COST Financial News

India will be only the second country after China to be operating on a short settlement cycle.

Vladimir Putin seized Crimea from Ukraine, a bold land grab that set the stage for Russia to invade its neighbor in 2022. The quick and bloodless seizure of the diamond-shaped peninsula, home to Russia's Black Sea fleet and a popular vacation site, touched off a wave of patriotism and sent Putin's popularity soaring. «Crimea is ours!» became a popular slogan in Russia. Now that Putin has been anointed to another six-year term as president, he is determined to extend his gains in Ukraine amid Russia's battlefield successes and waning Western support for Kyiv.

«From taking showers to using toilets and washing clothes, we are taking turns to do everything,» she said. It's the only water they can afford. A resident of Ambedkar Nagar, a low-income settlement in the shadows of the lavish headquarters of multiple global software companies in Bengaluru's Whitefield neighborhood, Muthuvel is normally reliant on piped water, sourced from groundwater. But it's drying up. She said it's the worst water crisis she has experienced in her 40 years in the neighborhood.

Gold And Silver Prices Today : Gold prices saw a slight decrease on Monday.The cost of 24 carat gold is Rs.6667.4 per gm down by Rs.131.0.The cost of 22 carat gold is Rs.6107.3 per gm down by Rs.120.0. The price change in 24 carat gold in the last one week has been 0.43% .whereas in the last month it has been -6.28%. The cost of "silver" is Rs.77200.0 per kg up by Rs.200.0 per kg.

Panama Canal has avoided the worst of a shipping crunch that threatened to upend the global economy — but at a cost to marine life and the Latin American country’s supplies of drinking water. After imposing strict limits on vessel traffic last year as drought left water levels languishing, the Panama Canal Authority is increasing the number of ships that can cross. Thanks to conservation measures, water levels fell just over a foot for the year through March 12, compared with three feet during the same period of 2023. Those measures, though, come with side effects. The canal recycles water from locks that vessels pass through, instead of simply flushing it into the ocean. This reused water gets saltier, and some of it infiltrates Lake Gatún, an artificial lake that forms part of the channel and is also Panama’s largest source of potable supply.

ITC Ltd.'s investors have been a worried lot this year. The company's stock has fallen a little over 9% since the year began, which is substantially higher than the 5% drop witnessed by the sectoral index Nifty FMCG in the same period. This weakness in the company's stock comes after it had consecutively outperformed the sectoral index in the previous two calendar years.

Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre has shot back at B.C. Premier David Eby’s comment that his plea to halt a federal carbon price increase is a “baloney factory” campaign tactic.

It is a paradox that though companies are forever trying to cut costs, many avoid taking steps that can enhance the income of their employees without adding to the wage bill. If companies restructure their compensation packages by replacing taxable emoluments with some tax-free perks, they can lower the tax liability of their employees. “The salary structure plays a critical role in determining the tax liability of an individual. Many tax deductions and exemptions are not available under the new tax regime, but certain tax-free allowances can be availed of even under the new regime,” says Avinash Godkhindi, Managing Director and CEO of Zaggle Prepaid Ocean Services. There are several such tax-exempt allowances, including food coupons and reimbursement of expenses on fuel and travel, newspapers and periodicals, phone and Internet (see graphic). The taxable portions of the salary, such as the special allowance, can be reduced to make place for the tax-exempt allowance. Taxpayers who pay a low rent can consider reducing the house rent allowance (HRA) as well. The HRA exemption is linked to the basic pay and is the least of the following three options: the actual HRA received, 50% of basic pay (40% in non-metros), and actual rent paid minus 10% of basic pay. If you pay a high rent and can claim exemption, keep it high, but if the rent is low, replace it with some other allowance. Taxpayers who live in their own houses and don’t pay rent can also reduce the HRA.

By Melanie Burton

By Farah Master, Tingshu Wang and Xiaoyu Yin

By Sarah Marsh

India's exhibition industry. According to the latest Ficci-EY media and entertainment report, footfalls in theatres (single screens and multiplexes) have fallen by 9% to 900 million in 2023 from 994 million in 2022. But, gross box-office collections (before tax) of single screens and multiplexes expanded 15.3% and 13.7%, respectively. To be sure, the base effect plays a role in the quantum of increase.

One morning late last month, the financial futures of hundreds of medical students in the Bronx, New York, changed forever. A gift of $1 billion from Ruth Gottesman, a former professor at Albert Einstein College of Medicine and chair of its board of trustees, will make the school tuition-free in perpetuity. The donation, one of the largest in US higher education history, is an act of generosity that will undoubtedly improve life for Einstein’s students and potentially benefit the surrounding community, one of America’s poorest.

Maruti Suzuki to Hyundai and Tata Motors, are seeking to democratize the electric power train in personal mobility through the introduction of one electric car a month over the next two years, breaking consumer resistance over affordability through more mass-market choices than ever before. “The adoption of EVs in passenger vehicle segment in India has been rather slow. Currently it is only 2.2% despite the substantial GST rate advantage. There are mainly 3 reasons for this slow adoption: the high acquisition cost ( EVs are typically 1.35-1.7 times more expensive than corresponding gasoline cars ), range anxiety among potential buyers due to lack of charging infrastructure and the relatively less number of mass models in this segment. It is expected that as the battery prices come down and as more models are launched and range anxiety fades away, the adoption rate will increase”, Shashank Srivastava, senior executive officer (marketing and sales) at Maruti Suzuki said, adding, “Some research shows faster adoption once penetration gets to around 5%. After this inflexion point, it is expected that EV penetration in India will each around 20% by 2030.” The largest number of product interventions — 12 — will be in the heart of the market in the mid SUV segment that has popular models such as Hyundai Creta and Maruti Suzuki Grand Vitara. Another half a dozen SUVs are scheduled for launch across the sub-compact, compact and premium SUV categories.

₹7.5 lakh per drone, it is an investment of ₹1.5 crore. A chunk of this capital investment was financed through the Agriculture Infrastructure Fund set up by the union government, which provides loans at concessional rates of 6% per year. A year of awareness campaigns and demonstrations seem to have paid off.

Saudi Arabia is considering transferring ownership of national carrier Saudia to the sovereign wealth fund, the Public Investment Fund, two sources familiar with the matter said. The transfer would include other assets owned by Saudia, one of the Middle East's oldest airlines, including its low cost unit, Flyadeal, the sources said.

Stamp Duty Amnesty Scheme 2023 for the third time and the move is expected to provide further support to redevelopment projects. The scheme that allows property buyers, who have either not paid or paid insufficient stamp duty on their purchase agreements, to regularize the sale by paying duty with a nominal penalty, has now been extended until June 30. The extension of the scheme is expected to inject renewed vigor into the real estate market, especially redevelopment projects that usually get stuck or delayed if an existing resident’s property falls in this category and is awaiting regularization.

NEW DELHI : Soho House is looking to expand its presence in India by adding two more ‘houses’ to its existing business here in the next few years, a senior executive of the global hotel chain said. The luxury members-only club -- which currently operates its 'house' in an asset-light model out of an 11-storied townhouse in Mumbai — first began operations in 1995 in London. The company's current membership costs about ₹1.6 lakh per annum for individuals if they want to enroll for just one house (say the one in Mumbai) and ₹3.1 lakh for all-house access.

NEW DELHI : Large OTT platforms with deep pockets, secure in their scale and dominance, are able to confidently adopt advertising-led monetization models to offer content for free, squeezing their smaller rivals. In response, these smaller regional-language streaming services have picked hybrid models of monetization, where they offer certain content for free to be sampled while developing a bouquet of programmes, based on a deep understanding of the local markets, at different price points.

diesel prices are the costliest in the country in Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Kerala while it is cheapest in smaller states and UTs like Andaman & Nicobar Islands, Delhi and those in the North East, mainly due to differential in local sales tax or VAT rates, oil industry data showed. The three state-owned fuel retailers — Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL) and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd (HPCL) — last week cut petrol and diesel prices by Rs 2 a litre each, ending a nearly two-year hiatus in price revision. That reduction brought relief to fuel users but rates continue to be above Rs 100 a litre mark in some states due to higher Value Added Tax (VAT). Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy's YSRCP-ruled Andhra Pradesh has the costliest petrol at Rs 109.87 a litre, followed by Left Democratic Front (LDF)-ruled Kerala, where a litre of petrol comes for Rs 107.54. Congress-run Telangana is close behind with petrol costing Rs 107.39 a litre.

Coal India Ltd and NLC India Ltd to go for pithead-based thermal projects with an aim to reduce transportation cost and improve availability of dry fuel, a top government official said. The plan is that all new thermal projects of Coal India Ltd (CIL) and NLC India Ltd should come up near the coal mines, Coal Secretary Amrit Lal Meena told PTI. This will reduce the dependence on transportation, which is mostly through rail and road, and make the coal accessible for usage in power generation, he said, while replying to a question on new projects of coal PSUs, the official said. The move will also reduce logistics cost and cost of power generation, he said, listing the benefits of a pithead-based unit.