The pace of building highways has accelerated to 25 km a day in the first quarter of the current fiscal, as against 22.3 km per day in the entire 2016-17, keeping up with the gradual increase in highway construction in the initial two years of the Narendra Modi government. Sources said with several projects awarded in the last few years having reached the construction phase now and their “better monitoring” by the ministry of road transport and highways (MoRTH) and NHAI, the construction would outpace the last year’s average in the current year. The average construction in the first three months of the current fiscal at 25.14 km per day, is much higher than the 21.4 km a day clocked in the same period last fiscal.

After the 24% correction in the past two months, we believe incremental risk reward is turning favourable again for PNB. Our adjusted book valuation of 0.55x Mar-19 book factors in Rs 790 billion of total stress vs gross NPAs of Rs 554 billion (FY17) adequately captures any asset quality risks. Near-term provisioning will remain elevated given the lower coverage of 41%, but the large stock of prudentially written-off NPAs provides comfort on recoveries/ upgrades. Subsidiaries now contribute 33% of PNB’s valuation, and will continue to accrete value. We maintain our TP of Rs 180, which is based on 0.8x Mar-19 book and implies 32% upside from current levels.

MUMBAI: Offering post GST benefit in pre-GST era drove India's largest luxury car maker Mercedes Benz to register a significant 40 per cent growth in June, rallying the brand back to double-digit growth in April to June second quarter since the end of 2015.

The company sold record 3521 units in Q2 of 2017, registering a year on year growth of 18 per cent. For the first half of 2017, Mercedes Benz sale growth was recorded at 8.7 per cent to 7171 units. The growth in Indian market is in line with global trend, wherein the maker of S-Class posted a record half-yearly number at 1.14 million units growing by 13.7 per cent.

NEW DELHI: State-owned Air India today launched its first flight to Washington DC from New Delhi, thereby adding its fifth destination in the US.

Air India has deployed its 238-seater Boeing 777-200 LR aircraft to cater to the new direct service to the US. The plane offers eight seats in first class, 35 in business and 195 in economy class.

Mahindra & Mahindra has raised concerns over the increase in road tax on vehicles by the Maharashtra government saying it would negate the price cuts on vehicles following the rollout of goods and services tax (GST).Pawan Goenka, managing director, M&M, said, “One small concern that I have is the state road tax going up in one of the states (Maharashtra) right now and I hope that does not become the norm because then the price cut (post-GST) on vehicles will get negated.”

Market on Friday moved lower from its all-time peak as participants were quick to take profit amid a lacklustre trend overseas.

Stocks of FMCG, capital goods, banking, IT and realty remained subdued.

Technology giant Microsoft is undertaking a major reorganisation that will likely see the company cutting about 3,000 jobs from its global workforce, a media report said today.

The layoffs under the restructuring at the technology giant led by India-born Satya Nadella will mostly affect sales, and as many as 3,000 jobs will be cut, CNBC reported.

The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) is in favour of having at least one woman as independent director (ID) on the board of listed companies, said two people in the know, including a senior Sebi official.

According to the Companies Act, 2013, all listed companies need to have at least one woman as a director on their board. While most companies have fulfilled this, some have done so by inducting family members of the promoters. And, women on India Inc boards are still low in number.

The Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (Irdai) has asked insurance companies with foreign joint venture (JV) partners to examine whether these agreements with ‘option clauses’ comply with Foreign Exchange Management Act (Fema) norms. If there is any gap in the agreements, then the insurers should amend it to ensure compliance, the regulator said.

The insurers need to comply with the norms related to pricing, pertaining to put and call options in the Fema rules, Irdai said.

Infosys, India’s second-largest IT services firm, said it would hire 2,000 Americans in North Carolina by 2021.

The Bengaluru-headquartered company said its second technology and innovation hub would come up in the southeastern state of US out of four such proposed facilities.

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