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Those who view President Donald Trump’s strikes on Iran as a blow to China should think again. Beijing will manage any potential leadership change in Tehran as long as the oil keeps flowing, a summit with Trump and President Xi Jinping stays on track, and Washington handles Taiwan—China’s most sensitive red line—with care. Xi’s strategy is closer to the ancient Chinese phrase that notes the benefit of sitting on the mountain and watching the tigers fight: conserve strength while others exhaust themselves, and intervene only if core interests are directly threatened.Beijing doesn’t think of alliances the way the US does.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.MUMBAI: Consumer goods makers are raising prices and bracing for weaker demand as commodity inflation spreads across fuel, packaging and food inputs.Large listed fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) companies, including Hindustan Unilever, Britannia Industries, and Dabur India, have started hiking prices across parts of their portfolios and warned in recent earnings calls that inflationary pressures are likely to persist.The conflict in West Asia has pushed up crude-linked input and freight costs while also driving a rise in global edible oil prices, increasing pressure on FMCG companies that rely on imported commodities.The cost pressures are now spreading beyond fuel and packaging into food commodities.On Wednesday, milk cooperative brands, Amul and Mother Dairy, raised milk prices by ₹2 a litre. Smaller regional cooperatives, including Indore-based Sanchi Milk and Kerala-based Milma, have either raised prices or are planning hikes, according to media reports.Industry executives said higher prices of milk, wheat and edible oils are squeezing margins, forcing FMCG companies to pass on costs through price hikes and lower grammage packs, a move that could weigh on demand recovery.India’s wholesale price index rose 8.3% year-on-year in April, driven largely by higher prices of mineral oil, crude, natural gas and metals, according to government data.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Several government committees, apart from the Niti Aayog, have asked for regulatory impact assessments (RIAs) to be institutionalized in India. The statutory backing of a legislative framework can ensure its meaningful use as a tool for assessing the costs and benefits of current and prospective regulatory measures. The inclusion of provisions related to RIAs in India’s recently concluded free trade agreements (FTAs) highlights the urgency to enact a central law on such study-based reports.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Meta Platforms is preparing to have to unwind its acquisition of the artificial-intelligence startup Manus after China banned the transaction on national-security grounds Monday, according to people familiar with the matter.Meta bought Manus, a China-linked, Singapore-based startup that specializes in building AI agents, in December for $2.5 billion, and quickly moved to integrate the new technology into its systems. Any attempt to undo the acquisition would mean disentangling the two.In another complication, Manus’s investors, which include California-based venture-capital firm Benchmark, have already received their returns, people with knowledge of the matter said.Meta garners significant revenues from Chinese advertisers who target consumers outside China, despite Facebook and other Meta apps being blocked in the country.Several former Manus investors in Asia, including Tencent, HSG and ZhenFund, have planned to cooperate if Meta goes ahead to unwind the deal, some of the people said.Beijing has handed the two companies a preliminary deadline of several weeks to unwind the deal and fully restore Manus’s Chinese assets to their original state, some of the people said.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.India’s presidency of Brics arrives at a consequential moment for the global order. Traditional multilateral institutions are struggling to respond to geopolitical conflict, economic fragmentation and technological disruption.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.If the Iran War has taught us nothing else, it’s that weaponizing shipping routes is now the military move du jour. That has rightly turned attention to the Taiwan Strait, but in this era of intense US-China rivalry, the Strait of Malacca is just as important.The shipping route—which carries roughly 40% of global trade and around 80% of China’s imported oil—has long been regarded as vulnerable to disruption. Southeast Asia’s divisions will make any crisis much harder to contain.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.New Delhi: The government will hold further consultations before rolling out schemes for debt resolution of all companies in a group in one go, and for dealing with cross-border insolvency cases where a company or its creditors are in different jurisdictions, two persons familiar with the development said.Introduced through legislative amendments in April, these two ambitious provisions form part of the most comprehensive overhaul of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC) since its enactment in 2016. The amended legislation received presidential assent on 6 April..Most provisions in the amended Code, which seek to improve the efficiency and outcomes of debt resolution of companies and their promoters, will be notified at the earliest but the schemes for group insolvency and cross-border insolvency may be rolled out only after further consultations, said the first of the two persons quoted above, both of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity.

₹16 crore. So, what difference has the FPO made to the life of a small farmer like Karma? A lot, she said.Karma’s cultivation costs have halved as the FPO helped farmers switch from expensive chemical inputs to bio-nutrients and organic pest repellents. The farmer-run company now supplies staples like wheat, maize and pulses to a host of corporate buyers like ITC, AWL Agri Ltd (formerly Adani Wilmar) and Safe Harvest, among others.

I’ve long thought that calling Adam Smith the father of economics seriously understates his significance. In some ways he was indeed the first economist, and The Wealth of Nations, published 250 years ago this week, was indeed the discipline’s seminal text. But his ambitions and insights extended so much further than the dismal science as now conceived.

Indian companies with operations in West Asia spent the weekend tracking their employees and gauging the impact on their businesses as the US-Israel strikes on Iran escalated the conflict, freezing movement from outside and within the region.“We are in touch with the client firms. The workers are safe.

India’s justice system is groaning under a crushing backlog. Nearly 48 million cases are pending in lower courts, while the Supreme Court alone has close to 90,000 unresolved matters. This does not include matters before tribunals and administrative bodies.

Mint, SDHI chief executive officer Vipin Kumar Saxena said the companies plan to cooperate initially on medium-range (MR) product tankers and potentially very large gas carriers (VLGCs), with Samsung providing designs and engineering support.“We will start by working together on specific ships (MR tankers and VLGCs). Once we execute these successfully and build confidence, the relationship can evolve further,” Saxena said in the interview.Samsung will license vessel designs and provide engineering and material packages, while construction will take place at SDHI’s Pipavav yard.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. Fixed income rarely grabs headlines, though it anchors most Indian portfolios. Fixed deposits (FDs), corporate bonds and certificates of deposit (CDs) may seem dull compared to equities, but they play a critical role in stability, cash flow and capital protection.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. New Delhi: India’s decision to allow imports of dried distillers grains with solubles (DDGS) under the interim trade framework with the US will help bridge the country’s protein deficit in animal feed and offer a cost-effective alternative to conventional feed ingredients, the chief of the Indian Dairy Association (IDA) said. Affordability is a key concern for small and marginal dairy farmers, as fodder accounts for nearly 60% of the cost of milk production.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. SEOUL—The hundreds of prize payouts were mostly just a few bucks each, part of a promotional campaign by a South Korean cryptocurrency exchange. The total reward pot: 620,000 Korean won, or about $425.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. New Delhi: As India and the US approach the bilateral trade agreement, the import commitments are key to its domestic impact. Since most imports are capital-intensive and strategic, experts believe the deal will avoid pressuring India’s labour-intensive sectors, even as trade increases.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. New Delhi: Engineers India Ltd (EIL) is in talks with the government of Guyana to help build its first oil refinery, CMD Vartika Shukla said in an interview, a step that could deepen energy ties between India and the South American country. EIL plans to offer project management and consultancy services for the proposed refinery.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. NEW DELHI : Negotiations for “the mother of all deals", which has been almost 20 years in the making, finally concluded this week. In EU President Ursula von der Leyen’s own words: “We are creating a market of 2 billion people.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. Small enterprises continue to rely heavily on informal sources such as friends and moneylenders for small-ticket loans, primarily borrowings below ₹50,000, highlighting persistent gaps in access to formal credit, the Economic Survey tabled in Parliament on Thursday showed. The survey, citing analysis of data from the Annual Survey of Unincorporated Sector Enterprises (ASUSE) 2023-24, points to a sharp divergence in financing patterns by loan size for micro and unincorporated enterprises.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. Amid a global upheaval, the conclusion of India’s free trade agreement (FTA) with the EU spells relief. Once it’s in force, this “mother of all deals" will mutually ease market access across a wide range of goods and service categories, with high tariff barriers left in place only for sensitive stuff on either side.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. Israel’s reliance on new Palestinian militias in Gaza to target Hamas was on display earlier this month when Hussam Al Astal, the leader of one of the groups, boasted about the killing of a police official in Hamas-controlled territory and said more such attacks are planned. “We say to Hamas and everyone affiliated with Hamas: Just as we reached him, we will come for you, too," said Astal in a video message that showed him brandishing an assault rifle.