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Steel firms cut prices as inventory rises
Haryana hikes VAT on tyres to 12.5 pc
Ex-Chairman of Daewoo indicted
IOC to bid for refineries in Turkey
TRAI comes down on landline players
VSNL acquires Tyco Global for $130 m
PNB opens office in Dubai
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Labour unrest costs Honda Rs 100 crore
Jindals to set up aluminium plant in Andhra
ONGC set to win 7 oil, gas blocks
India to oppose offloading of cheap farm goods
Maruti sales up by 4.6 per cent in June
Toyota Motor Corp’s Managing Director Atsushi Niimi (left) and President of Toyota Motor Manufacturing (North America) Ray Tanguay pose in front of a Rav 4 model on Thursday by a field where a new plant to produce the vehicle will be built in Woodstock, Ontario. The plant will employ nearly 1,300 workers. — AP/PTI
photo
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Steel firms cut prices as inventory rises
New Delhi, July 1 “Essar Steel has revised prices for its products in the domestic markets. The prices will be lower by approximately five to eight per cent and will come into force with immediate effect,” an Essar Steel spokesman said. He said with the import duty now at five per cent, domestic steel prices are in line with international rates. Therefore, any decrease or increases in prices are due to the international prices, he pointed out. Ispat Industries also announced lowering of its steel prices by seven per cent, again due to rising inventories, company sources said. Tata Steel, too, has cut the prices for its branded products by Rs 2,000 to Rs 3,000 per tonne but has not effected any change in the long-term contract prices. Last evening, Steel Authority of India Limited (SAIL) cut prices by Rs 500 to Rs 2,000 per tonne terming it a “temporary correction” owing to market fluctuations triggered partially by China’s low intake of steel. The cut, to be effective from today, was necessitated by the present demand and supply situation, besides lowering of global steel prices, a SAIL spokesman had said. However, the public sector behemoth is hopeful that within a month or two, global steel prices would stabilise and the market would again rejuvenate to allow prices to rise.
— PTI
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Haryana hikes VAT on tyres to 12.5 pc
New Delhi, July 1 The state has adopted a two-tier VAT slab for automotive tyres and introduced 4 per cent VAT for tractor and tractor trolley tyres and 12.5 per cent for all other categories of tyres. The rate difference between Delhi and Haryana had led to a situation where a large number of trade intermediaries had started flooding Delhi’s various transport centres, with lower-taxed tyre and tubes brought from Haryana at 8 per cent VAT. Tyre sales had dipped by almost 80 per cent for commercial vehicles and utility vehicles in Delhi due to migration of tyre customers to lower VAT- levying Haryana. Representatives of Delhi tyre trade, having a turnover of more than Rs 900 crore per annum, had complained of trade diversion to Haryana, owing to the tax differential UP too levies 12 per cent sales tax on tyres.
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Ex-Chairman of Daewoo indicted
Seoul, July 1 Kim Woo-Choong, who returned to South Korea last month after fleeing the country in 1999, is accused of having falsified Daewoo’s accounts to draw billions of dollars in illegal bank loans before diverting them overseas. He has come to epitomise the excesses of the country’s “chaebol”, the privately controlled conglomerates whose unbridled expansion on borrowed money helped undermine the economy in the 1990s. Kim was indicted on charges of 40 trillion won $ 39 billion in accounting fraud, obtaining 9.8 trillion won ($ 9.5 billion) in illegal financing and diverting 23 trillion won ($ 22 billion) out of the country, the Supreme Public Prosecutors’s Office said in a statement. The police and prosecutors believe Kim (69), had been travelling in Europe since leaving South Korea, and that he acquired French citizenship during his sojourn. He left the country in October, 1999, before charges were prepared. Kim could potentially face a maximum sentence of life in prison, though given his age, former stature in South Korea and public expression of remorse upon arrival, it’s doubtful he would serve much time, if convicted. — AP
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IOC to bid for refineries in Turkey
New Delhi, July 1 Addressing a teleconference from Turkey, Indian Petroleum Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar today said the Turkish government has been quite positive to the interest evinced by IOC. “If the bids are found competitive, the IOC will surely gain stake in the Turkish refinery sector. ONGC has plans to enter the Turkish oil sector, ” he said. The minister today met his counterpart, Mr Hilmi Guler, Minister of Energy and Natural Resources, Turkey, and held discussions on increasing bilateral relations in the hydrocarbon sector. Mr Aiyar said: “Both countries have agreed to form a joint working group in the hydrocarbon sector. The group will report to the joint commission of India-Turkey to increase trade relations in the hydrocarbon sector.” Turkey, which has a major influence on the Central Asian countries with vast oil and gas reserves, will help India enhance trade relations with them, the minister said Referring to India-Iran gas pipeline through Pakistan, the Minister said: “There are a lot of things to learn from the Turkish experience in running Bakku-Tblisi-Ceyhal (BTC) pipeline passing through Ajerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey. Since they have been successfully operating the pipeline for the past 30 years, despite the fact it passes through difficult terrain like Northern Iran and East Turkey, we can also learn some best practices from them.” The minister will also visit Romania as a part of India’s efforts to enhance cooperation in the hydrocarbon sector.
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TRAI comes down on landline players
New Delhi, July 1 “The performance of basic service providers was found to be very poor, especially the ones that predominant wireline networks,” TRAI said in a statement here. In case of cellular operators, however, TRAI expressed some satisfaction saying that 75 per cent of service providers were meeting most of the quality standards defined by the authority but pointed out that there was still a problem of several other parameters not being met. As per the new schedule, TRAI said that the fault incidence should be less than 5 per cent a month to be achieved by March 2007 and less than 3 per cent by March 2008. According to TRAI’s assessment, in case of wireline basic operators such as BSNL and MTNL, the condition was so poor that the possibility of meeting these targets within stipulated time frame for their huge networks was not feasible. In terms of call completion rate within local network, TRAI has brought down the benchmark percentage to 55 per cent from the existing 65 per cent. In case of cellular mobile services, the call set-up success rate has been fixed at 95 per cent, TRAI said, adding it has been shifted from a standard of 99 per cent at present to a new parameter. The fault incidence parameter for cellular services is now deleted, as this is more relevant for fixed line services.
— PTI
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VSNL acquires Tyco Global for $130 m
Mumbai, July 1 VSNL, which completed the eight-month-long acquisition process today, expects to recover the
investment in three-four years compared to five-six years required under normal circumstances due to access to ready business, synergy and reasonable purchase price, its director, Mr Kishore
Chaukar, said here today. The revenues of TGN are pegged at $ 90-100 million and its income and profits would start reflecting in the books of VSNL International’s overseas business arm from the current quarter (02), Mr Chaukar said. Over 200 employees of TGN would be absorbed as a fallout of acquisition and teams from VSNL and TGN would prepare plans, including investments, in the next three months, he said. VSNL had acquired Tyco, which has over 60,000 kms undersea cable network in North America, Europe and Asia, for $ 130 million. TGN would provide VSNL
more bandwidth for providing connectivity to carriers, IT and BPO firms. Mr Chaukar said this acquisition would help VSNL do non-India centric business. Earlier, the Tata group company could only deal with bilateral business traffic moving in and out of India.
— PTI
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PNB opens office in Dubai
Chandigarh, July 1 The bank had ambitious plans for overseas expansion in keeping with its vision of becoming a world-class financial organisation. He said the bank had established correspondent relationship with 500 international banks and had set up a rupee drawing arrangement with 17 Exchange Houses in the Middle East and Singapore. Besides, the PNB was the first Indian nationalised bank to set up a branch at Kabul, Afghanistan, said Mr Gupta. The bank has representative offices at Almaty (Kazakhstan), London and Shanghai and now at Dubai. PNB has also entered into a joint venture with the Everest Bank Ltd., Nepal.
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Labour unrest costs Honda Rs 100 crore
New Delhi, July 1 Honda Motorcycle and Scooter India (HMSI), which has its plant at Manesar in Haryana, is in the midst of a big labour unrest, with the workers’ union demanding higher wages commensurate with the company’s growth in the market. The profitable company, which is credited with reviving the scooter market in India, has suspended about 25 ‘Line Associates’ and was forced to even dismiss five others. Scooter production at the plant has gone down from about 2,000 units a day to just about 250 units. Sources said the crisis is far from over with as many as 250 workers shunning work and protesting outside the plant, even threatening those who have resumed duty. Gurgaon Deputy Commissioner Sudhir Rajpal said that their personnel had to be deployed at the factory last week after the situation appeared to be worsening. “The police personnel have to stay until normalcy returns,” he said, adding that production seemed to be gradually returning to normal though the plant was currently churning out only about 250 scooters per day. Commenting on the situation, a company official said trouble started after some workers began “indiscipline and insubordination” after being “misled by some outside forces with vested interests.” The plant employs about 3,500 employees.
— PTI
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Jindals to set up aluminium plant in Andhra
Hyderabad, July 1 Under the agreement, the O.P.Jindal group would promote an alumina and aluminium refinery and sSmelter to produce about 2.5 lakh tonnes of aluminium per annum initially, with a provision for suitable expansion, with a capital outlay of about Rs.9,000 crores. Mr.Sajjan Jindal, Vice-Chairman & M.D, JSW Steel Ltd and Joint MD Mr.Raman Mathok, signed the MoU in the presence of Chief Minister Y.S.Rajasekhara Reddy here. The Andhra Pradesh Mining Development Corporation will supply bauxite for the exclusive need of the aluminium company. About 10,000 persons would be employed directly or indirectly.
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ONGC set to win 7 oil, gas blocks
New Delhi, July 1 Twenty blocks — 12 onland, two shallow water and six deepwater — were auctioned under the new exploration licensing policy (round V), for which the bids closed on May 31. Reliance Industries has been recommended as the winner for two Kerala-Konkan deepsea blocks while the ones in the Krishna Godavari basin and the Mahanadi basin have been recommended to be
awarded to Reliance-Hardy Oil (of UK) and Reliance-Niko Resources (of Canada) consortium, respectively. The ONGC has been suggested winner of the two Andaman basin deepwater blocks — one on its own and the other in partnership with ENI of Italy and GAIL (India) Ltd.
— PTI
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India to oppose offloading of cheap farm goods
Bangalore, July 1 Union Commerce and Industry Minister Kamal Nath also asserted that the UPA government would not allow FDI in the retail sector until it developed a model to protect the interests of the present retail market. The country was reporting 22 per cent growth in the retail market every year which could not be met by the unorganised retail sector. He said there was an intrinsic difference in agriculture as practised in India vis a vis developed countries. “Here agriculture is still at the subsistence level rather than a commercial activity”. The minister said despite treating agriculture as a commercial activity, developed countries were subsidising their farmers to the tune of $ 1 billion a day.
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Shukla is LIC Chairman
Mumbai, July 1
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Maruti sales up by 4.6 per cent in June
New Delhi, July 1 India’s largest car maker sold 37,995 units in the domestic market, up 4.3 per cent from 36,415 units in June, 2004. Exports stood at 3,395 vehicles, an increase of 7.5 per cent over 3,159 units sold in the year-ago period. Maruti’s volume in the domestic A2 segment grew by 31.6 per cent and in the A3 segment by 75 per cent during June, 2005, compared to sales in June, 2004, the company said in a statement here.
GM India General Motors India June sales dipped 9.7 per cent to 2,183 units as against 2,418 cars in the same month last year as unprecedented rains and floods in Baroda disrupted production and dispatches towards month-end. “We lost sales of around 300 units as rains and floods hit our production and dispatches towards month-end,” GM India Vice President (Marketing and Sales) Amit Dutta said in Delhi. Sales during June included 1,461 Taveras, 404 Chevrolet Optra, 315 Opel Corsas and three units of imported Forester SUV. During the first half of 2005, GM India sales registered year-on-year growth of over 42 per cent to 15,297 units as compared to 10,737 in the first six months of 2004.
Honda Siel Honda Siel Cars India (HSCI) reported a 38 per cent sales growth in June this year at 3,826 units against 2,772 units in the same month last year. The company said cumulative sales for the calendar year (January-June ‘05) jumped by 29 per cent to 21,604 units against 16,738 units in the same period last year. HSCI said while its mid-size offering ‘City’ recorded a growth of 31 per cent, luxury sedan ‘Accord’ saw numbers going up 6 per cent and SUV ‘CR-V’ 49 per cent.
Mahindra and Mahindra Mahindra and Mahindra Ltd (M&M) has posted a 15.7 per cent increase in its tractor sales for June, 2005, at 7,879 units as compared to 6,812 units in the same month last fiscal. Tractor sales for the first quarter ended June 2005-06 increased by 32.1 per cent to 21,200 units as compared to 16,048 units in the same quarter of the previous fiscal, M&M said in Mumbai.
Bajaj Auto Bajaj Auto Ltd (BAL) has posted a 33.9 per cent growth in its motor cycle sales for June at 1,30,710 units compared to 97,591 units sold during the same period of the previous fiscal. BAL’s combined sales of two and three-wheelers in the country for the month ending June 30, 2005, were up by 20 per cent at 1,61,282 units compared to 1,34,391 units sold in the same period last year, the company said in Mumbai. Two-wheeler sales rose 25.5 per cent to 1,41,316 units (1,12,643 units in June, 2004) while sales of three-wheelers fell by 8.2 per cent to 19,966 units from 21,748 units posted during the same period of previous fiscal. The motor cycle sales for this fiscal’s first quarter ended June 30, increased by 53.2 per cent to 4,22,543 units compared to 2,75,786 units sold during the same period last fiscal.
Hero Honda Hero Honda sold 2,26,073 bikes in June, 2005, registering a growth of 12.5 per cent over 2,00,922 units sold in the corresponding month of last year. The world’s largest two-wheeler company said its sales during the April-June quarter increased 13 per cent to 6,86,494 units as against 6,09,123 units sold during the year-ago period.
TVS Motors TVS Motor Co said its two-wheeler sales in June increased by 18 per cent to 1,08,111 units from 91,945 vehicles a year ago. The country’s third-largest motor cycle maker said its bike sales jumped by 25 per cent to 60,170 units from 48,159 units in June, 2004. The sale of scooterettes increased by 2 per cent to 22,829 units as
against 22,339 units in the year-ago period. — Agencies
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