India Financial News

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.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Stock market recap: Following a strong relief rally in the previous session, Indian equity benchmarks consolidated on Thursday, April 16, 2026, as investors paused to assess the durability of easing geopolitical tensions. The Nifty 50 closed marginally lower at 24,196.75, down 34.55 points (0.14%), while the Sensex ended about 80 points lower, mirroring the cautious tone.Despite the slight dip in headline indices, broader market sentiment remained resilient, as reflected in a healthy advance-decline ratio of 2:1, with 2,147 stocks advancing and 1,089 declining.Among sectors, Nifty Metal led gains with a 1.53% rise, followed by IT and Media, which saw buying interest on supportive global cues.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) has sought the latest quarterly profit-and-loss (P&L) statements of clients from top brokers to assess the full-year financial impact of equity derivatives trading on individual investors, according to two broking officials."The regulator had directed us to submit the data sometime last week," said one of the officials, requesting anonymity."The January-March data of the previous fiscal year has been called for by Sebi, which will give them a view of the full year's P&L. Earlier, we had submitted Q1-Q3 data after the end of each quarter," said the second official.An email sent to Sebi went unanswered till press time.Alarmed by losses of individuals trading in the equity derivatives segment (EDS), Sebi has been requisitioning quarterly P&L data from the top 10 equity brokers whose clients account for 90% of the derivatives volumes on NSE and BSE, per the second official.The regulator had used the data for two studies—one in September 2024 and the other in July last year—to analyse the P&L of individual traders from FY22 through FY25.The studies showed that individual or retail traders suffered rising losses during this period.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.India is the one of fastest-growing markets in Asia for real-time analytics and artificial intelligence observability platform Clickhouse, according to a top executive at the firm.“On the revenue side, India would be one of the highest in Asia,” co-founder and chief technology officer Alexey Milovidov said in an interview with Mint. “While revenue would be behind the US and Europe, in southeast Asia and the APAC region, India wins just on scale.”The database startup launched in India just eight months ago with a product engineering team and a smaller go-to-market team, and has several large enterprises and new-age tech companies as clients.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.The Centre is exploring plans to sharply raise the national daily minimum wage to ₹350-450, at a time workers’ protests have prompted wage hikes in Uttar Pradesh and Haryana.The Union labour ministry is working on fixing minimum wages for all workers in skilled, semi-skilled and unskilled categories, two people aware of the development said. Once a national floor is set, states will be compelled to revise their minimum wages accordingly, as wages cannot be set below the national floor.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Trends test our patience while the lower levels are being held . The road ahead looks challenging, but we will slowly and steadily conquer it.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Bosch Ltd’s shares have been on a roll this month. The auto component company’s stock is up almost 30% so far in April from the 2026-year-to-date low of ₹28,745 apiece on 30 March.The stock had fallen 21% last month after the West Asia war began and the disruption in natural gas supplies forced one of its suppliers to declare force majeure.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Every now and then, you come across a news article about someone deleting food delivery and over-the-top entertainment apps from their phone and going on to save a substantial amount on monthly expenses. These stories feel nice, and somewhere, we all wish we could do that too. But who does not want to have some pizza when watching an IPL match at home or watch the latest shows on an OTT platform?“If you ask most people what they spend on “extras”, they’ll think of a big dinner or a weekend trip.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Will we reach a maturity level in our workplaces where a company can ask for a mental health check the same way it asks for a physical test after rolling out a job offer but before signing the final appointment letter? When attention deficit disorder (ADD), cortisol spikes and high cholesterol are openly discussed in water-cooler conversation, why is mental health not a factor that needs to be gauged before an employment contract is signed?According to a senior partner at one of New Delhi’s most prominent law firms, the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act of 2016 states that one is prohibited from discriminating against a candidate based on the Act’s stipulated list of disabilities, unless proportionate to a legitimate objective.A note released by the Press Information Bureau in December 2025 said that the same law defines a ‘person with disability’ as “someone who has a long-term physical, mental, intellectual or sensory impairment which, in interaction with barriers, hinders their full and effective participation in society equally with others.” While employers cannot be biased during the hiring process, they can take a final call depending on the role’s needs. If the mental health conditions of candidates may obstruct their work efficacy, should employers not be informed of such diagnoses? Maybe not under present workplace dynamics.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.India has three good reasons to engage with one of the biggest open questions in economics today: the impact of artificial intelligence (AI) on jobs.First, the country has the world’s largest youth population. Second, its growth model has been dominated by software services, and AI tools like Anthropic’s Claude Opus are getting exceedingly good at writing code and finding bugs. But the third and possibly the most crucial point is this threat to entry-level positions comes amid an alarming oversupply of college graduates.The wage bump that graduates enjoy over school-leavers is shrinking and AI could further narrow the gap.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Nuvoco Vistas Corp. Ltd’s March quarter (Q4FY26) Ebitda touched a record quarterly high of ₹587.6 crore, aided by better realizations, exceeding Bloomberg’s consensus estimate by 5%.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.The industry body for venture capital, Indian Venture and Alternate Capital Association (IVCA), will focus on drawing more domestic institutional capital into alternative investment funds (AIFs), even as structural bottlenecks continue to slow participation.“Pension funds and insurance companies allocate very little to AIFs despite regulatory permission,” said Srini Srinivasan, the newly appointed chairperson of IVCA and managing director, Kotak Alternate Asset Managers Limited, in an interview with Mint.While policies allow these institutions to invest in AIFs, execution remains a challenge, he said.One key hurdle is structural misalignment.For instance, the National Pension System (NPS) requires a daily net asset value (NAV), but AIFs do not provide this. This mismatch makes it difficult for pension money to flow into these funds.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Two data releases on 13 April held important messages for the government on ensuring food security and shielding the livelihood of citizens. First, inflation estimates released by India’s ministry of statistics for March suggest food inflation is rising faster than overall inflation. Second, early monsoon forecasts point to a high likelihood of deficient rains in 2026.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Viewership for films that turn big hits at the box office often doesn’t end with their theatrical run. Appetite for repeat consumption on streaming platforms remains strong — even among those who have already watched the film in cinemas.According to media consulting firm Ormax, 65% of Dhurandhar’s audience on OTT had already watched the film in a theatre, pointing to a high correlation between theatrical and streaming performance of big-ticket Indian films.Industry experts say this could accelerate the trend of OTT platforms spending big bucks only to acquire major commercial hits, leaving small and mid-budget titles out in the cold.According to Ormax, while 21.2 million people watched Dhurandhar only in theatres, about 7.5 million watched it only on OTT.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Investing in stocks requires a series of essential steps to build a strong and successful portfolio.It begins with establishing clear objectives, selecting an investment strategy that aligns with your individual preferences, and maintaining active involvement with both the market and your holdings.Additionally, seeking inspiration from seasoned investors and incorporating their time-tested strategies can provide significant value.A notable example is Radhakishan Damani, a highly regarded investor whose decisions in the market frequently attract substantial interest.He recently picked a stake in a mid-cap investment firm.Radhakishan Damani is a Mumbai-based entrepreneur, businessman, and billionaire investor who founded India's mega-retail chain D-Mart.Born on 15 March 1954 to a Marwari family, he was brought up in Bikaner. Damani is one of the few self-made billionaires in the country.Damani is considered to be one of the Big Bulls in the stock market.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Muted earnings, premium valuations, currency weakness, relatively attractive emerging market (EM) peers, and India’s limited participation in the global AI value chain have reduced the country's appeal for foreign portfolio investors (FPIs), says Arbind Maheswari, head of India equities at BofA Securities, in an interview with Mint. While global investors remain cautious, domestic flows will continue to support the country's market activity, he says. Edited excerpts of the interview:If we take a step back, in the post-covid recovery phase, India seemed like the only large emerging market that had a story to tell.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.A 34-year-old Pune woman, diagnosed with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) as a teenager, saw her first natural menstrual cycle in February—six months after starting Mounjaro for weight management. This spotlights a broader shift, as more women with the condition turn to GLP-1 (glucagon-like peptide-1) drugs for metabolic relief and, in some cases, improved fertility.The trend is accelerating across India, doctors said, even though these drugs are not officially approved for treating PCOS and are prescribed primarily for type-2 diabetes and obesity.“I’ve had PCOS since I can remember, and with that comes infertility,” she told Mint, requesting her name be withheld to protect her privacy.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.New Delhi: India is planning to overhaul its pharmaceutical storage rules for vaccines and biological products, as gaps in the regulatory framework have frequently led to drugs being stored under improper temperature conditions, potentially compromising their efficacy, according to two government officials and documents reviewed by Mint.The plan is to define and classify these medications into two group— thermostable or those that can survive high temperatures, and thermolabile, or those that cannot, to ensure medicines, including insulin and vaccines are handled with scientific precision throughout the supply chain. Currently, the Drugs and Cosmetics Act, 1940, lacks these specific classifications.While Schedule P of the Drugs Rules, 1945 provides general storage instructions such as ‘cold place’ for temperatures not exceeding 8 degrees Celsius, there has been no comprehensive, science-based list to guide manufacturers and drug inspectors.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.India’s exports took a blow in March, with merchandise exports falling to $38.9 billion from $42.1 billion a year earlier. Imports fell to $59.6 billion from $63.7 billion, helping narrow last month’s goods-trade deficit to $20.7 billion. The impact of the US war on Iran seems to have started playing out.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.The International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) latest projections for the global economy are broadly along expected lines, but its view on India springs a surprise. The multilateral lender now sees India’s growth exceeding what it had forecast before the outbreak of war in West Asia. At 6.5%, India’s projected GDP growth for 2026-27 is 0.1 percentage point higher than published in the January World Economic Outlook of the IMF and 0.3 percentage point higher than its October view.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.A new report suggests that India's budget and mid-scale hotels may be overbuilt by global standards, offering far more amenities than their international counterparts. Features such as multiple restaurants, banquet halls, and event spaces have become standard across categories, driven by strong demand for weddings and social gatherings.