Market News & Trends November 26

HOT FROM THE PRESS

* BANKS : Dy Governor says its not the right time for consolidation in the
banking industry as we have very few dominant players & consolidation will
further enhance the problem.. while another rpts states Govt has asked the
top 5 PSU Banks to come up with detailed roadmap on banking consolidation by
the end of current fiscal.. separately govt plans to move a bill early next
year to allow foreign investors in pvt banks to hv voting rights in proportion
to their share holding

* BANKING : RBI extends deadline for increasing provision coverage for NPAs to
70% from Sept 2010 to March 2011

* IDBI BK : Chmn says identified 2 lenders as potential targets for acquisition

* SBI : MD says loan offtake poor.. only retail sector witnessing a pick-up

* ONGC : CMD says to discuss "specific opportunities" with National Iranian
Oil Co next week.. to refinance $1bn debt raised for Imperial acquisition

* PANTALOON RETAIL : FII holding in the Co falls below the max 24% limit..
fresh purchases allowed after prior RBI approval or via FII blocks

* WIPRO : seeing a rise in demand in financial services segment and expects to
sustain overall opeating margins in near term

* INFOSYS : focussing on small acquisitions to boost growth.. mgt says does not
expect pxing to improve in near term.. separately to hire 20k in FY11

* HINDUSTAN LEVER : research firm Neilsen's Oct data shows co has arrested fall
in value market share in 3 categories ie soaps, washing poweder & skin cream

* GODREJ CONSUMER/MARICO : media reports cos have bid for a £250mn British
brand "Simple" one of the largest beauty product brands in UK

* IRB INFRA : board approves raising Rs 12bn from mkts

* LANCO INFRA : to acheive financial closure for atleast 3 major coal fired
power projects entailing total investments of over Rs 150bn

* INFOTECH ENTERPRISE : annd wud acquire cos in US or Europe in FY10 for ~$40mn

* EI HOTELS : ITC which owns a 14.98% stk in the co, says exploring several
options, incl increasing its stake to 25%


Corporate News – Industry trends

* The Department of Economic Affairs, the Ministry of Commerce
and Industry and the RBI have come to a consensus that FII in a
company should be monitored on a monthly or a quarterly basis to
ensure there is no breach of sectoral caps under the proposed FDI
guidelines (BS)

* Cigarettes-to-hospitality group ITC is reviewing its approach on
equity in EIH, which runs the Oberoi chain of hotels. ITC has a 14.98%
stake in EIH (BS)

* Pipe manufacturer Welspun Gujarat Stahl Rohren said it had raised
US$250 mn by way of institutional placement of shares and bonds
issue (BS)

* Suzlon Energy, has bagged a 42-Mw repeat order from Infigen
Energy, the largest wind energy player in Australia. Suzlon will supply
20 units of S88 - 2.1 Mw wind turbine generators that will be installed
at one of the wind farms in Infigen’s pipeline of future projects in New
South Wales (BS)

* Sugar maker Balrampur Chini Mills said its net profit surged nearly
threefold to Rs 427mn in the quarter ended September 30. Total
income on a standalone basis declined to Rs 3799mn in the latest
quarter from Rs 4167mn in the same period last fiscal (BS)

* The Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) has asked the
DOT to take a final decision on 2G policies and review conditions for
licence before inviting applications for 3G (BS)

* Oman Oil Company has paid a full 50% premium for a re-entry into
the Rs 113.9bn Bina Refinery project of the state-run Bharat Petroleum
Corporation (BS)

* Tata Communications has signed an agreement with the Qatarbased
Qtel for a new undersea cable network that will connect a
number of regional operators in the Gulf region with the country (BS)

* Infotech Enterprises, a Hyderabad-based engineering and
geographic information services provider, is planning to acquire two
companies in the US by the end of this financial year (BS)

* In the face of alleged multi crore rupee kickback, which is being probed
by CBI, the government is considering cancelling power PSU NTPC’s
Rs 20bn contract with a Russian equipment firm (BS)

* Salesforce.com, the US$1-bn provider of customer relationship
management products, has entered into a multi-year partnership with
Wipro Infotech to market its products in India (ET)

* Former Maruti chief Jagdish Khattar-owned Carnation Auto has raised
Rs 1700 mn loan from Punjab National Bank to fund its expansion
programme (ET)

* The US-based 3Com Corporation has entered into an agreement
with Tata Consultancy Services to build the Andhra Pradesh State Wide
Area Network project that the latter bagged. 3Com would provide
enterprise switching, routing and security solutions for the project
aimed at connecting all the 23 district offices in the State (BL)

* Bajaj Hindustan said its board approved expansion of power
generation capacity of 400 MW to 830 MW (Mint)

Economic/Regulatory development

* The Reserve Bank of India may give banks a breather by extending
the deadline for increasing the provision coverage for non-performing
assets (NPAs) to 70% from September 2010 to March 2011 (BL)

* Domestic crude oil output continued with its declining trend in
October, with production dropping by 2.2% against the same month
last year. Natural gas production remained robust registering a 44.2%
increase YoY (BL)

* Sugar mills in Uttar Pradesh have offered higher prices to growers,
raising hopes that protesting farmers would start selling cane (Mint)

International trends

* General Motors Co doesn’t expect to find new bidders for Saab and
may shut the bankrupt unit after Koenigsegg Group AB cancelled a
planned acquisition, people familiar with the matter said.

* France Telecom SA, Europe’s third largest phone company, agreed to
merge its Swiss unit with that of Denmark’s TDC A/S, paying 1.5 bn
euros for control of the combined entity; France Telecom will own 75%
of the company formed by the merger of its Orange Switzerland unit
with TDC’s Sunrise Communications SA, and has an option to buy the
rest for about 1.2 bn euros, the Paris-based operator said (BS)

Note: More intra-day opportunities will be provided
live during the market hours

Bank nifty closed on a negative note today and it was low by 37.40 points. Few stocks which were among market losers today are : Mahindra & Mahindra, Bajaj finance and Hindustan Unilever.