GST collections in February dropped to Rs 97,247 crore from Rs 1.02 lakh crore in the previous month, the Finance Ministry said on Friday.

However, compliance improved and the number of sales return or GSTR-3B filed for the month of January up to February 28, 2019 stood at 73.48 lakh. This is higher than 73.3 lakh returns filed in January.

Wagah: After a suspenseful wait lasting hours, Indian Air Force pilot Abhinandan Varthaman finally returned home Friday night from his nearly three-day captivity in Pakistan, a major step towards defusing a near-war situation triggered by India’s retaliation over Pakistan’s continued support for terrorism.

Amazon.com Inc plans to open dozens of grocery stores across the United States as it looks to expand in the food business, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday, citing people familiar with the matter.

Amazon is also exploring a strategy of strengthening its new supermarket brand by purchasing regional grocery chains that operate at least a dozen stores, according to the report.

Consumer sector saw some pick-up in competitive intensity with P&G getting aggressive though not alarming yet. Raw material basket is comfortable, but a sudden rise in crude and copra prices needs to be watched against. Except for Britannia that talked about slowdown in the month of December, other FMCG companies didn’t highlight any slowdown though were cautious on commentary near-term with upcoming elections. ITC, APNT, NEST, DABUR and JUBI are our sector Buys.

Global investment firm The Carlyle Group on Friday bought 9% stake in SBI Life Insurance from BNP Paribas Cardif for `4,635 crore. According to the bulk deal on BSE, group firm CA Emerald Investments purchased 9 crore shares at `515 per share, at a discount from the market price. The stock price of SBI Life on Friday closed at `612.25 gaining 5.47%.

Continuing the muted demand trend, sales of passenger vehicles in February for market leader Maruti Suzuki grew by marginal 0.2% year-on-year (y-o-y) at 1,36,912 units.

While passenger vehicles sales in the April-June quarter had clocked a 20% y-o-y growth, the trend has reversed since then. Post the September quarter results, Maruti Suzuki chairman RC Bhargava had pointed out that the festive season was a dull one.

The government Friday appointed former Finance Secretary Hasmukh Adhia as chairman of state-owned Bank of Baroda (BoB).

Bank of Baroda is set to become the third largest lender of the country after amalgamation with Vijaya Bank and Dena Bank effective April 1.

Accommodating passengers from its cancelled flights has become harder for Jet Airways as at least two airlines have cancelled their ‘flight interruption manifest (FIM) agreement’ with the airline.

This comes at a time when the cash-strapped airline is cancelling more than 100 flights daily due to grounding of its planes.

Ravneet Gill took charge as managing director (MD) and chief executive officer (CEO) of YES Bank on Friday for a three-year term, subject to shareholder approval.

A career banker with a long innings at Deutsche Bank, Gill comes in place of Rana Kapoor, the bank’s co-promoter and former MD and CEO.

The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) tightened the valuation methodology for liquid mutual funds (MFs) and did away with the open offer exemption given to those seeking to acquire assets undergoing insolvency resolution.

To make sure liquid schemes reflect the underlying portfolio risks, Sebi has said all debt papers with maturity of 30 days or more to be marked to market. Earlier, fund houses didn’t have to do so for securities that had less than 60-day maturity.

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