SEBI fines Axis bank for violation of debt issuance norms

Top of the Morning

In this episode, find out why oil marketing companies have raised petrol prices for the third time in a row, also find out about Reliance Industries’ bid for Sintex Industries

Business Term of the Day: Gross Merchandise Value

Axis Bank: SEBI levied a penalty of Rs 5 lakh on the bank for violation of debt issuance norms. The matter related to issue of debt securities between 2016 and 2019, where the bank acted as a merchant banker.

Canada Pension Plan and Investment Board has sold 4 crore shares of Kotak Mahindra Bank worth around ₹6,800 crore. As per bulk deal data on BSE, the pension fund sold the shares at an average of ₹1,700.10 apiece. Separately, Regents of the University of California bought 1,12,27,404 equity shares in the private sector lender at an average of ₹1,699.05 per share

Oil marketing companies (OMCs): Raised petrol and diesel prices by 80 paise a litre each on Friday, the third increase in four days. Meanwhile, India’s top fuel retailers IOC, BPCL and HPCL together lost around $2.25 billion in revenue between November and March by keeping petrol and diesel prices unchanged despite a sharp rise in global crude oil prices.

The joint bid of Reliance Industries and Assets Care & Reconstruction Enterprise (ACRE) for debt-ridden Sintex Industries has been moved before the NCLT for approval after it was unanimously cleared by the lenders of the company.

Bharti Airtel will not buy 5G network equipment from Chinese vendors and will instead use equipment from European vendors such as Nokia and Ericsson, as well as openRAN-based 5G network provider Mavenir, among others. Airtel may also look at taking 100 MHz of 5G spectrum if it is affordable, but will be open for a lower quantum of airwaves if prices are high.

Moving on to markets

The key benchmark indices are likely to start Friday’s trade with nominal gains as per trends indicated by the SGX Nifty futures, which were quoting 17,290 levels at 8 am, hinting at a opening gain of 50-odd points on the Nifty index.

 Asian stocks were largely steady on Friday, tracking the strong overnight finish in US indices. Oil retreated as European Union leaders refrained from fresh steps to cut imports of Russian crude

Markets will closely monitor EU summit’s last day meetings for any cues on likely bans on Russia’s energy imports.

Business Term of the day

 Gross Merchandise Value (GMV) is a metric that measures your total value of sales over a certain period of time. It’s a metric that is most commonly used in the eCommerce industry and is also sometimes referred to as Gross Merchandise Volume. GMV can be used to determine the overall health of an eCommerce business, and a good indicator of growth. This is because it measures the volume and value of merchandise sold or the number of transactions handled.