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Life Insurance Corporation (LIC), the biggest equity investor in India, is staying away from the stock markets at a time when the markets are almost hitting life-time high. The insurer, a dominant player in the market, pruned its investments 38% to Rs 39,705 crore for the nine month period ended December 31, 2016, against Rs 64,000 crore last year. It sold Rs 38,000 crore worth of equities during the period. V K Sharma, chairman and managing director, LIC said, “We have deliberately taken this decision because of the way the markets are moving, LIC is a contrarian player in the market.” He said equity usually forms 12% of the total investible assets. LIC said its equity market investments will remain subdued but may hit a level of Rs 50,000 crore by the end of the financial year. During this period the corporation also invested about Rs 1.98 lakh crore into the debt market, bulk of which — Rs1.83 lakh crore – was into the government bonds The state-owned insurer reported a 78% rise in

Mumbai: ICICI Bank Ltd has blocked transactions on payments app PhonePe in at least the second such instance of a commercial bank trying to protect its turf against non-bank mobile wallet and payment companies. PhonePe is a unified payments interface (UPI) app which works on the ecosystem created by the National Payments Corp. of India (NPCI). On Saturday, PhonePe’s co-founder and chief executive officer Sameer Nigam took to microblogging site Twitter to allege that ICICI was blocking transactions since Friday. In a series of tweets, he said that ICICI was blocking “Definitely on purpose! Over 10x txns failed. Bank is not reversing the block.” An email seeking comment was sent to ICICI Bank late on Saturday night. This story will be updated when the bank responds. “We are waiting for an actual confirmation from ICICI through either NPCI directly or through Yes Bank, but we have no official intimation from any party,” Nigam told Mint . Yes Bank is a UPI partner of PhonePe. Infosys co-f

Regulator Sebi notified rules allowing foreign investors to own up to 15 percent stake in an exchange, a move that is expected to help attract more overseas funds. Currently, foreign entities can hold only up to 5 percent in an exchange. Sebi has amended regulations to increase the limit of shareholding of foreign entities like stock exchange, depository, banking and insurance company and commodity derivatives exchange in Indian stock exchanges to 15 percent, from 5 percent. Now, these entities "may acquire or hold, either directly or indirectly, either individually or together with persons acting in concert, up to 15 percent of the paid-up equity share capital of a recognised stock exchange", Sebi said in a notification dated January 12. The move comes after Sebi board in September approved a proposal to this effect. Already, a number of overseas investors have invested in leading exchanges NSE and BSE and the latest decision will help them enhance their exposure to the Indi

BENGALURU: Differences between the state government and the railways over the funding pattern for the city's suburban rail network could delay the project. Bengaluru development minister KJ George has said that Karnataka was ready to enter into a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the railways for the project. Railway minister Suresh Prabhu is scheduled to visit the city on January 16. George said, "We want to make it a joint venture, with 50-50 equity funding. We have also sent our suggestions on the draft policy proposed by the Indian Railways." As per the draft policy, the state needs to bear 20% of the project cost, raise loans to cover 60% and the railways will contribute the remaining 20%. The draft also enjoins on the state to handle all land acquisition in Bengaluru, and other cities in the state that are in need of suburban railway networks. However, Bengaluru Central MP PC Mohan told STOI that the state government wasn't keen on taking ownership of the

State-owned Coal India arm Central Coalfields Ltd today announced an increase in price of coking coal, which may help the PSU earn an additional revenue of nearly Rs 89.98 crore for the remainder of 2016-17 and Rs 222 crore for the next fiscal. The announcement came at a time when steel companies are feeling the squeeze because of a surge in global coking coal prices. However, the company did not specify the quantum of the increase. In a filing to BSE, Coal India (CIL) said: "The board of directors of Central Coalfields Ltd, a subsidiary of Coal India, has approved revision of coal prices with effect from 00:00 hours of January 14, 2017... this revision, will earn approximately additional revenue of Rs 89.98 crore for the balance period of 2016-17 i.e January 13 to March 2017 and additional revenue of Rs 222 crore for 2017-18 subject to achievement of production and dispatch target norms." According to an official, the price of various grades of coking coal of the PSU varies

BENGALURU: Is India's economy prepared to shift from cash to a 'less-cash' model that the government has been talking about since demonetisation ? Yes, says Nandan Nilekani , a name synonymous with Aadhaar, and now part of the Niti Aayog panel on e-payments that is working with chief ministers to promote the use of digital payments systems across the country. In an exclusive interview, Nilekani told TOI that the infrastructure needed to enable more than a billion people to transact digitally is already in place, but unlike the West, where card-based payments are more common, the Indian economy will digitalise through mobile-based payments that are faster and cheaper to roll out. Now, it is a matter of increasing awareness and keeping transaction charges low, he added. At present, only 5% of personal consumption expenditure in India happens digitally. The 600 million debit cards are used mostly for ATM withdrawals while credit cards number merely 20 million. Nilekani said

Private steel major Tata Steel's Noamundi Iron-ore Mine in adjoining West Singhbhum district of Jharkhand is all set to become the first mine of the country to launch 'Drone Application in Mine Monitoring' (DAMM) on Monday. Noamundi Iron Mine of Tata Steel will become the first Mine in India to launch "Drone Application in Mine Monitoring" (DAMM) on January 16, a Tata Steel press release here today said, adding the DAMM will be launched by Secretary, Ministry of Mines, Balvinder Kumar. Under the Flagship program 'Make in India', Prime Minister Narendra Modi emphasised on role of Space Science for achieving good governance during his address at the National Meet on Promoting Space Technology based Tools and Application in Governance and Development. Based on the Prime Minister's vision, Ministry of Mines conceptualised and launched MSS (Mine Surveillance System) on October 15, 2016. MSS is a satellite-based monitoring system through automatic remote sen