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Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Kolkata-based WishCare, known for its range of serums, sunscreens, and hair growth products, is exploring a majority stake sale that will value the brand at about ₹3,000-3,500 crore, three people familiar with the matter said.The company has appointed O3 Capital to help with the sale and several strategics and private equity funds will be tapped as part of the process, the people said on the condition of anonymity.“The deal is likely to attract a strategic buyer and feelers are expected to be sent to the likes of Marico, ITC and L'Oréal,” one of the people cited above said.India’s beauty and personal care (BPC) market, valued at $23 billion in FY25, is projected to touch $40 billion over the next four years, according to consultancy firm Redseer. Riding this surge in premium, science-led skincare demand, WishCare competes with fast-scaling brands such as Minimalist, Pilgrim, Dot & Key, The Derma Co, Arata, True Frog, Lotus Herbals and Auli Lifestyle across categories.Emails sent to WishCare, O3 Capital, Marico, ITC and L'Oréal did not elicit a response till the time of publishing.“The company clocked about ₹350 crore in revenue and ₹100 crore in Ebitda in the last financial year (FY26),” according to the second person.WishCare clocked about ₹200 crore in revenue in FY25 and has been profitable.At the upper end of the indicated valuation range, the deal would value the company at roughly 8–10x FY26 revenue and about 30–35x Ebitda, indicating strong investor appetite for profitable new-age beauty brands.Interestingly, L'Oréal is also evaluating the acquisition of personal care brand Innovist at a valuation of $350-400 million, Moneycontrol reported last month.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.India’s top private-sector banks reported a marked improvement in asset quality in the March quarter, with no visible stress in their loan portfolios despite the US-Israel-Iran war.The gross non-performing asset (GNPA) ratio either declined sequentially or remained stable, highlighting resilient credit performance across segments, largely due to lower slippages and stabilization in microfinance portfolios.While HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank, Axis Bank, RBL Bank and Yes Bank continued to report sub-1.5% GNPA levels, others, such as IndusInd Bank and IDFC FIRST Bank, saw a moderation in stress over the previous quarter.However, the improvement hides a cautious undertone, with lenders increasingly building buffers and stress-testing their portfolios against adverse global scenarios.Axis Bank has taken the most explicit stance, frontloading provisions to prepare for potential shocks. During the fourth quarter, it created a one-time additional provision of ₹2,001 crore as part of a voluntary enhancement of its provisioning framework.“Based on an assessment of evolving and unpredictable macro and geopolitical uncertainties, the bank created an additional one-time provision…This action is prudent and precautionary in nature and does not reflect deterioration in asset quality,” chief financial officer Puneet Sharma said in the earnings call on 25 April.The bank’s internal stress scenarios assume extreme conditions, including crude oil prices exceeding $150 per barrel, inflation at 7.4%, and a 20% currency depreciation in 2026-27.“Based on some of these test scenarios, we look at which accounts could go into NPL…and based on that, this number is right.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Private credit has had a good start. There is growing demand from corporate borrowers for faster credit decisions, customization of the loan structure and possible flexibility in repayment terms. Except a few exemplar banks, most still take 30-75 days for corporate loan underwriting, while they find it challenging to customize loans or offer flexible payments for regulatory reasons.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Shriram Finance Ltd expects its cost of funds to decline by around 1% over the next 18 months as the non-banking financial company (NBFC) looks to restructure its debt following a capital infusion from Japan’s Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group (MUFG).First announced in December 2025, MUFG completed the acquisition of 20% stake in the NBFC for ₹39,618 crore in April 2026. The non-bank plans to use about 50% of the proceeds to restructure its liabilities and the remaining to push lending in existing segments.The capital infusion also led rating agencies to upgrade the company’s debt rating to ‘AAA’ from ‘AA+’, which is also expected to help reduce funding costs.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.India’s newly unveiled CGSMFI 2.0, a ₹20,000 crore credit guarantee scheme for microfinance, aims to revive credit flows to the stressed sector. Yet, in its current form, it only partially addresses the symptoms and largely ignores the causes. India’s microfinance sector is in downturn.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Mumbai: A clutch of private equity firms including Multiples Private Equity, Warburg Pincus, KKR and Kedaara Capital are evaluating a stake in jewellery brand Giva in an $80-100 million deal, three people familiar with the matter told Mint.“The company is expected to see an uptick in its valuation and is seeking a little over ₹6,000 crore for this round,” the first of the three persons cited earlier said, all of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity. The second person said the round is largely primary (about 75%) with a small secondary component that is likely to see early investors like A91 Partners and Sixth Sense Ventures exit their stake in part or full as the structures are still being decided.“The company plans to use the funds towards expansion plans including opening new stores, expanding inventory lines and manufacturing capabilities.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Stock market recap: Indian equity benchmarks ended a volatile session on Monday with a positive bias. Indices had opened higher, tracking firm global cues, and briefly strengthened around midday, but gave up most gains as concerns around the US-Iran ceasefire kept sentiment cautious.Sensex closed up 26.76 points at 78,520.30, while Nifty 50 edged up 11.30 points to settle at 24,364.85.Sectoral performance was mixed.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.If you want proof that multilateralism is limping and hobbling, all you have to do is look at the latest ministerial of the World Trade Organization (WTO) held last month. The talks ended without any consensus over a global trade deal, adding yet another episode to years of paused global trade agreements.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.On 13 April, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) returned Ujjivan Small Finance Bank's (SFB) application for a voluntary transition to a universal bank, asking it to diversify its loan portfolio. RBI had also returned Jana SFB's application in October 2025 for failing eligibility criteria under its April 2024 framework for SFB-to-universal bank transitions. Jana and Ujjivan are expected to reapply.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Power transmission projects worth nearly ₹5 trillion are currently under bidding or execution across India, according to a senior official from the ministry of power.This large pipeline comes at a time when transmission infrastructure has emerged as a bottleneck in expanding renewable energy capacity and meeting the country’s rapidly rising power demand.To achieve 500 GW of non-fossil fuel capacity by 2030, the government has planned significant transmission expansion.In FY26, transmission projects worth ₹1 trillion cleared the National Committee on Transmission stage, while projects worth ₹1.47 trillion progressed beyond the special purpose vehicle stage.The government’s broader objective is to build a next-generation, intelligent and integrated national grid capable of supporting renewable energy, storage solutions, green hydrogen, and emerging demand centres such as data hubs.With power transmission emerging as a major investment theme, the sector is attracting investor interest.Here are a few companies with strong order pipelines to track.According to the business update Investor and analyst interaction on 23 March 2026, the company has a strong, visible execution pipeline of over ₹1.48 trillion.Assuming a 50% win rate on a ₹15 trillion opportunity, the company estimates potential project wins of around ₹7.5 trillion over the coming decades, resulting in an illustrative long-term execution pipeline of over ₹9 trillion.Power Grid, a Maharatna central public sector enterprise under the ministry of power, is primarily engaged in the transmission of electricity through its EHVAC (extra high voltage alternating current) and HVDC (high voltage direct current) transmission networks.The

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Since its merger-led transition into a bank in 2024, Slice has been moving away from an almost fully unsecured lending portfolio to a large, secured loan book, the bank’s top executive told Mint. Managing director and chief executive Rajan Bajaj said secured lending, which currently accounts for about 22% of the company’s portfolio, is expected to become the dominant segment over the next decade.“For us, secured business is growing faster than unsecured and will continue this way.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.In India’s equity market, few segments carry the same wealth-creation potential as midcaps. These are companies ranked 101 to 250 by market capitalisation—large enough to have scale, but still small enough for meaningful growth.They sit in an awkward middle ground. Too small to feel safe.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Mumbai: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has returned Ujjivan Small Finance Bank’s application to upgrade to a universal bank, sending a clear signal to the industry: meeting financial criteria is not enough. The regulator is placing heavy emphasis on the diversification of loan books, a move that will force other hopefuls to reassess their transition timelines.Ujjivan was among the three small finance banks (SFBs) that had applied to the central bank to transition to a universal bank.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Domestic travel stocks are in the limelight amid uncertainty around international travel routes and fuel supply disruptions. Strong summer travel demand, rising disposable incomes, and robust tourism activity are enhancing growth prospects for Indian hotels and online travel companies.Here are three travel stocks to watch: Thomas Cook (India) is a leading omnichannel travel company offering foreign exchange, leisure and corporate travel, and visa services.Founded in 1881, it operates across 28 countries and manages brands like SOTC and Sterling Holidays, providing end-to-end travel solutions with a strong global presence.The company reported revenues of ₹2145 crore vs ₹2061 crore YoY.

Democracy is inherently fraught. At its core lies the difficulty of translating individual preferences into a coherent social choice, a problem famously captured by Nobel laureate economist Kenneth Arrow’s impossibility theorem and later developed by another Nobel laureate Amartya Sen in his 1970 book Collective Choice and Social Welfare.

Mumbai: The Nuvama Group’s private equity arm has invested ₹200 crore for a minority stake in Val-Met Engineering, betting on a specialized supplier of aerospace and defence materials as global manufacturers move more of their high-end production to India.“Over the last couple of years, there has been a rising focus in India and globally to become more self-reliant. Sensitive sectors like aerospace, defence, industrial and advanced/value added manufacturing have been the biggest beneficiaries of this shift in mindset,” Pranav Parikh, managing partner and head of private equity at Nuvama Asset Management, told Mint in an interview.According to Parikh, global conflicts and geopolitical uncertainties have made domestic self-sufficiency a critical priority.

What I’m about to say was once obvious, yet it will seem less persuasive with each passing year: Bitcoin is nothing without its origin story. The story is that an unknown man whose real name was certainly not Satoshi Nakamoto created this cryptocurrency between 2008 and 2009 to liberate us from governments and banks. As Bitcoin’s value rose hundreds of times, it became public knowledge that he held about 1.1 million Bitcoin, worth over $120 billion US dollars at some point last year, and over $70 billion at the time of filing this column.

With the introduction of the Jan Vishwas (Amendment of Provisions) Bill of 2026 (JV2), India’s government has made one thing unmistakably clear: the decriminalization of various actions covered by the country’s statute book is not a one-time gesture, but a sustained and serious programme of reform. Covering 79 Central Acts in a single sweep, the JV2 Bill follows the Jan Vishwas Act of 2023 and picks up where the Select Committee-examined 2025 bill left off. The ambition behind this exercise deserves recognition on its own terms.

₹1.20 trillion even as the markets turned volatile, according to a February Care Edge report. A meaningful share of these borrowed positions is concentrated in relatively illiquid stocks, where MTF outstanding is several times the daily trading volume.This is not merely a story about rising leverage. It is a window into a larger regulatory blind spot.Financial regulation is designed to protect individuals.

The Museum of Innocence by Orhan Pamuk, the Turkish Nobel laureate, I found myself wanting to stop and find out more about the author, the city of Istanbul, the Bosphorus, and many other things. I started asking Gemini, which soon became my reading companion for this interesting book.As I progressed past a chapter or two, I became consumed with curiosity about Füsun, the beautiful young girl with whom Pamuk’s main character Kemal became obsessed with. She was described in such detail that she seemed entirely real, and I couldn’t help wanting to see her.“Show me Füsun,” I asked Gemini.

₹174 million.He held no stake in the company earlier. While the exact reasons for the purchase are not publicly known, several developments could help explain the interest.Simplex Infrastructures has shown signs of operational improvement in recent quarters.For the December quarter (Q3 FY26), the company reported revenue of ₹2,477 million, up from ₹2,298 million a year earlier.