South Africa will remain on the lowest 'level 1' of its five-level lockdown strategy to fight the COVID-19 pandemic despite the global panic around the detection of the Omicron variant in the country, President Cyril Ramaphosa has announced .
A summary of sports events and persons who made news on Sunday
Foreign direct investments (FDI) into the country grew 19 per cent to $59.64 billion during 2020-21 on account of measures taken by the government on the fronts of policy reforms, investment facilitation and ease of doing business, the commerce and industry ministry said on Monday. Total FDI, including equity, re-invested earnings and capital, rose 10 per cent to the "highest ever" of $81.72 billion during 2020-21 as against $74.39 billion in 2019-20. "FDI equity inflow grew by 19 per cent in 2020-21 ($59.64 billion), compared to 2019-20 ($49.98 billion)," the ministry said in a statement. In terms of top investor countries, Singapore is at the top with 29 per cent share.
The Boeing 777 disappeared on its way from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing, sparking a two-year search which has turned up few leads.
Intensifying its efforts, the Indian Navy has deployed nine warships to bring liquid oxygen and other medical supplies from several countries in Persian Gulf and south-east Asia as hospitals across India continued to reel under acute shortage of the life-saving gas following a massive surge in COVID-19 cases.
France on Sunday delivered to India 28 tonnes of ready-to-use medical supplies including eight large oxygen plants while the US sent to India a third flight that brought over 1000 oxygen cylinders
The medical equipment and other supplies were brought to Delhi in a C-5M Super Galaxy, one of the largest strategic airlift aircraft of the US Air Force.
The clarification by the National Securities Depository (NSDL) - which is tasked with monitoring foreign portfolio investor (FPI) investment in domestic stocks - that the accounts of top investors in Adani group stocks remain 'active' has helped prevent a $500-million selloff of shares. Analysts said a freeze of the FPI accounts, as reported by some media outlets, could have prompted global index providers to cut weighting of four Adani group companies from their global indices. Brian Freitas, an analyst at independent research provider Smartkarma, said if the FPI accounts were indeed frozen, FTSE and MSCI would have reduced weighting of Adani group companies at the next rebalance, since it would have meant that the large part of the free float was not tradeable.
The plan was to expand further, add more branches and also eventually become the third bank in India to start a wholly owned subsidiary after Singapore's DBS Bank and State Bank of Mauritius, but those plans never materialised due to lack of scale and rising non-performing assets in the country.
Though India's airlines are certainly bleeding, they haven't yet faced the ignominy of shutting down.
The report claims that the military experts who have analysed the evidence collected by its Investigative Unit say an airstrip under construction in Agalega will almost certainly be used for maritime patrol missions by the Indian Navy.
Cases with the Omicron variant have already been detected in Karnataka and Gujarat.
In May, India and Mauritius signed a protocol to introduce in-principle taxation of capital gains in India in a phased manner.
Markets regulator Sebi and the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) are probing some Adani Group companies for alleged non-compliance with rules, the government told Lok Sabha on Monday. Minister of State for Finance Pankaj Chaudhary in a written reply to a question said accounts of three of the six Mauritius-based funds, that have invested most of their money in Adani Group firms, were frozen in 2016 over the issuance of Global Depository Receipt (GDR) by certain listed firms. No freeze was ordered for their holding in other firms.
The two sides signed a maritime security agreement after extensive talks between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Mauritian counterpart Pravind Jugnauth.
Antigua and Barbuda received 1,75,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccines out of which 40,000 were donated to the country under the 'Vaccine Maitri' initiative.
Britain's Cairn Energy has secured a French court order to seize 20 Indian govt properties to recover arbitration award, it is learnt.
Zee Entertainment last week witnessed shareholder activism that saw an open call for the ouster of promoters and the incumbent management led by Punit Goenka. Besides, Dish TV also faced a similar call earlier this month. The trouble at Zee Entertainment can be gauged from the fact that this is a unique company wherein the promoters own just 3.99 per cent, but fully control the firm.
Most of those who tested positive either recently arrived from African countries or were in contact with such people.
Colombo seems to be veering to the middle path between China and the US on global matters, but in regional matters of strategic security, it is increasingly identifying with India, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
The announcement means that a total of five pieces of debris from the Malaysian Airlines' jet have now been discovered in various spots around the Indian Ocean since it vanished.
Mauritius and Singapore account for the bulk of the $278 billion in foreign equity investments since 2000
Now, funds from Mauritius interested in India will have to weigh paying capital gains taxes that could range from zero to as much as 20 per cent
Prime Minister Modi has said India's vaccine production and delivery capacity will be used for the benefit of all humanity to fight the COVID-19 pandemic. He said last week India was ready to do everything possible for a healthy planet.
Out of the 45 lakh doses, the Hyderabad-based vaccine maker will be supplying over eight lakh to some of the friendly countries such as Mauritius, Philippines and Myanmar, free of cost as good will gesture sources added.
Foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) have pumped in a whopping $33.8 billion into domestic equities and debt till February 15 this fiscal year -- the highest since FY15 when it was nearly $46 billion --taking their net outstanding investments to a record $592.5 billion, as per a report. Of the total FPI assets of $592.5 billion, $537.4 billion were in equities and $51.38 billion in debt, according to the data collated by Care Ratings. The maximum holding is in financial services sector at $191.3 billion, followed by software ($76.1 billion), oil & gas ($50 billion), automobiles & auto components ($26.9 billion, pharmaceuticals & biotechnology ($22.8 billion), sovereign ($21.7 billion--debt), household & personal products ($20.2 billion), capital goods ($19.8 billion), food, beverages & tobacco ($15.7 billion) and insurance ($13.4 billion).
The Centre is in talks with Mauritius with regard to the long-pending revision of the bilateral tax treaty.
Funds parked by Indian individuals and firms in Swiss banks, including through India-based branches and other financial institutions, jumped to 2.55 billion Swiss francs (over Rs 20,700 crore) in 2020 on a sharp surge in holdings via securities and similar instruments, though customer deposits fell, annual data from Switzerland's central bank showed on Thursday. The increase in aggregate funds of Indian clients with Swiss banks, from 899 million Swiss francs (Rs 6,625 crore) at the end of 2019, reverses a two-year declining trend and has taken the figure to the highest level in 13 years. It stood at a record high of nearly 6.5 billion Swiss francs in 2006, after which it has been mostly on a downward path, except for a few years including in 2011, 2013 and 2017, as per the Swiss National Bank (SNB) data.
Companies wanting to consider treaty benefits and deducting tax at a lower rate will have to examine the qualitative factors. They will have to consider whether FPIs are liable to tax and whether they are the beneficial owner of dividend income.
Choubey said till February 4 total 81 AEFIs, which is 0.096 per cent of the total beneficiaries who have been administered Covaxin, have been reported.
Other forms of securities such as compulsorily convertible debentures (CCDs), optionally convertible debentures (OCDs) and some derivatives could remain out of the scope of the amendments
Mauritius wanted extension of the benefits limitation clause in India's treaty with Singapore, which we were quite willing to extend, for our price
Investors brace up ahead of the key macrodata- IIP and CPI numbers due to be unveiled tomorrow.
'Rationalising TDS on dividends for FPIs to reduce it to treaty rates ranging from 5 to 15 per cent, depending on the country of residence of FPIs from current rate of 20 per cent will provide a big cash flow relief for FPIs.'
India is losing over $10.3 billion (about Rs 75,000 crore) in taxes every year owing to global tax abuse by MNCs and evasion by private individuals, a report said on Friday. The State of Tax Justice report said globally countries are losing a total of over $427 billion in taxes each year to international corporate tax abuse and private tax evasion. This is costing countries altogether the equivalent of nearly 34 million nurses' annual salaries every year -- or one nurse's annual salary every second.
The combativeness reflects her insistence not to meekly acquiesce to what has been going on in Raisina Hill for years or decades, observes Kartikeya Tanna.
In a tweet, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said India is deeply honoured to be a 'long-trusted' partner in meeting the healthcare needs of the global community and that supplies of the vaccines to several countries will commence on Wednesday, and more will follow in the days ahead.
Mauritius FDI source for India during Apr-Dec.
An India-built naval patrol vessel for Mauritius that will help in better policing its vast exclusive economic zone was commissioned today by Prime Minister Narendra Modi who said it will make the Indian Ocean "more safer and secure".