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Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Mumbai: Axis Bank is selectively chasing corporate loan growth in sectors with strong tailwinds, such as data centres, commercial real estate and renewables, while staying “watchful” in the weaker segments, said Vijay Mulbagal, group executive and head of wholesale bank coverage, corporate salary, sustainability and CSR.The private sector lender has also sidestepped the “bidding game” in some aggressively priced loans to state-run firms, as banks grapple with pressure on margins and companies remain cautious on large capital expenditure despite healthy profitability.India’s third-largest private lender reported a 38% growth in corporate loans during the March quarter of FY26, significantly outpacing its rivals. The growth of corporate lending—outstanding loans at ₹4.12 trillion as on 31 March—was also higher than the bank’s retail or small business segments.Mulbagal, who joined from HDFC Bank in 2024, took over the corporate vertical a year ago, told Mint in an interview that the bank has not been reckless and its underwriting standards have been strong, with corporate borrowers rated A- and above at 91% of the book.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.State-run NTPC Ltd is considering investing about ₹56,000 crore to set up 2.8 gigawatt (GW) of nuclear power generation capacity in Bihar through its subsidiary NTPC Parmanu Urja Nigam Ltd, two people aware of the development said.The proposal involves initially setting up two units of 700 megawatts (MW) each, which may later be scaled up with two additional 700 MW units, taking total capacity to 2.8 GW, they said.The required capital expenditure for 1 MW of nuclear power generation capacity is about ₹20 crore. NTPC is conducting a feasibility study for the proposed site in Banka district of Bihar."The standard capacity of NTPC's nuclear power plants would be 2x700 MW.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories."Our first kartavya (duty) is to accelerate and sustain economic growth by enhancing productivity and competitiveness.” This statement by India’s finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman in this year’s budget speech set a clear imperative: that productivity and competitiveness are not incidental to India’s growth story, but necessary conditions for its long-term economic development. Its significance has grown clearer since.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.The Centre has approved a ₹5,659 crore Cotton Productivity Mission (Kapas Kanti) over five years to revive India’s cotton economy at a time when output has stagnated, imports are rising and textile exporters face intensifying global competition.The mission marks one of the most ambitious interventions in India’s cotton-textile value chain in recent years, linking farm productivity to manufacturing competitiveness and export growth.Mint explains how the scheme seeks to lift yields, improve fibre quality and strengthen India’s textile export competitiveness.The programme seeks to address multiple structural weaknesses at once—low farm productivity, inconsistent fibre quality, volatile raw material supply and rising import dependence.Unlike earlier schemes focused largely on cultivation, this mission adopts a value-chain approach, connecting farm-level reforms with textile manufacturing, exports and global sourcing competitiveness.Improving the availability of domestic raw cotton is critical. Textile manufacturers have increasingly struggled with supply shortages and quality inconsistencies.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Kota-based test preparation company Resonance Eduventures is preparing for a fresh growth phase after completing the bulk of its long-running debt resolution exercise, the top executive of the firm told Mint.Founder Ram Kishan Verma said the company is now betting on a recovery in offline coaching demand, student enrolments and brand rebuilding.“The company is now in a much better position operationally. Most of the work on the settlement side has been completed and we are closing the remaining part as well,” Verma told Mint, in an interview.Mint was the first to report in April that KKR-backed Resonance was nearing an asset reconstruction company (ARC)-led debt resolution that could see lenders take nearly an 80% haircut on principal claims after years of financial stress.India's test preparation market size was valued at $11.60 billion in 2025, growing at a CAGR of 8.7% during the forecast period 2026-2030, according to a report by research firm Technavio.Resonance, which was a sector leader before pandemic, was disrupted by digital hyper funded peers and faced high poaching pushing it into a debt trap.According to Abhijit Shrivastava, co-founder and managing partner at Azalea Capital Partners LLP, over 90% of lenders have already sold their exposure as part of the restructuring exercise.“The ARC involved is ACRE.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.The other day, I came across an exchange on X where an American trader posted a confident thesis: AI would compress revenues of Indian IT companies like TCS and Infosys. Reasonable concern. Many analysts have raised it.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.This 100-minute film opens with the MGM lion bleating instead of roaring, setting the tone for a cutesy yarn, or a “herder mystery”, a clever pun used in the promotions. Three Bags Full: A Sheep Detective Story, a 2005 novel by Leonie Swann, is the foundation for the mystery comedy The Sheep Detectives, adapted by Craig Mazin and directed by Kyle Balda.The shepherd in question is George (Hugh Jackman), who dotes on his flock to the extent that he has named each one of them.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.The AI hack we unlocked today is based on a capability- Gemini's File Generation.Here is a pain point most professionals quietly endure: you have a great session with AI, you've structured a report, drafted a proposal, built a budget breakdown and then spend 30 minutes doing the one thing AI was supposed to eliminate: copy, paste, reformat, fix spacing, redo headers. The AI gave you the content.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.From India and Vietnam upgrading their bilateral ties and setting a $25 billion trade target by 2030, to four states declaring assembly election verdicts amid a mixed economic backdrop, direct tax collections falling short of revised estimates in FY26, manufacturing and services activity rebounding in April, and India’s domestic LPG consumption taking a hit due to West Asia war—here is a compilation of this week’s news in numbers.India and Vietnam have set a target of raising bilateral trade to $25 billion by 2030, following talks between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Vietnam President To Lam in New Delhi this week. The two countries also upgraded ties to an “Enhanced Comprehensive Strategic Partnership”, signalling deeper cooperation in trade, defence and technology.Trade has steadily expanded over the past decade, crossing $18 billion in FY26.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Accor, the French hospitality giant, is betting big on the quiet shift in India's luxury hotel industry, where domestic travellers, not foreign tourists, are the primary engine of the high-end hospitality market.India’s luxury hotel boom still has room to run, according to the chairman of Accor India and group CEO, Ennismore, Gaurav Bhushan, who said the country is only ‘just getting started’ as affluent domestic travellers increasingly spend on high-end experiences and boutique hospitality.“The Indian luxury consumer is spending more on experiences than ever before,” Bhushan, recently appointed chairman for Accor in India, told Mint. “As long as you offer a real product and a real experience, people will spend.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.India’s health ministry has initiated comprehensive precautionary surveillance measures in response to reported cases of hantavirus infection occurring onboard the cruise ship MV Hondius, according to the two officials familiar with the matter.The ministry is monitoring the situation in close coordination with the National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), the Integrated Disease Surveillance Programme (IDSP), and the World Health Organization (WHO).The officials cited above confirmed that two Indian nationals are currently onboard the MV Hondius. “Both individuals are presently asymptomatic and are under observation in accordance with established international health protocols,” one of the officials said.“The Union health ministry remains vigilant and is maintaining close coordination with WHO and other international partners,” the official said, adding that necessary public health measures are also being undertaken proactively to safeguard the health and wellbeing of Indian citizens.As per preliminary data shared via the WHO under the International Health Regulations (IHR) framework, health officials have identified a total of eight probable cases of hantavirus infection among those on the vessel.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.OnEMI Technology Ltd, the operator of digital lending platform Kissht, listed on the National Stock Exchange (NSE) on Friday at ₹190 per share, an 11.1% premium to its issue price of ₹171. The debut offers one of the clearest public-market tests yet of whether an app-first lender can be valued beyond just another unsecured credit player.That question matters because while the market has large listed financial firms such as Bajaj Finance, Bajaj Finserv, and Aye Finance, it has few listed pure-play digital lenders of Kissht’s kind.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.BENGALURU: India’s quick commerce sector may be entering a new phase where blistering growth begins to cool even as the overall momentum remains intact.Eternal Ltd’s Q4 shareholder letter showed Blinkit’s net order value (NOV) grew 8% to ₹14,386 crore sequentially, compared to 13% growth QoQ in the previous quarter. On the other hand, Instamart’s gross order value (GOV) fell to ₹7,881 crore from ₹7,938 crore in the previous quarter.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.India’s cable and internet gear makers are experiencing the effects of the US-Iran war, with companies citing higher raw material costs, export disruptions, and growing uncertainty across global markets.The geopolitical tensions have pushed up prices of key inputs such as polyvinyl chloride (PVC), copper, aluminium, preform, helium and polymers, while also affecting exports to West Asia, according to companies such as Havells India Ltd, Polycab India Ltd, R R Kabel Ltd, Sterlite Technologies Ltd (STL) and HFCL Ltd.“While US tariff headwinds have meaningfully moderated from peak levels, adding margins, we are seeing new near-term cost pressures from geopolitical disruption driven by the war in West Asia, particularly impacting helium and polymer inputs,” said Ajay Jhanjhari, chief financial officer at STL, during an analyst call on 29 April.Helium is mainly used in making optical fibre for telecom networks, so it matters more to companies such as STL and HFCL. Polymers are used in almost all wires and cables to cover and protect them, affecting the entire industry.To be sure, some telecom gear makers, impacted by the US reciprocal tariffs, saw an improvement in margins during the March quarter owing to the tariff being reduced from 50% to 15%.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.This year’s Met Gala, the fancy-dress competition for the ultra-wealthy, was a memorable one. Not just because one of the world’s richest tech bros, Jeff Bezos, and his wife, Lauren Sánchez Bezos, served as honorary chairs—a first—but also because the evening of 4 May saw the largest Indian contingent yet ascend the steps of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, with each attendee reportedly paying $100,000 to attend fashion’s most exclusive fund-raiser.Ananya Birla, Isha Ambani, Karan Johar, Manish Malhotra, Sudha Reddy, Natasha Poonawalla, Sawai Padmanabh Singh and Gauravi Kumari were in attendance, presenting their interpretation of the 2026 Met Gala dress code, “Fashion is Art”, which challenged guests to treat the body as a canvas, express their relationship with fashion “as an embodied art form and celebrate the countless depictions of the dressed body throughout art history”.Did the Indian contingent get the memo right? That depends on whether you believe fashion as art is best expressed through spectacle, symbolism or genuine risk-taking.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Shree Cement Ltd clocked volume growth of around 9% in the March quarter (Q4FY26) at 10.8 million tonnes (mt), a tad ahead of the industry average growth of 8%. It closed FY26 with volume growth of 2% at 36.4 mt and eyes 40 mt volumes in FY27.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Indian IT’s mid-tier firms are narrowing the gap with the industry’s six largest players in terms of incremental revenue, even as growth slows across the board amid AI disruption and demand uncertainty.Coforge, Mphasis and five similar companies saw growth moderate, but the rate of decline in new business in FY26 was slower than that of the country’s six largest software exporters, which include the likes of Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) and Infosys.Together, these seven mid-tier companies, each with annual revenue between $1 billion and $2 billion, added $1.1 billion in new business in FY26, down from $1.25 billion in FY25. In comparison, the six largest firms, with annual revenue in a range of $5-30 billion, added $1.9 billion, down from $2.28 billion in FY25, according to a Mint analysis of company filings.This suggests that mid-tier tech firms are closing the gap with larger peers in incremental business.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Quant Mutual Fund believes this year is about identifying undervalued and under-researched segments of the market while avoiding overcrowded trades.In the Mint Money Guru series, Quant Mutual Fund founder and chief investment officer Sandeep Tandon explains why he believes this is the biggest buying opportunity since the covid pandemic.It's largely a behaviour call coming from some analytics that we have built. The element of fear is very high. People are worried about crude prices, the rupee and the exit of foreign institutional investors (FIIs).

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.The Alliance Fairfax, a towering black and white car-carrier ship that had been stranded in the Persian Gulf for over two months, was finally making a break for it.“You are all set to go,” a U.S. military officer radioed as the ship glided through the Strait of Hormuz on Monday and swung around the peninsula at the northern end of Oman. “Safe travels.”Soon after, Iran launched a barrage of missiles and drones at commercial ships, at the U.S.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.It seems like the script of a horror film. Three confirmed cases of hantavirus and five suspected ones among 150 people aboard a cruise ship that left Argentina last month have sent global health authorities into a tizzy. Three of the eight are dead, as reported, and efforts are on to identify possible carriers among other passengers and those with whom the infected may have come in contact before showing symptoms.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.The market is betting on peace in the war with Iran while riding the relentless surge in tech stocks.Asia markets rumbled again on Thursday as Japan returned from its extended spring holidays and the Nikkei 225 roared nearly 6% higher on the opening day of trading.That takes the regional benchmark close to a 25% gain for the year, well outpacing the 11.4% advance recorded for the tech-focused Nasdaq and the 8% rise for the S&P 500.Not much has changed on the ground, or in the Strait of Hormuz, this week apart from sentiment, which seems tied to reports of a near-term deal between the U.S. and Iran that will end two months of hostilities and reopen the world’s busiest oil and energy conduit.Crude prices have slumped more than 12% over the past two sessions, with Brent futures falling below the $100 a barrel mark, on hopes of a near-term agreement that will lead to longer, more detailed peace talks between Washington and Tehran.But with stocks now more than 16% higher than their late March trough, and the first-quarter earnings season largely finished, the mood on Wall Street is expected to switch quickly.Jobs data on Friday could put the final nail in bets on a Federal Reserve rate cut this year, while crude prices and Treasury bond yields remain elevated enough from their prewar starts to suggest inflation will continue to echo through the world’s largest economy well into the fall.The war may be nearing its end, but the cleanup in certain markets will continue.