UPS Financial News

Coal India Ltd’s shares hit a new 52-week high of ₹467.90 on the NSE on Thursday, gaining over 4% when the Nifty 50 index declined 0.5%, possibly on expectations of higher prices at its e-auctions as global coal prices rise due to the West Asia conflict.The flare-up in oil and gas prices is spilling over to the international coal market, too. Higher global coal prices would hurt domestic import volumes and push CIL’s e-auction premiums and offtake higher.The state-owned company sells some of its output through e-auctions at market-determined prices, in addition to fuel supply agreements (FSA) with power producers.

₹1,549 a month on Furlenco. The platform also offers an option to buy it for ₹32,500, which is roughly equivalent to 21 months of rent.

₹100.A PMS requires a minimum of ₹50 lakh.An AIF demands ₹1 crore.An SIF sits between these options, with a minimum investment of ₹10 lakh per asset management company (AMC) at the PAN level.The intended audience is therefore clear: experienced retail investors and emerging high-net-worth individuals (HNIs) who understand risk and can absorb volatility without panic.Structurally, SIFs operate within the mutual fund regulatory framework. They maintain transparency and reporting standards similar to mutual funds, and liquidity can be daily or periodic depending on the scheme.If equity exposure exceeds 65%, taxation applicable is similar to an equity mutual fund.However, within this framework SIFs enjoy far greater strategic flexibility—including up to 25% unhedged short exposure via derivatives.SIFs are permitted to run strategies that would be impractical or impossible within a traditional mutual fund framework.Managers can take long positions in stocks expected to rise while simultaneously shorting stocks expected to fall through derivatives.

A sudden surge in demand for induction cooktops, triggered by India’s curbs on LPG supplies, has prompted kitchen appliance makers to ramp up production, testing supply chains for imported components.Demand for induction cooktops spiked after the government imposed restrictions on booking LPG cylinders and increased their prices, pushing restaurants and households in urban areas to look for electric cooking alternatives.At Stovekraft Ltd, the parent company of kitchen appliance brands Pigeon and Gilma, average sales of induction cooktops increased about four times over the past few days, with weekly demand about five-fold higher than in the same period last year, managing director Rajendra Gandhi told Mint.“Induction cooktops are currently seeing the strongest demand, followed by cookware,” Gandhi said. Demand is largely from retail consumers through online channels, with some traction from restaurants and cloud kitchens, he said.Wonderchef Home Appliances Pvt Ltd founder and CEO Ravi Saxena said the company’s monthly inventory of induction cooktops sold out within hours after demand suddenly spiked.“Whatever we sell in a month has already been consumed in less than half a day,” Saxena said.

Aster DM Healthcare India Ltd has secured approval from its shareholders and unsecured trade creditors for its amalgamation with Blackstone-backed Quality Care India Ltd more than a year after the deal was announced.The voting was held on 10 March, and the results were declared on 11 March. The deal was announced in November 2024.The merger was approved by 96.68% of shareholders and all unsecured creditors, stock exchange notifications from Wednesday showed.Aster's deputy managing director Alisha Moopen told Mint that the merger is expected to be completed in the first quarter of fiscal 2027.Aster and Quality will merge via a share-swap ratio of 977 shares of Aster for every 1,000 shares of QCIL.Aster shareholders will hold 57.3% and QCIL shareholders 42.7% in the merged entity — Aster DM Quality Care, which will be the new name for current listed entity Aster DM Healthcare.Blackstone will be the largest shareholder in the merged entity with 30.7% shareholding, followed by Aster’s promoters (the Moopens, 24%).

Mumbai: Private credit is stepping in ahead of public listings to help founders and promoters consolidate stakes or shore up capital as investors seek partial or full exits amid equity market uncertainty.Over the past 12-14 months, founders or promoters of companies including Leap India, Symbiotec Pharma, Vivriti Group, Zepto, InMobi, Lenskart and Zetwerk have engaged in such transactions ahead of their initial public offerings (IPOs), multiple people familiar with the matter told Mint. “Credit is increasingly being used as a flexible pool of capital to capture these opportunities and, in some cases, to provide exits to their investors, especially when public/IPO markets are facing headwinds,” said Aakash Desai, chief investment officer (CIO) & head of private credit at 360 ONE Asset, which closed its fifth private credit fund with a $400 million corpus earlier this week.

It is welcome that India is liberalizing inward investment from countries that share a land border with India. Investments up to 10% of a company’s paid-up capital that involve no board-seat control will be allowed under the automatic route. Investment proposals that need government approval would also be fast-tracked for nods within 60 days in specified sectors, including the manufacture of capital goods, capital goods for electronics, electronic components, polysilicon and the conversion of polysilicon into ingots and their slicing into wafers.

Springing a surprise, US President Donald Trump on Wednesday announced a plan for what he called America’s first new refinery in half-a-century, backed by investment from India’s Reliance. To be built by America First Refining, it is part of a deal whose value Trump put at $300 billion, calling it the biggest in US history.“Thank you to our partners in India, and their largest privately held Energy Company, Reliance, for this tremendous Investment,” he said in a Truth Social post.

India's angel networks are increasingly creating their own funds, tapping into the surge of domestic capital to institutionalise early-stage investing in the country's startup ecosystem.To streamline their investment focus, these networks are shifting from deal-by-deal syndication to closed-ended funds, capitalizing on the surge in domestic capital available.“Failure rates for individual angels can be very high, and coming together to structure their investing is a way of addressing that failure rate,” said Ranjeet Shetye, a deeptech angel investor and a mentor at YourNest Venture Capital.Veteran networks like Indian Angel Network (now IAN Group), Hyderabad Angels, and Rajasthan Angels have launched their own funds. These networks have successfully identified enough winners, encouraging investors to supply capital for early-stage bets rather than engaging directly in deal-making.Hyderabad Angels Fund (HAF) launched their maiden fund last year, but it is relatively small at ₹150 crore.

New Delhi: India’s automakers could be heading toward another semiconductor supply squeeze—this time triggered by the artificial intelligence (AI) boom. As chipmakers shift manufacturing capacity toward high-bandwidth memory (HBM) for AI data centres, supplies of conventional memory chips used in vehicles are tightening, driving up prices and raising supply risks for the industry.This could mark the third major supply disruption for the auto industry in recent years, after the rare earth magnet crunch triggered by China’s restrictions last year, and the global semiconductor shortage during the covid pandemic years of 2020-22.At least two industry executives said that if supply pressures persist, automakers may start facing shortages by the end of the next financial year (FY27).“Internal estimates suggest that the supply crunch will get serious towards the last two quarters of the next financial year, which is why there is a rush to prepare now,” one of the executives mentioned above said on the condition of anonymity.The issue was earlier flagged to analysts by Mahindra and Mahindra Ltd (M&M), which makes electric cars, and e-two-wheeler manufacturer Ather Energy Ltd.“Memory chips are something that is a supply chain risk/price sensitive thing because shortage obviously is driving premiums in memory chips,” M&M executive director Rajesh Jejurikar told analysts and investors on an 11 February earnings call.

KKR plans to own multiple independent platforms for renewable energy assets in India, a key market for the global private equity giant, where it is betting on infrastructure and financial services to consumer technology.KKR is vying for larger assets, such as Sprng Energy and Gentari, directly through its Asia fund, rather than via its renewable energy platform, Serentica. "The idea is to have multiple energy platforms in the country," said a person with knowledge of the firm's strategy.“The assets are large, and Serentica does not have the debt gearing or equity to finance those deals.

Mint. “With the population and purchasing power that the country has, companies can't afford to make solutions which are not designed with the Indian price point in mind.”Qualcomm's chief executive Cristiano Amon had announced the AI-focused $150 million fund at the India AI Impact Summit held in Delhi last month.

₹2 crore over five days, excluding revenue from souvenirs and other merchandise. The estimated economic impact generated for hotels, transport services, restaurants, artisans and local businesses is pegged at ₹130 crore, according to KLF officials.It was not an isolated spike.

Dixon will be able to manufacture display modules locally in India. Display modules account for roughly 10-12% of the bill of materials in smartphones.“This foray into display modules deepens Dixon’s presence in the component ecosystem, with the level of backward integration in smartphones expected to rise by about 10-12% from 16-17% now,” said Emkay Global Financial Services.Dixon is expected to produce around 24 million smartphone displays and 2 million laptop displays annually in the first phase.

New Delhi: As India's job market battle intensifies, top tech firms are swapping staid job ads for influencer-marketing campaigns on Instagram, YouTube and LinkedIn. Creators with millions of followers now spotlight job openings and work cultures, turning a single video into a flood of thousands of applications.Companies like Atlassian, 7-Eleven GCC, Octa, EPAM Systems, ServiceNow, Intuit, ZS Associates, and Infosys are leading this charge, betting on niche influencers’ social media reach to lure talent in a hyper-competitive landscape.“For us, it’s about visibility in the right places where top tech talent is consuming content.

Indian banks are losing ground among working-age savers, even as retirees return in growing numbers to park money in fixed deposits and savings accounts.Recent data from the Reserve Bank of India shows the share of deposits held by working Indians aged 25 to less than 60 has steadily declined over the past two years, highlighting how younger savers are no longer reliant on banks to grow their money.The working population held 55.46% of retail deposits in December 2025, down from 57.41% in March 2023, the earliest comparable data. That is a change of 195 basis points (bps).By contrast, the share of depositors aged 60 and above rose sharply to 40.6%, from 38.25% as of March 2023, up 235 bps.

Mint explainsDSR refers to a cultivation method where seeds are sown directly into the field without transplanting seedlings, saving water, labour, and time compared to traditional methods.This eliminates several stages involved in conventional rice farming such as nursery preparation, ploughing, puddling and transplanting. In the traditional system, farmers grow seedlings in nurseries and later transplant them into flooded, puddled fields.Puddling is particularly concerning from an environmental perspective because it releases methane, a potent greenhouse gas.Though not a new technique, DSR is increasingly seen as a transformative approach to rice cultivation as India faces growing concerns over groundwater depletion, labour shortages and climate sustainability.Experts say the technique can play an important role in addressing groundwater depletion, particularly in major rice-growing states where intensive irrigation for paddy has put pressure on water resources.Producing a kilogram of rice requires 3,000–5,000 litres of water under conventional methods.

The war in West Asia that has blocked supplies of crude oil, liquefied natural gas (LNG) and refinery products from the Gulf serves India a reality check on the soundness of relying on imported hydrocarbons for cooking food. It is high time we began to wean our kitchens off liquid petroleum gas (LPG) and piped natural gas (PNG); while LPG is essentially a mixture of propane and butane, PNG is mostly methane, like the compressed natural gas (CNG) that is used by vehicles as a low-carbon substitute for petrol and diesel. We should cook, instead, on electric stoves that run on power generated from domestic coal and renewables.Since we have our own coal, its supply cannot be disrupted by a war abroad.

February data from the Association of Mutual Funds in India signals a rise in equity appetite. Funds investing in them saw an 8% bump-up in inflows from January to ₹25,977 crore, with mid- and small-cap funds in the lead; inflows into the former rose 26% and those in the latter surged 32%. Flexi-cap funds, which are quite popular, saw inflows decline, though not by much.

Business News, Market News, Breaking News Events and Latest News Updates on Live Mint. Download The Mint News App to get Daily Market Updates.

War never brings good news. But the West Asian geopolitical crisis has halted an information technology (IT) sector-led sell-off in domestic office real estate investment trusts (Reits) as investors flock toward defensive, income-generating assets amid volatility.Reits have held up better than the broader market so far this year, falling around 2% on average year-to-date, while the benchmark Nifty 50 is down about 7%.Analysts attribute this resilience to the quasi-debt nature of these trusts.