City Abu Dhabi, state Dhabi Financial News

Abu Dhabi state fund Mubadala has invested in the ecosystem around cryptocurrencies, such as block-chain technology, given the increase in the digital currency's market value, its CEO Khaldoon al-Mubarak told CNBC in an interview. «I think, you know, this is a business that had, what $200 billion worth of crypto value two years ago, and it's two and a half trillion dollars today and growing,» Mubarak said. «So I think while many people are sceptics, I don't fall in that category.»

Mahindra & Mahindra has told the government there must be a level playing field between domestic and foreign players and local manufacturing must be promoted, a top executive said, as New Delhi seeks to lure carmakers such as Tesla. Mahindra and Tata Motors have pressed Indian officials privately not to lower import taxes of 100% on electric vehicles and protect domestic firms and their foreign investors as the government reviews Tesla's plans to enter the market, Reuters reported last month. Asked about Tesla's entry and New Delhi's planned policy to lower import taxes, Mahindra Managing Director Anish Shah said his company had made representations to Indian officials saying global EV makers must be nudged to invest in India. «It should be a level playing field and investing in India is important,» Shah told Reuters in an interview at the World Economic Forum annual meeting, without referring to Tesla by name. «Our approach is essentially to create a stronger industry in India, and not to be in a situation where manufacturing is done outside India, and India just becomes an importer of products,» he added. India sold 4 million cars last year and just 82,000 of those were EVs, but the nascent segment clocked sales growth of 115% versus the previous year. Mahindra has raised around $400 million from Singapore's Temasek and British International Investment, while private equity firm TPG and Abu Dhabi state holding company ADQ invested $1 billion in 2021 in Tata. Shah said Mahindra has plans to list its EV unit, but not before 2029 «because we need to be able to show significant success in that business.» «For us, electric is the future,» he said. Tesla has proposed setting up an Indian factory but also demanded

Tata Motors is pressing Indian officials not to lower import taxes of 100% on electric vehicles and to protect domestic industry and its investors, as the government reviews Tesla's plans to enter the market, people with direct knowledge said. As India tries to boost domestic manufacturing and electric vehicle (EV) adoption, Tesla is proposing to set up an Indian factory but is demanding lower import taxes for electric cars.

By Aditi Shah and Aditya Kalra

Mahindra & Mahindra and Temasek, the Singapore-headquartered global investment firm, have executed a binding agreement for the latter to invest Rs1200 crores into MEAL (Mahindra Electric Automobile Limited), the four-wheeler (4W) passenger electric vehicles company, Mahindra and Mahindra said in a filing to the stock exchanges. Temasek will invest Rs1200 crores in the form of Compulsorily Convertible Preference Shares (CCPS) at a valuation of up to Rs 80,580 ($9.74 billion) crores resulting in Temasek’s ownership of a 1.49% to 2.97% stake in MEAL. ET had reported on the company’s fund-raising plans in its July 10 edition.

defunct crypto exchange FTX asked a judge to approve the sale of its interest in a fund of venture capital firm Sequoia Capital to an Abu Dhabi state-backed investment firm, in a deal valued at $45 million. FTX agreed to sell the interest in the Sequoia Capital Fund, which previously belonged to its sister trading outfit Alameda Research’s venture arm, to Al Nawwar Investments RSC Limited on Wednesday, its estate said in a filing to Delaware’s bankruptcy court late that same day. Al Nawwar is a subsidiary of an investment fund wholly owned by the Abu Dhabi government, and is an existing investor in the Sequoia fund. Alameda had acquired the stake in March 2022 for an aggregate capital commitment of $100 million, the filing said. To date, around $50 million of that commitment had been called up by Sequoia for investment in various portfolio companies. Advisers for FTX have been scrambling to raise money from the failed crypto exchange’s wreckage in order to repay creditors, with around $5 billion in cash and cryptoassets located as of January. Liquidators said that it had decided it was in “the best interest” of the estate to sell its Sequoia stake now because of its size, expected management fees and because its value could diminish if Sequoia chose to make more capital calls in the future.