Daily News Roundup - Dec 4 2009

The government may allow ONGC to auction small and marginal fields that are not economical to develop, so that the discoveries in these fields could be brought into production. (BS)

TCS has bagged a £150mn software implementation contract from Cardiff City Council, its first win from the local government space in UK. (BL)

L&T bagged Rs68.9bn contract from MAHAGENCO for supply of three 660Mw supercritical boiler turbine generator units. (BS)

SBI, the country’s largest lender will not extend its 8% home loan scheme beyond November 8. (BS)

After SAIL reduced flat steel prices, private steel makers like Ispat and Essar Steel have reduced prices by Rs1,000/ton and Rs700-1,000/ton respectively. (BS)

Tata Motors and Ashok Leyland have been asked to accelerate the supply of 2,500 buses, an order placed by Delhi Transport Corporation at the start of this year. (BS)

Land Rover, taken over by Tata Motors last year, launched its sport utility vehicle ‘Range Rover Model Year 2010’ in India at a starting price of Rs0.98mn ex-showroom, Mumbai. (BS)

Mahindra Satyam announced its plans to collaborate with defence and security company Saab to develop its operations in India for the global defence and homeland security market. (BS)

The state government said Reliance Power promoted Sasan UMPP is on schedule and is in the final stage of land acquisition, while civil and main plant work are likely to be started soon. (BS)

Mahindra & Mahindra's farm equipment sector posted 21% increase in tractor sales in October to 18,772 units against 15,465 units last year. (BL)

Bajaj Hindusthan’s attempt to acquire its closest rival, Balrampur Chini Mills, for around Rs24bn has fallen through over differences on the payment schedule. (ET)

Adani Power plans to expand capacity at the under-construction thermal power project in Tiroda, Maharashtra, to 3,300 MW from the initial plan of 1,980MW. (BL)

Reliance Communications and Loop Mobile said that they would also bill their mobile telephony subscribers on a per second basis. (BL)

Shoppers Stop has tied up with German denim jeans wear and lifestyle company Mustang for retail marketing in India. (ET)

Hero Honda revised upwards its sales target for FY10 and said it will exceed the 0.4mn units mark announced earlier. (ET)

ABG Shipyard, which is engaged in a takeover battle to acquire Great Offshore, has alleged that the board of the target company is tilted in favour of the rival bidder, Bharati Shipyard. (ET)

Essar Oil said it has time till the month-end to conclude talks for acquisition of Royal Dutch Shell’s three refineries in Europe. (ET)

The Delhi High Court has issued a stay order on the use of the Star Bazaar name by Tata’s retail company Trent for opening of stores in Delhi. (BS)

Consumer durables major Videocon Industries board approved raising Rs12.5bn via issue of shares on rights and preferential basis. (BS)

Total investment in setting up Apollo Tyres upcoming manufacturing plant near Chennai will stand at Rs20bn from the earlier investment of Rs5bn. (FE)

Religare plans to launch a US$500mn pan-Asian fund targeted at emerging economies. (BS)

Inorder to revamp its business, Mukand plans to improve its product mix by increasing the production of its high-value products and become a ‘one-stop-shop for speciality steel products’, majorily for auto and engineering industries. (BS)

Vishal Retail has signed an agreement with lenders for restructuring the terms of its Rs7.3bn debt, the process of which would start within a few days. (BS)

Tata Chemicals, the second largest producer of soda ash in the world, extended its salt brand portfolio with the launch of ‘i-Shakti Cooking Soda’, in Gujarat. (BS)

Lok Housing will seek shareholder approval to raise funds to the tune of Rs23bn from the international market and by way of private placement of shares. (ET)

IPCA Laboratories buyback programme will close on November 10. (FE)

Delhi High Court has granted an interim stay order against the NTC for calling any new bids for the 11-acre Finlay Mills land in Mumbai, for which real estate developer Lodha Group had earlier emerged as the highest bidder quoting Rs7.1bn. (BL)

Consumer electronics chain Tata Croma has drawn up capex of Rs1.5bn over the next two years to expand its footprint in the metros and launch new product lines via its dedicated computing and electronics chain Croma Zip. (BS)

Air Works, the only established company in the country for maintenance, repair and overhaul of aircraft, has received European Aviation Safety Agency certification for its engineering activities. (BS)

The finance minister signaled that the government’s economic reform strategy would focus on fiscal consolidation, debt management and mobilizing additional resources through disinvestment proceeds, curbing subsidies and promoting private sector investments. (BS)

The cost gap between low cost airlines and full service carriers is being narrowed as the latter has taken strategic initiatives to cut costs. (BS)

The average mall vacancy in the southern cities of Chennai, Hyderabad and Bangalore dropped to 5.7% in the July-September quarter of 2009 from 7% in the second quarter. (BS)

Orissa Electricity Regulatory Commission has fixed the tariff for the newly created category of agro-based industries in the state where the energy charge for irrigation pumping and agriculture in the LT category will be Rs1.10/kwh. (BS)

The government plans to reduce mobile termination charges by next year, a move that is expected to bring down call rates further. (BS)

India’s trade gap has narrowed to US$7.7bn in September, against US$15.3bn last year, as imports fell by 31.3%. (BS)

The Government has asked profitable listed PSUs in need of funds to meet their capital expenditure to approach the stock market with follow on public offerings, where the government will consider the sale of a part of its shareholding. (BS)

The government has identified some public sector companies for disinvestment, but its primary focus would be to dilute equity in listed profitable companies with less than 10% public shareholding, with follow-on public offerings. (BS)

As the XIth Plan reaches halfway, the government is likely to face financial shortfalls in the next two years, resulting in a marginal decline in the originally envisaged cumulative gross budgetary support of Rs 1.6trn. (BS)

India’s apparel exporters may be hit by the bankruptcy filing of New York based CIT Group, one of the leaders of short term financing to many small and mid-sized vendors in India. (BS)

RBI bought 200tons of gold from the International Monetary Fund for ~US$6.7bn. (BS)

Banks gross NPAs during the quarter ended September 2009 increased by Rs39.8bn over the sequential quarter. (BS)

Loan syndication by banks for Indian firms in the domestic and overseas market reached US$38.5bn through 108 deals in 2009 so far, 17% growth over last year. (BS)

After a lull in the last three months, cement sales seem to have picked up in October as real estate demand revived post-monsoon. (BL)

The Agriculture Ministry expects the kharif foodgrains output for 2009-10 at 96.63mn tons, lower than 117.7mn tons last year, due to the worst recorded monsoon since 1972. (BL)

FM said the new GST regime would be rolled only once all states are on board. (FE)

RBI has come up with draft guidelines for the issuance of NCD of maturity less than one year. (FE)