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interim Budget, says BofA Securities. “The current government’s intent is to consolidate the fiscal deficit through capital expenditure-driven growth instead of expenditure compression. We expect this strategy to continue in FY25 union budget as well,” the global brokerage firm said. The brokerage also expects the Centre to meet its fiscal deficit target of 5.9% of GDP in FY24. Between April and November of the current fiscal year, the government used up 50.7% of the budgeted fiscal deficit target for the full year, which is quite less than the median 75.9% of the total that usually gets exhausted in this period, BofA pointed out.

BANGKOK (Reuters) — Thai Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin said on Friday his government will move ahead with its flagship $14.3-billion 'digital wallet' handout scheme, though it may be delayed.

Cholamandalam Investment & Finance Company Ltd. dropped 2.59 per cent to Rs 1258.6 at 02:04PM (IST) in Friday's trade. The counter hit a high of Rs 1295.65 and low of Rs 1258.15 so far during the session.

Hindustan Zinc Ltd on Friday reported a net profit of Rs 2,028 crore for the quarter ended December, which was down about 6% from Rs 2,156 crore in the year-ago quarter. Revenue from operations too declined 7% year-on-year to Rs 7,067 crore in the said third quarter. On a sequential basis, net profit jumped 17% from Rs 1,729 crore reported in the preceding quarter, while revenues were up 8% quarter-on-quarter. The company posted an EBITDA of Rs 3,521 crore in the reporting third quarter and the margins came in at 48.2%. MORE TO COME...

Indian Railway Finance Corporation (IRFC) is now more valuable than 19 Nifty stocks including Bajaj Auto, Mahindra & Mahindra, LTIMindtree and Tata Steel. On Friday, the market capitalisation of the company touched Rs 2.1 lakh crore mark as the stock jumped 10% to hit its fresh 52-week high of Rs 160.80 on the NSE on Friday. The stock has seen an exponential rise in its price from its 52-week low of Rs 25.40 on March 28, 2023. With today's fresh high, the gains translate into a staggering 533% in less than a year.

Tube Investments of India Ltd. traded 1.1 per cent down in Friday's trade at 01:59PM (IST). Around 2,662 shares changed hands on the counter.

Cryptocurrency markets were trading lower in Friday's trade due to heavy outflows in ETFs. Bluechip crypto token BTC fell 3.2% to $41,381 in early trading on Friday, while Ethereum fell 2.5% to $2,467. «The crypto market is witnessing an unexpected downward trend as Bitcoin faces selling pressure due to heavy outflows from Exchange Traded Products (ETPs) to new spot ETF issuers,» said Shivam Thakral, CEO of BuyUcoin. «For example, Blackrock’s Bitcoin ETF accumulated $1 billion worth of BTC in just one week, which means there is a heavy outflow of Bitcoin to such regulated ETFs. We can expect the Bitcoin price to rise once this transition cools down and investors are done with profit booking,» he said. Other major altcoins, such as Solana and Avalanche, fell over 6% each. Also, Cardano, XRP, Dogecoin, Polkadot, Chainlink, Toncoin, Polygon, Internet Computer and Shiba Inu declined.

Rahul Jain, President and Head of Nuvama Wealth believes that reviving the rural economy, which has slowed down due to deficient monsoon, will be the government's focus in the Interim Budget 2024. He also expects more sectors to fall in the ambit of PLI. In an interview with Mint, Jain also shared his views on markets and the sectors he is positive about.

Interim Budget or Vote-on-account. Industry experts believe the Narendra Modi Government should make favorable policies to promote stock market education and reduce taxes on capital gains to increase stock market participation and encourage economic growth. “In the past decade, the number of stock market participants has increased by nearly 100%.

Bharat Forge Ltd. traded 1.28 per cent up at Rs 1239.0 on Friday at around 01:08PM (IST), while the benchmark BSE Sensex advanced 520.11 points to 71706.97. As many as 10,155 shares changed hands on the counter with a total value of Rs 1.25 crore.

Indian Railway Finance Corporation (IRFC) achieved a significant milestone today as its market capitalisation surpassed ₹2 lakh crore for the first time, making it the ninth Indian PSU firm to achieve this feat. The stock in today's trade hit a new all-time high of ₹158.50 apiece. Over the past 10 months (including January), the stock has exhibited a remarkable upward trajectory, witnessing an extraordinary gain of 495%.

Stock market today: Infosys shares have been in uptrend after the announcement of Q3 results 2024 on 11th January 2024. Extending its bull trend for yet another session during Friday morning deals, Infosys share price today opened upside and went on to touch an intraday high of ₹1,665.50 per share on the NSE, which turned out its new 52-week high.

Shree Cements Ltd. traded 0.52 per cent up at Rs 26576.35 on Friday at around 12:02PM (IST), while the benchmark BSE Sensex advanced 495.25 points to 71682.11. As many as 383 shares changed hands on the counter with a total value of Rs 1.02 crore.

Trent Ltd. traded at Rs 3170.35 on BSE at 12:07PM (IST) on Friday, up 0.67 per cent from previous close. The stock quoted a 52-week low price of Rs 1155.1 and a high of Rs 3248.35.

Voltas Ltd. traded at Rs 1045.55 on BSE at 11:52AM (IST) on Friday, up 0.87 per cent from previous close. The scrip quoted a 52-week low price of Rs 737.6 and a high of Rs 1067.95.

Kotak Mahindra Bank is expected to report a double-digit growth in net profit for the quarter ended December, led by strong interest income, healthy loan growth, lower credit costs, and stable asset quality. The private sector lender’s net profit for the quarter is seen rising 15.3% year-on-year (YoY) to Rs 3,219 crore, and net interest income is likely to grow by nearly 14% YoY to Rs 6,416 crore, the average of estimates given by 12 brokerage firms showed. Sequentially, the growth is likely to have slowed down sharply, with net profit seen rising 0.9% and net interest income about 2%. The lender is scheduled to release its quarterly earnings on Saturday. Here’s summarising analysts’ expectations on the third quarter earnings scorecard front: Nuvama Institutional Equities Given the low base of unsecured loans for Kotak and lower than peers’ CD ratio, we estimate the bank to continue with its strong growth in Q3 FY24. We expect 6% QoQ/19% YoY growth in loans and 4% QoQ/21% YoY growth in deposits. However, Kotak’s deposit franchise is weaker than the top three private banks. As such, the risk of slower-than-expected deposit growth, in turn, leading to slower loan growth is high for this quarter given soft business updates from other banks. Management had pointed to a negative one-off of 14-15 bps in NIM in Q2FY24. We anticipate NII growth of 2% QoQ.

Marico Ltd. traded 0.65 per cent up at Rs 527.7 at 11:57AM (IST) on Friday, even as BSE benchmark Sensex gained 500.34 points to 71687.2.

Metro Brands fell 5% to Rs 1,140 in Friday's trade on BSE after the footwear retail chain reported a 12.6% decline in consolidated net profit to Rs 98.8 crore for the third quarter ended December 2023. The company had posted a net profit of Rs 113 crore during the October-December period a year ago, according to a regulatory filing from Metro Brands. However, its revenue from operations increased 6.14% to Rs 635.5 crore during the quarter under review against Rs 598.7 crore in the year-ago period. In a separate filing, MBL said its board in a meeting held on Thursday declared an interim dividend at Rs 2.75 per equity share on the face value of the paid-up equity shares of Rs 5 each for the FY 2023-24. Also read: Epack Durables IPO opens. Should you subscribe to this issue? At 10.45 am, the scrip was trading 3.3% lower at Rs 1,162.4 on BSE.

UIDAI issued a notification to amend the Aadhaar (Enrolment and Update) Rules. The UIDAI has released new forms for the resident individuals and non-resident individuals (NRIs) for Aadhaar enrolment or updation purposes. Here is everything you need to know According to the new rules, an Aadhaar card holder can now update information via online or offline mode.

BSE also jumped about a per cent. Around 10:15 am, the Nifty 50 was 0.83 per cent up at 21,639.40 while the Sensex was also 0.84 per cent up at 71,785.22. Here are five key reasons that appear to have given a boost to the market: Positive global cues gave a boost to the domestic market sentiment.

earnings heavy day with 46 listed companies to declare their December quarter earnings. Street will be keenly looking at the results of Reliance Industries (RIL), Hindustan Unilever (HUL), UltraTech Cement and Paytm operator One 97 Communications. The other important results will be from the likes of Atul, Central Bank, Hindustan Zinc, RBL Bank, Sunteck Realty and Supreme Industries. On Thursday, IndusInd Bank and Polycab India announced their October-December quarter results along with 40 other companies. While the private lender reported standalone net profit growth of 17% year-on-year at Rs 2,298 crore which was up from Rs 1,959 crore in Q3FY23, Polycab posted a double-digit growth in both profit and revenue for the said quarter. The consolidated net profit rose 15.4% year-on-year (YoY) to Rs 413 crore.