|
|
|
NEW DELHI, Oct 17: Major health care and medical equipment manufacturing...more
India attracts NEW DELHI, Oct 17: India attracted three billion dollars of Foreign Direct ....more NEW DELHI, Oct 17: Malaysian national car maker Perusahaan Otomobil Nasional Berhad.....more ICRA upgrades short term rating of UTI bank to A1 NEW DELHI, Oct 17: ICRA has upgraded the Rs 500 crore certificate of deposit. ......more |
 |
Shares
suffer setback NEW DELHI, Oct 17: A major sell-off by Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) and domestic speculators pulled benchmark index down by nearly 1.5 per cent on the stock market today after stocks led by technology segment suffered sharp setback to close with widespread losses.......more RWRC advises farmers BHOPAL, Oct 17: In view of the shortage of water in Madhya Pradesh, the Regional Wheat Research Centre, Indore, has advised the farmers to sow .......more
Gold dip, silver NEW DELHI, Oct 17: Silver coins continued an upward march on the bullion market today on persis....more |
 |
|
|
NEW DELHI, Oct 17: Major health care and medical equipment manufacturing companies based in Thuringia country in Germany will be displaying their products at the three day exhibition ‘Mimel 2000’ to be held along with academic conference of India Medical Association (ACADIMA) in capital from October 20. The exhibition, being organised for the first time in the country, has been sponsored by the Thuringian Foreign Trade Agency (TAF) and organised by Asia Trading Consulting Germany, in association with Indian Medical Association. The products, medical instrument and equipment on display will include oxygen supply devices, oxygen concentrators, artificial human eyes, clean room trolleys and storage systems, medical measuring system, medical precision engineering products, ultrasonic inhaler, laboratory automation devices, new drug discovering and testing systems, sports medicines and occupation health products, medical measuring systems for vascular and cardiological diagnosis. The other products on display will include ultrasonic inhaler for home and clinics, water purification systems and water saving units and host of other products for medical application. Major highlight of the exhibition will be needle free injection system ‘Injex’, which is virtually pain free, safe and cost effective to needle syringes. It is compact, light weight, easy to use and eliminates the risks of transmitting infectious diseases like hepatitis and HIV. It is beneficial for insulin dependent diabetic patients, pediatricians, surgeons, hospitals and pet owners. (UNI) |
|
India attracts $ 3 billion of FDI NEW DELHI, Oct 17: India attracted three billion dollars of Foreign Direct Investment during the first eight months of this calendar year and is expected to garner another two billion dollars in the remaining four months, Union Minister of Commerce and Industry Murasoli Maran said today. The expected five billion dollars of FDI during 2000 would be up 25 per cent against four billion dollars last year. "This shows that the investor confidence about India is on the rise," Mr Maran said while addressing a meeting of the India-Italy Joint Business Council, organised by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry here. When asked what special programmes are being launched by the Government to attract another two billion dollars, Mr Maran said the amount would flow into the country automatically in the liberalised foreign direct investment scenario. The Government has set a target to attract ten billion dollars per annum after next three to four years. (UNI) |
|
|
NEW DELHI, Oct 17: Malaysian national car maker Perusahaan Otomobil Nasional Berhad (PROTON) has, for the present, dropped plans to enter India with its mid-sized car ‘Wira’ in a proposed venture with the C K Birla-owned Hindustan Motors Limited (HM). Meanwhile, HM is in negotiations with its its technology partner Mitsubishi Motor Corporation of Japan to expand its product range with the introduction of a premium model and the famed sports utility vehicle ‘Pajero’, Mr B K Chaturvedi, president of Hindustan Motors, told UNI here today. The negotiations with PROTON were called off as the partners found the pricing of Wira too close to HM’s existing premium model ‘Lancer’. "We found that the pricing of Wira was too close to Lancer and it did not make much business sense to put another model opposite lancer," he added. "At this moment, we are not discussing any models. PROTON has to come back to us with an option...We will resume study when we have a workable model. The talks have ended for now and we do not have any workable model," he said. Though the partners do not yet have a workable model, Mr Chaturvedi said, HM is exploring the feasibility of introducing a regular mid-size model to be positioned opposite Maruti Esteem and Ford Ikon. The company is also open to foraying into the mass small car segment, but said, "probability for introducing a small car is very low". PROTON was eyeing a five per cent marketshare in India’s car market over a 3-5 year period with the Wira. The car maker had in September last year signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with HM to begin a feasiblity study for the Assembly of completely knocked down units of PROTON cars in Chennai. The company’s had planned to produce 3,000 units of its Wira models in the initial phase of operations. The Wira was proposed to be introduced in 1.3 litre and 1.5 litre versions. The installed capacity of HM’s chennai plant is 12,000 units per annum. During the first half between April to December, HM has rolled out 4024 units of Lancer. PROTON had also stated that it was not in favour of picking up equity in Hindustan Motors. "PROTON, as a group policy, does not take stake in such ventures worldwide and we are not looking for any stakeholding in hm as well," Mr Masaharu Iwata of Proton had said earlier. The Wira is currently produced in four-door Sedan and five-door hatchback versions. Globally, the car sports both a petrol and a diesel engine. Proton produces a range of cars mostly based on designs by its joint venture partner, Mitsubishi Motor Corp, but also has a model based on a Citroen car. PROTON cars are currently exported to around 50 countries, with Britain being the largest export market. Meanwhile, HM has no plans to discontinue its Ambassador model and expects the car to drive the company into a cash positive stage in the current calendar year. "If we are lucky, we will achieve cash breakeven this year and total breakeven in the 2001-02 fiscal," he added. Hindustan Motors posted about Rs 62 crore losses last year. The C K Birla flagship company is also dispatching a high level team to Japan to negotiate with auto giant Mitsubishi for introduction of more models of the Lancer in India. The issue of more models from the Lancer family including Cadia and Gallart was discussed when a team of the Japanese car giant visited India earlier this month. "We are now following up the issue and I will take a team to Japan next month," he said, adding that during the Japan visit the HM team would meet top executives of Mitsubishi including its Chief Executive. The company was also planning to increase Lancer indigenisation level to 70 per cent from the present level of 56 per cent by end of the current year and upto 85 per cent by the next year. The increased localisation level would help the company in cutting manufacturing costs by about Rs 40,000 per unit. (UNI) |
|
ICRA upgrades short term rating of UTI bank to A1 NEW DELHI, Oct 17: ICRA has upgraded the Rs 500 crore certificate of deposit programme of UTI bank to A1. The revised short-term rating indicates highest safety. The prospect of timely payment of debt obligation is the best. UTI bank’s net advances increased from Rs 2169.79 crore in 1998-99 to Rs 3506.62 crore in 1999-2000 registering a growth of 61.61 per cent. A significant portion of the growth in advances was during the last quarter of the financial year. In 1999-2000, the growth in credit was mainly on account of increased bills discounting activity besides a strong growth in cash credit and demand loans. UTI bank’s asset quality has improved and there was a reduction in both the gross NPA/gross advances and net NPA/net advances ratios. The NPA generation rate has come down in the last two years though this is also attributed to the substantial increase in credit growth. The net NPA/ net advances reduced from 6.32 per cent in 1998-99 to 4.71 per cent in 1999-2000. Even with this decrease, the net npa percent for UTI bank continues to be much higher than other new generation private sector banks. However, the fresh exposures taken by UTI bank in 1999-2000 and during the first half of 2000-01 where to good quality medium and large corporates. A substantial portion of the bills portfolio is 100 percent backed by letters of credit and to that extent the credit risk onthis portfolio is negligible. The net interest margin/ average total assets for the bank decreased from 2.05 per cent in 1998-99 to 1.71 per cent in 1999-2000. This was because the decline in the yield on advances was more than the decline in the cost of funds resulting in lesser interest spread. The net interest margin for UTI bank is lower when compared to other new generation private sector banks. The operating profit martin (operating profit/average total assets) however increased from 1.93 per cent in 1998-99 to 2.20 per cent in 1999-2000 because of increased trading profit on investments. The capital adequacy of the bank was 11.37 per cent as on March 31,2000 and the bank is likely to raise fresh capital during 2000-01 to improve its capital adequacy and to support its growth plan. The rating takes into account the improved asset quality, reduction in the generation of NPAs, a strong growth in credit and deposits and change to a superior technology platform, which will enable the bank to increase its fee based income. The rating also takes into account the strong parentage with UTI and LIC continuing to be the two principal shareholders of the bank. (UNI) |
|
Shares suffer setback on selling pressure NEW DELHI, Oct 17: A major sell-off by Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) and domestic speculators pulled benchmark index down by nearly 1.5 per cent on the stock market today after stocks led by technology segment suffered sharp setback to close with widespread losses. Bucking the general trends, an IT software solution major NIIT Ltd maintained its rising tempo for the second straight session after the company posted nearly 57 per cent growth in its net profit for the fiscal ended September 30, 2000. Mirroring the weak sentiments, the Delhi Stock Exchange sensitive index ended 11.90 points down at 784.34 points after dipping to 780 points (intra-session). Brokers said it seemed that market had completely discounted all positive developments such as excellent working results by front-line technology sector companies, ruling out of a hike in freight by the Railway Minsiter and deferring of rolling settlement by the market regulator Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI). They said reports of overnight weakness on the technology-high NASDAQ and similar trends on the regional exchanges too dampened the trading sentiments. End of settlement on the National Stock Exchange (NSE) too had its shadow on the sentiments, they added. The prime movers of the Indian bourses, FIIs reportedly sold stocks of Infosys Technologies, Satyam Computer, Pentamedia Graphics and fast moving consumer goods major Hindustan Lever. "Large-scale selling by FIIs in key stocks created almost panic in the market", felt a DSE broker. Infotech Giant, Infosys Technologies, which showed some signs of recovery at the outset, traded higher at Rs 6575 on renewed purchases by speculators amidst short-covering but re-emergence of selling by profit-takers wiped-off the entire gains to close Rs 16.90 down at Rs 6478.10. Satyam computer stocks continued to remain in the negative territory and plunged to Rs 326.65 before winding up Rs 26.15, or almost 8 per cent down at Rs 337. Silverline Technologies stocks also in the tandem reacted to massive selling and lost Rs 12.95 to close at Rs 289.75 off session’s low of Rs 282.20. The telecom giants like Himachal futuristic after remaining highly volatile through out the session following alternate bouts of buying and selling by major players, ended Rs 10.20 down at Rs 1007.80 after bouncing between Rs 954.10 and Rs 1031 while global telesystems drifted down by Rs 3.50 to Rs 1104.50 after touching session’s low of Rs 1042. Shyam Telecom also succumbed to massive selling and finished Rs 10.40 down at Rs 209.65. Among old-economy stocks, petrochemicals giant Reliance Industries slipped below Rs 300 mark to touch recent low of Rs 298 on bear hammerings amidst absence of buying support and terminated at Rs 303, still showing a fall of Rs 4. State Bank of India at Rs 160.40, TATA Loco ATRs 75.70 and Larsen and Toubro at Rs 158.10 also retreated. (PTI) |
|
RWRC advises farmers to sow durum variety BHOPAL, Oct 17: In view of the shortage of water in Madhya Pradesh, the Regional Wheat Research Centre, Indore, has advised the farmers to sow durum variety (malvi wheat). This variety of wheat has played a very significant role in the wheat revolution in the state leading to an unprecedented increase in the production of wheat. This year, the wheat production has touched the 91 lakh tonne mark in the state. The Research Centre has developed three new varieties of durum malav shri, malav shakti and malav ratna. These varieties are high yielding, immune to gerua disease and the wheat is of high quality, which is making them popular among farmers. The production of malav ratna variety is 30 to 35 quintals per hectare following one or two waterings, whereas the yield of malav shri and malav shakti varieties is 45 to 50 quintals per hectare after three waterings. The same production level of sharbati wheat requires five or six waterings. The State Government is carrying out a special campaign to increase its production. This variety of wheat is being sown in 60 per cent area in Dhar district while 20 per cent area is being covered under it in the other districts of Malwa region. Head scientist of the centre Dr Heeranand Pandey said production cost would go down and the wheat crops would be immune to gerua rust if sowing of this variety is encouraged in the country. The malvi variety of wheat has immense resistence against karnal bunt and kandwa diseases, he added. Containing one and half to two per cent more protein than rice and sharbati variety of wheat, this variety has higher content of bita kairotin which forms vitamin "A" , he said adding increase in production of this variety of wheat would help solve the problem of malnutrition to a great extent in rural areas. Besides, the variety is suitable for fast food items. By increasing its production, Madhya Pradesh can export wheat in greater quantity to other states like Maharashtra, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Kerala. The international competition in marketing of Sharbati wheat is higher, whereas the competition for malvi wheat is not so high, therefore, it can be exported to other countries also. (UNI) |
|
Gold dip, silver coins shoot up on festive buying NEW DELHI, Oct 17: Silver coins continued an upward march on the bullion market today on persistent buying by local parties and closed with handsome gains. Gold rolled down on lack of buying in the face of new stocks offloaded by stockists and registered a notable loss despite a festival season. Marketmen said trading was thin and there was hardly any worthwhile buyer in gold, though the festival season going on. They said a weak trend in the international market was another reason behind falling trend. In Hong Kong, gold was traded at 271.20 U.S. dollar an ounce against previous close of 276.60. Standard gold and ornaments dropped by Rs.25 each at Rs.4510 and Rs.4360 per ten gram respectively. Sovereign continued to be asked at previous level of Rs.3825 per piece of eight gram. Silver .999 (ready) was unchanged at Rs.7930 per kilo while weekly delivery lost Rs.5 at Rs.7935 per kilo. Its coins were traded further higher by Rs.100 at Rs.11,400/11,500 per 100 piece in scattered deals. The following were today’s quotations: Silver .999 (ready) 7930 and delivery 7935. Silver coins buyer 11,400 and seller 11,500. Standard gold 4510, ornaments 4360 and sovereign 3825. (PTI) |
|
|
