Banking stocks continued to gain ground on Wednesday, with the Nifty Bank index hitting a high of 20,575.80 in intra-day deals on the National Stock Exchange (NSE). Top gainers include Federal Bank, IndusInd Bank, Bank of India, HDFC Bank, State Bank of India (SBI) and Axis Bank that hit their respective 52-week high levels.

Nifty PSU Bank index was the largest gainer among sectoral indices, up 0.7% at 10am. By comparison, the benchmark index, the Nifty 50 was trading 0.1% lower at 8,930 levels.

Recent government initiatives to ease the construction sector's woes have come at a time when the sector's growth has slumped to 1.5 per cent in the first quarter of this financial year from 5.6 per cent a year before. Besides reducing the burden of companies, struggling with high debt, these steps are expected to reduce the problem of bad loans.

Commercial vehicle (CV) makers Tata Motors and Ashok Leyland have seen a sharp rise in bus orders from state transport undertakings (STUs). The two firms have together bagged orders for 8,600 buses worth about Rs 1,500 crore in the first five months of the current financial year. Most of these orders will be executed during the current financial year. STUs account for bulk of bus purchases in the country.

Mumbai: Private sector lender Yes Bank Ltd is gearing up to make a debut in the offshore bond market with a five-year dollar bond. The bank is looking to raise $300-500 million before March 2017 to avail cheaper funding for its offshore lending branch at GIFT City in Gandhinagar, Gujarat, said two people from the bank.

The offshore branch is meant to function as a foreign branch of the domestic bank and lend in foreign currency. GIFT City is India’s first international finance centre.

Reliance Industries Ltd’s (RIL) Hazira manufacturing unit in Gujarat has come under the scanner of central revenue authorities for alleged excise duty evasion of at least Rs 25 crore.

The Directorate General of Central Excise Intelligence (DGCEI) here has started a probe in the case and sought certain clarification from RIL, official sources said.

State-run Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd today termed Reliance Jio’s entry into the market as a “challenge” for all operators, but said it expects to match the intense competition “tariff-by-tariff”.

BSNL Chairman and Managing Director Anupam Shrivastava told PTI that the telecom PSU will adopt an aggressive stance on tariffs going forward.

Tata Motors has bagged orders worth Rs 900 crore for over 5,000 buses from various state and city transport undertakings in the first five months of the financial year. The numbers mark a sharp 80% jump in order book over last year. Most of these orders will be executed during the current financial year.

“The big surge in STU (State Transport Undertakings) buying across, is being witnessed after a gap of nearly four years, indicating renewed focus of various state governments / city transport providers on public transport,” the largest commercial vehicle player in the country said.

Calcutta, Sept. 5: Coal India Ltd (CIL) could fall short of its production target of close to 1 billion tonnes by 2019-20 unless there is an improvement in offtake.

In the first five months of 2016-17, cumulative offtake stood at 211.38 million tonnes (mt), a growth of 0.2 per cent over the year-ago period. Production at 194.81mt grew only 1.3 per cent during the period.

New Delhi, Sept. 5: State-owned refiner Indian Oil Corporation plans to add 24 million tonnes per annum (mtpa) to its refining capacity by 2022 at an investment of about Rs 40,000 crore.

The expansion will help the PSU to garner additional foreign exchange through export of petroleum products and meet the growing energy demands of the country.

Mumbai: The CNX Nifty hit the 8,900 mark for the first time in 18 months led by gains in auto and banking stocks after weaker-than-expected US non-payroll data reduced investor fears of a Federal Reserve rate hike in the near term. Continuous inflow from foreign and domestic institutional investors also helped.

In intra-day trading, Nifty touched a high of 8,905.10, a level last seen on 5 March 2015, and gained as much as 1.08% from its previous close. India’s benchmark Sensex index touched a high of 28,843.48, a level last seen on 16 April 2015, and gained as much as 1.1%. Both indices gained in five out of the last six trading sessions.

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