2020 Financial News

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.At his confirmation hearing last week, Kevin Warsh [US President Donald Trump’s nominee for Federal Reserve Chair] dodged questions about interest rates, tariffs and the 2020 election. As his nomination to be chair of the Federal Reserve heads toward confirmation after clearing the Senate Banking Committee Wednesday, it’s worth focusing on an equally troubling gap in his public record: his near silence on anything related to employment.Warsh gave a perfunctory nod to the Federal Reserve’s dual mandate—price stability and maximum employment—in last week’s testimony, but while he extensively discussed the former, he essentially ignored the latter.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Most investors struggle with one question: what stock to buy. But what if investing wasn’t about finding the next multi-bagger, but about backing a pattern that repeats over time? Factor investing is built on this idea.Instead of chasing individual stocks, factor investing targets specific traits or investment styles, such as value (undervalued stocks), momentum (stocks that are in an uptrend), or quality (stocks of financially strong companies).

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.It has been a sad few years for the venerable central processing unit. The one-time standard-bearer of the computing revolution has been pushed aside in recent years with the rise of generative artificial intelligence powered by graphics processing units, or GPUs, which are used for a lot more than graphics these days.But now attention is swinging back to the main brain of data-center computing, the CPU.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.High stock valuations have investors on edge about the next stock market crash. Famed trader Paul Tudor Jones, who famously predicted the 1987 crash, isn’t just worried—he’s envisioning exactly how the next big one could play out.The founder and chief investment officer of Tudor Investment, which has more than $100 billion of assets under management, Jones laid out his view of how and when the next bear market could hit and how big of a wallop it could pack.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.On Monday, shares of One97 Communications Ltd, which operates Paytm, fell more than 8% intraday before trimming losses to close 1% lower at ₹1,137.80 apiece on the National Stock Exchange. The decline followed the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) cancellation of Paytm Payments Bank Ltd’s (PPBL) licence.But what triggered the action, and what does it mean for India’s fintech major? Mint breaks it down.PPBL, launched in May 2017, had long been under regulatory scrutiny over its operational structure and dependence on its parent’s technology systems and data-sharing arrangements.Over time, RBI flagged concerns including breaches of deposit limits and weak know-your-customer (KYC) controls, which it said weakened safeguards against money laundering risks.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.New Delhi: Three weeks after its official inauguration, the Noida International Airport faces fresh uncertainty over the start of commercial flights, as a key security clearance for its chief executive is still pending. The nod from the Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS)—essential before operations can begin—has yet to come through, raising the possibility of a delay to the airport’s planned mid-May launch.The Noida International Airport at Jewar in Uttar Pradesh, 100 km off Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International airport, was inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on 28 March 2026.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.On Thursday afternoon, Netflix announced that co-founder and chairman of the board Reed Hastings would be stepping down when his term expires later this year “in order to focus on his philanthropy and other pursuits,” according to a letter to shareholders.Hastings founded Netflix in 1997 with Marc Randolph, and took the reins in 1999 when the company was still a DVD-by-mail service. In 2020 he elevated creative executive Ted Sarandos to the co-CEO position, reflecting how important original content had become for Netflix, by then the leading subscription streaming service.

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.For almost six years, Argentines have demanded the truth about the mysterious death of their tragic national hero, Diego Maradona, among the greatest soccer players the world has ever seen.Now, prosecutors say they have an answer and are putting their evidence to the test this week in a trial accusing Maradona’s medical team of “simple homicide with eventual intent,” meaning that their actions contributed to his death. Seven defendants, including Maradona’s doctor and nurses and a psychiatrist, face as many as 25 years in prison.Prosecutors alleged that Maradona’s medical team ignored significant warning signs as his health deteriorated in late 2020.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Mutual fund investors, especially those who entered the market after 2020, are now facing an unfamiliar situation. For investors who entered the market post-Covid, investing in mutual funds looked so easy, with little worry about drawdowns and consistent annual profits between 2020 and 2024. Investors buying mutual funds had a good experience, which gave them confidence to significantly scale up their investments based on near-term past performance.This ramp-up happened very quickly as they added more money and generated returns for four successive years.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) have pulled nearly ₹1.8 trillion out of Indian equities in FY26 — the largest outflow in 34 years.At first glance, that headline sounds alarming. But for long-term investors, it may signal opportunity rather than danger.

If I ask which is the most volatile investment option among fixed deposits, Public Provident Fund, equity and liquid mutual funds, everyone will get the answer right: equity. Of course, there are assets like cryptocurrency that are even more volatile, but we are not going there now.When we look back on index charts for various stock markets globally over the decades, it all looks so simple: the market went down here, then went up, and obviously you would have either remained invested through the ups and downs or bought more at the bottom. Of course.

Mint takes a look at the arguments made by the high-profile Adani counsels and the road ahead in the case.The SEC has alleged that billionaire businessman Gautam Adani and Sagar Adani, among others, paid $250 million in bribes to unnamed government officials in India to secure favourable power-supply contracts for Adani Green Energy Ltd.The regulators further claimed that when raising capital from American investors, the Adanis did not tell them about the alleged bribes while stating the company’s anti-bribery policies, thus misleading investors and committing securities fraud.The Adani Group has denied any wrongdoing.The Adani lawyers filed a motion to dismiss the SEC case based on a lack of personal jurisdiction. The Adani kin are neither residents of the United States nor did they purposefully direct their activities towards the country, the counsels said in their motion.Gautam Adani did not personally authorize the issuance of the $750 million bonds under question or direct the sale of these bonds in the US, they said.

IndiGo, with India’s largest airline hitting one air pocket after another.In early December, it was caught off guard by its approach to new domestic regulations that curtailed and staggered pilots’ flying hours, forcing widespread flight cancellations. Then came the US attack on Iran, setting off a chain reaction across oil prices, West Asia aviation, and the rupee’s exchange rate against the dollar—all variables central to IndiGo’s business.As it heads into the peak summer season, the airline has significant course correction ahead if it is to return to the steady glide path it has long been known for.Nowhere is the strain more visible than in the share price of InterGlobe Aviation Ltd, IndiGo's parent company.

Mint explains the nuances of this new, yet strategically crucial, industry.Yes. Ever since the Indian space industry was privatized in 2020, a crop of private Indian space startups has emerged with core technologies that enable space-based surveillance services.These include imagery and data from satellites, analytics from ground stations based on satellite data, and maps of satellites that help countries monitor who might be observing them.

Mint.Jio, which has over 500 million subscribers, told the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) that it was in compliance with the regulator's guidelines, and the tariff plans offered are based on “intelligible criteria”, and cannot be treated as discriminatory.The service provider has been given time till 14 April to comply with two directions. First, Jio has to publish and make available all tariff offerings, including the three special tariff vouchers— ₹249, ₹199 and ₹209—at all its platforms such as retail stores, customer care centres, website and app.

Mint India Investment Summit, Ravishankar said India’s AI opportunity lies less in outspending global leaders and more in building useful products quickly and cost-effectively at scale, leveraging the country’s deep engineering talent.He outlined two broader areas where Indian startups can still create large businesses, even if the country is not yet at the cutting edge of global AI development.The first opportunity, he said, is that India will be a quick adopter of AI across large, everyday use cases. As AI tools improve, many familiar consumer and service categories could be reimagined from the ground up, he said.“India will be a fast follower and a quick consumer of AI in areas such as customer support, citizen services, travel and jobs, where new companies are beginning to rebuild internet products with AI at the centre,” Ravishankar said.The second opportunity lies in the layers around AI itself: infrastructure, software and tools that help other companies build and use AI products.Ravishankar said Indian teams are well-placed because of the country’s large developer base and growing technical talent pool.

Essel Propack after its merger with Swiss firm Propack in 1997. Over the next two decades, Essel Propack built a strong international footprint across the Americas, Europe, Asia, and Africa.In 2019, Blackstone invested $460 million to acquire a 75% stake in the company, and renamed it EPL.

Indian equity valuations have eased sharply down to the levels of peer regional markets, offering investors some comfort after a prolonged phase of elevated multiples.The Nifty 50 is now trading at 19.4 times on a trailing 12-month (TTM) earnings basis, slipping below its five-year median of 22.6x and 10-year median of 22.3x—marking a marked shift down from recent peaks.The headline index has slipped below the 20x price to earnings, or PE, mark for the first time since the Covid-led market disruption in 2020. At these levels, it is placed at a discount to markets in Taiwan, Japan, and South Korea, a Mint analysis based on data from Bloomberg showed.The moderation follows a nearly 12% correction in the Nifty 50 from its 52-week high of 26,328.55 touched on 02 January 2026, driven by the West Asia war, sustained foreign outflows, and softer earnings momentum.While the pullback has brought valuations below to historical averages, it also raises a key question: are Indian equities attractive enough to lure foreign investors back?Foreign portfolio investors, or FPIs, have pulled out about ₹1.25 trillion from Indian equities in 2026, driven by global risk-off sentiment, earnings and growth concerns and sector-specific pressures.“With the Nifty now around 19x PE, valuations have come off meaningfully and look more reasonable versus history,” said Ravi Singh, chief research officer at Master Capital Services.Still, he said, it may be premature to call it a bottom.

rise of artificial intelligence (AI) and global volatility has kept hiring sentiment largely muted, Indian Institute of Management (IIM) campuses saw their median compensation rising 25-40% from that of the 2020 pandemic-era batch, as the 2026 cohort got picked up for specialized roles.As per its press release, IIM Calcutta’s median pay package was ₹35 lakh in 2026, up nearly 3% from ₹34 lakh last year and more than 37% higher that the 2020 level of ₹25.5 lakh. IIM Lucknow matched the momentum at ₹32.9 lakh, over 6% higher than ₹31 lakh a year ago and a massive 43% up from the ₹23 lakh annual package of 2020, its press statement said.

₹29,845 crore in February, down 4% from ₹31,002 crore in January, according to data from the Association of Mutual Funds in India (Amfi).As markets fall, many investors are seeing negative returns and wondering whether to stop SIPs. The math suggests they shouldn’t.The core mechanism behind SIPs is rupee cost averaging. When markets fall, a fixed monthly investment buys more units.