Moneycontrol Bureau
10:50am Fertiliser stocks in action: The Union Cabinet approved gas pooling for 30 urea manufacturing units in the country, communications minister Ravi Shankar Prasad today said.
The move would allow sale of gas at a composite price arrived at by pooling gas from cheaper domestic and more expensive imported sources.
“This is a historic moment for farmers,” Prasad said, while making the announcement.
The minister also announced the government would set up a 2000 km gas pipeline between Haldia (West Bengal) and Jagdishpur (Uttar Pradesh) at a cost of Rs 10,000 crore and said fertilizer plants in Gorakhpur (UP) and Barauni (Bihar) would be revived and connected to the above pipeline.
10:30am L&T bags order: L&T secured a turnkey order from NTPC for setting up a 2x660 MW greenfield ultra-supercritical thermal power plant in Khargone district of Madhya Pradesh on EPC basis.
Valued over Rs 5,580 crore, the project entails design, engineering, manufacture, supply, erection and commissioning of two coal-fired thermal units of 660 MW each with ultrasupercritical parameters, said the company in its filing to the exchange.
“While this EPC package order from a central utility like NTPC has brought prestige to L&T, it also comes with the added responsibility of executing the power project under stringent norms and timelines” said Shailendra Roy, whole-time director (power, minerals and metals).
10:10am Clariant Chemicals in Focus: Clariant Chemicals (India) has acquired the carbon black business from Lanxess India Private Limited, comprising of the carbon black dispersion plant located at Nagda, India together with its respective assets, liabilities and employees as going concern on a slump sale basis for a lump sum consideration of Rs. 13.5 crores, effective from April 1, 2015.
10:00am Market Check
The market remained in a consolidation mode for the second consecutive session today. The Sensex declined 11.71 points to 27945.78 and the Nifty slipped 9.20 points to 8481.80 while the broader markets outperformed benchmarks.
The BSE Midcap and Smallcap indices gained more than 0.6 percent. More than two shares advanced for every share declining on the Bombay Stock Exchange.
Infosys lost 2 percent following weak Q3 forecast announced by its rival HCL Technologies. Country's fourth largest software services firm HCL yesterday said its dollar revenue for the March quarter will see an "adverse impact" of 2.8 percent on strengthening of the greenback against global rivals.
Shares of HDFC Bank, TCS, Reliance Industries, HDFC, Wipro, Coal India and Cipla were marginally lower. GAIL dropped 2 percent. However, Bharti Airtel, Dr Reddy's Labs, Maruti and NTPC topped the buying list, up 1-1.5 percent.
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