The Supreme Court in its verdict, announced today, on the contempt of court plea against Reliance Communications (RCom) has held its Chairman Anil Ambani guilty for not honouring the undertaking. The Swedish telecom equipment manufacturer Ericsson has filed the contempt plea against RCom due to the non-repayment of dues worth Rs. 550 crores. The apex court has granted four weeks to Reliance Communications Ltd in order to comply with the order and clear the Rs 450 crores dues to Ericsson, failing to which can attract risks of jail term for the chairman of the Reliance Group. Rcom has already deposited Rs. 118 crores with the Supreme Court, which will be handed over to Ericsson. In addition, the two-judge bench headed by Justice R F Nariman and Justice Vineet Saran said that the undertakings given by the three R

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has announced, on Monday, to infuse Rs. 12,500 crores into the system in order to increase liquidity through the purchase of government securities, scheduled to take place on Thursday. According to RBI, the purchase will be made through open market operations (OMOs). The central bank in a statement released said, "Based on an assessment of prevailing liquidity conditions and also of the durable liquidity needs going forward, the RBI has decided to conduct purchase of...government securities under OMOs for an aggregate amount of ?125 billion on February 21, 2019" RBI said that the eligible participants should submit their offers in electronic format on the RBI core banking solution (E-Kuber) system on February 21, adding that the result of the auction will be announced on the sam

The Reserve Bank of India, after its central board meeting on Monday, has announced to transfer an interim dividend of Rs 28,000 crore to the Government of India. The dividend payout is likely to benefit the government to meet its revised fiscal deficit target of 3.4 per cent of GDP for 2018-19. RBI in a press release said that the decision for the dividend payout was taken based on a limited audit review and after applying the extant economic capital framework. According to RBI, it is the second consecutive year where the central bank has transferred an interim dividend. The Reserve Bank of India, in FY 2017-18, had transferred a total of Rs 50,000 crores to the government. Out of the sum transferred, Rs 10,000 crores had been transferred in the form of an interim dividend. RBI, whose financial year runs from

SBI Mutual Fund combined with two other companies infused Rs 1,322 crores in FMCG major Emami Ltd through the purchase of share by the open market transactions, on Monday. According to the information available at BSE, a total of around 3.72 crore shares of Emami Ltd was purchased by SBI Mutual Fund, PI Opportunities Fund I-LT and Pioneer Investment Fund. In terms of individual entities, PI Opportunities brought shares worth Rs. 199.97 crores, Pioneer Investment purchased shares for Rs. 399.98 crores whereas SBI Mutual Fund purchased shares for a sum of Rs. 722.78 crores. The average price for the scrip stood at Rs. 355 per share. In a separate transaction, however, seven entities including Emami Ltd promoter Amitabh Goenka sold around 2.3 crore shares for a sum of Rs. 844 crores in Monday bulk deal. Goenka pe

The Anil Ambani Group, through its subsidiary Reliance Power Ltd, moved to a division bench of Bombay high court to restrict the Edelweiss Group from selling its pledged shares on Monday, after the petition filed by the group on the matter to a single-judge bench last week was dismissed. The Reliance Group companies suffered a major crash in their share prices when a sum of four financial institutions (NBFCs) sold a number of pledged shares of the group companies during the first week of February. According to the Reliance Group, the uninitiated sale of shares cost the group Rs. 13,000 crores in market capitalization. The Group also called the move by the financial institutions “illegal”. Darius Khambata, the senior advocate representing Reliance Project Ventures and Management Pvt. Ltd and Reliance Wind T

The reopening of Vedanta Ltd’ copper smelter in Tamil Nadu has been refused by the Supreme Court. The two-judge bench, which was headed by Rohinton Nariman, set the National Green Tribunal’s (NGT) order aside which allowed Sterlite Copper to reopen its smelter unit in Thoothukudi. The Supreme Court informed Vedanta Ltd that the mining company can approach the Madras High Court again in order to reopen the plant, adding that the company can seek expeditious hearing of the case. On December 15, 2018, the National Green Tribunal asked Tamil Nadu government to order the consent to operate for the reopening of the plant. The tribunal also asked the state government, its order, to restore the electricity supply to the plant subject to it fulfilling certain conditions. The tribunal, however, also ordered Vedan

Due to the net increase in export, India’s trade deficit has contracted in the month of January year on year basis. According to the data released by the Ministry of Commerce, the trade deficit (gap between exports and imports) stood at $14.73 billion compared with $15.67 billion a year ago. The trade deficit, however, has widened up as compared to the previous month. Trade deficit had earlier in December 2018 narrowed down to the lowest in 10 months at $13.08 billion. The imports in January 2019 increased to $41.09 billion from $41.01 billion in December 2018 and $41.08 billion a year ago. India export soared from $25.41 billion in January 2018 to $26.36 billion in the month under review. However, the exports narrowed from $27.93-billion in December. India’s crude oil import declined 3.59 per cent to $11.

In a recent turn of events, Yes Bank has announced that the Reserve Bank of India has asserted that the press release by Yes Bank, which was made public yesterday, breaches confidentiality and violates regulatory guidelines. Yes Bank yesterday announced that the that the Reserve Bank of India had not found any divergence in its non-performing asset recognition for 2017-18. RBI in a letter to Yes Bank said, “The RAR report was marked confidential, it was expected that no part of the report and information contained therein be divulged.” Yes Bank in the press release on RBI communication also stated, “The RAR (risk assessment report) also identifies several other lapses and regulatory breaches in various areas of the Bank’s functioning and the disclosure of just one part of the RAR is viewed by RBI as a