key hotspots for these mid-sized IT services companies earning $1 billion to $5 billion in revenue as they look to insulate themselves from macroeconomic tensions and tap new growth markets.Persistent Systems, the country’s ninth-largest IT services company, got about 80% of its $1.41 billion revenue from North America.

Mint explains.On Wednesday, the California Superior Court held that Meta Platforms, which owns Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, and Google, which owns YouTube, deliberately built features that foster prolonged, compulsive use among children, contributing to mental distress and long-term harm.The court flagged infinite scroll and algorithmic recommendations as core drivers of “addiction by design,” drawing parallels with tobacco companies. Both firms have disputed the verdict.Unlikely.

Infosys Ltd’s announcement late Wednesday to buy two US-based tech services firms for $560 million takes its acquisition spend in a fiscal to an all-time high, reflecting the pressing need for new capabilities as automation tools upend India’s tech sector.The country’s second-largest information technology (IT) services company said it will spend up to $465 million to buy Optimum Healthcare IT, a Florida IT services and consulting firm.On the same day, it announced the acquisition of Stratus, a New Jersey-based tech services provider to the insurance sector, for up to $95 million.Both deals are in cash and are expected to close by June. The payment includes upfront amounts and earn-outs but excludes management incentives and retention bonuses.The acquisitions will add $319 million in incremental revenue to Infosys, including $276 million from Optimum Healthcare and $43 million from Stratus, making up almost 45% of Infosys’ incremental revenue last year.Infosys ended last year with $19.28 billion in revenue, up 3.85% on a yearly basis.

Five major central banks—the US Federal Reserve, the European Central Bank, the Bank of England, the Reserve Bank of Australia, and the Bank of Japan—met this week to deliver their rate decisions. Four of the five opted to pause and continue with existing policy rates.

Gail (India) Ltd’s shares have declined about 12% since the conflict in West Asia began, hitting 52-week low of ₹144.50 on Monday. The Strait of Hormuz blockade and QatarEnergy's suspension of operations at its LNG plant would hit Gail’s transmission and marketing businesses.As per Elara Capital, the state-owned company transported 123 million standard cubic meter (mmscmd) of natural gas in 2025, and about 30% of it came from sources that pass through or are close to the Strait and are stalled currently.The marketing segment traded volume of 105 mmscmd in 2025, and its dependency is less at 16%, thanks to diversified contracts from the US, Russia, and Australia.

On 7 January, Mint made a case for reforming India’s highly inefficient regime of fertilizer production, pricing and distribution, and for switching over from product subsidization to income support for farmers. This imperative has since been sprung centre-stage by a war in West Asia that has disrupted our imports of urea and its feedstock gas, both of which form large shares of domestic usage and have seen global prices flare up.

Dhurandhar: The Revenge was, like its first edition, is anyway unlikely to release in the territory given its patriotic and anti-Islamic theme, other titles scheduled for the coming weeks could bear the brunt, given the unpredictable timeline of disruption.Over the coming weeks, Akshay Kumar’s horror comedy Bhooth Bangla, Telugu film Dacoit, and Malayalam titles Aadu 3, Drishyam 3 and Pallichattambi would have ordinarily looked to West Asia for box-office returns. Indian film buffs are now unlikely to make it to theatres to watch these films under present circumstances even if cinemas are technically functional.The region is among the top five overseas markets for Indian films along with the US, the UK, Australia and New Zealand.Industry experts said most Indian film producers are in a wait-and-watch mode, with only Kannada star Yash’s Toxic moved to June, citing tensions in the region.To put it in perspective, a big hit like Shah Rukh Khan's 2023 release Jawan had earned nearly ₹150 crore from the UAE alone and trade experts estimate that 25-30% of overseas box office comes from West Asia.“There will definitely be a big impact.

New Delhi: Indian refiners have ramped up daily domestic production of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) by around 10% in the past few days in the face of a supply squeeze from the US-Iran war, two people aware of the development said.The refiners have also secured 20 very large gas carriers (VLGC) carrying around 1 million tonne (mt) cargo, mostly from the US, the people said on condition of anonymity.However, the country is still short of another 20 VLGCs—totalling 2 mt—which Indian oil marketing companies (OMCs) have been scouting for since the war broke out on 28 February, these people added.“Production has already gone up by 10%,” the first person cited above said, adding that India is looking at sourcing more LPG from all available sources, including the US, Canada, Australia and Algeria.The second person said: “There was a shortfall of about 40 VLGCs, and 20 VLGCs have already been booked.