| | | Question of the Week What is it about IndiGo Airlines that suggests it is named after indigo dye, one of India's most famous exports to the West through the centuries? | | |  | Here's a great value proposition A digital subscription to Mint premium can be yours at just ₹213 per month. Check out the convenient and affordable plans we have for you here. | | Good Morning | | The News in Summary While the shadow of a Sebi investigation continues to loom large over it, the Adani group has been successful in shoring up its defenses by selling stakes in key companies to investors like GQG Partners. Meanwhile, JSW Steel Ltd is considering bidding for a 75% stake, as part of a consortium, in Canadian miner Teck Resources' steelmaking coal business Elk Valley Resources while the Gangwal family sold more of its holding in Indigo as part of the plan announced when co-founder Rakesh Gangwal quit the airline’s board last year. Elsewhere, Infosys bagged another mega deal, this one worth $1.64 billion from existing client Liberty Global, while Puneet Goenka’s efforts to join the newly merger Zee-Sony company suffered a blow with Sebi refusing to rescind its earlier order which forbade him and Subhash Chandra from holding any position on a company’s board. | | | | Stake Sales Boost Adani Coffers Ahead of Sebi Report  The Adani group has been on a stake-selling spree, amassing nearly Rs 39,400 crore through stake dilutions in various group companies ever since a damning report was released by US short-seller Hindenburg Research in January. In the latest such development, Abu Dhabi National Energy Company PJSC (TAQA), the second-largest stock on Abu Dhabi Securities Exchange (ADX), was reported to be evaluating an investment of up to $2.5 billion in Gautam Adani's power business though, in an official filing, the company subsequently denied any such discussions with TAQA. This follows a Rs 2876 crore investment in the power firm by Goldman Sachs GQG Partners International Opportunities Fund. But the biggest deal came when GQG Partners invested $1.1 billion for a 8.1% stake in Adani Power, marking Gautam Adani’s largest equity capital-raising through a share sale in a single entity. With this, the Rajiv Jain-led GQG Partners Llp has picked up stakes worth over four billion dollars in multiple Adani group firms through secondary market transactions since March this year. Meanwhile, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) sought a 15-day extension, till the end of August, from the Supreme Court to submit its final status report on 24 issues it has investigated in connection with the Hindenburg report. | | | | JSW Steel Considering Mega Bid for Canadian Coal Assets  JSW Steel Ltd is considering forming a consortium to bid for a 75% stake in Canadian miner Teck Resources' steelmaking coal business Elk Valley Resources, in a deal that could value the business at $8 billion. The Indian company’s bid, if it comes, will rival the one by Swiss commodities giant Glencore which earlier this year offered to buy Teck's steelmaking coal business as a standalone unit, after the Canadian company had rebuffed its $22.5 billion offer for the combined company. The mining and minerals development firm which has been looking to unload its coal assets for years, since coal’s perception as a “dirty” commodity has weighed on its share price, said that a number of companies had evinced interest in its coal operations. For JSW Steel, India’s second largest private sector steel company which has upscaled its initial plan to buy 20% of Elk, the 21.5 million tonnes of steelmaking coal the Canadian company produced in 2022, are important to its steel-making business. | | |  | | | | | | | | The problem with steel-making through traditional manufacturing processes is that it generates a lot of CO2. This video explains how a modest industrial truck from Volvo Group is the prototype for what may be an entirely new, carbon free way of making this essential material. | | | | Gangwal Family Continues Selling Stake in IndiGo IndiGo cofounder Rakesh Gangwal continued to cut his stake in the airline in accordance with his announcement when he quit the company’s board in February last year. In the latest move, his wife Shobha Gangwal sold 11.5 million of her shares amounting to 2.99% stake in InterGlobe Aviation Ltd for Rs 2,801.8 crore, with the possibility of another 1% being sold separately. Over the last 12 months, the Gangwal family has already sold 6.8% stake in the airline for Rs 4,900 though in terms of value, this will be the largest block deal yet by the Indian-American billionaire who had a total of 37% stake in the airline he and Rahul Bhatia set up back in 2006. Gangwal’s latest round of selling is timed to take advantage of the sharp rise in the price of IndiGo shares, up 27% from Rs 2,007 in January to Rs 2,548.35 now, on the back of record profits in its latest quarter. | | | | Big Deal Wins for Infosys Counter IT Sector Slowdown Infosys may have issued a muted revenue guidance for the year after reporting its weakest June quarter revenue growth since FY21, but that hasn’t stopped India’s second largest IT services firm from notching up a series of big wins over the last few months. In the latest such deal, the company signed an initial five-year agreement worth €1.5 billion ($1.64 billion) with Liberty Global, the British-Dutch-American telecommunications multinational. The deal comes with the option of being extended to 8 years in which case its size will grow to €2.3 billion. The two companies have been working together since 2020, with the new agreement a major step up. The latest win comes barely a month after Infosys signed another large 5-year deal valued at $2 billion with one of its existing clients for artificial intelligence (AI) and automation development, modernization and maintenance services. | | |  | | | | Sebi Refuses to Clear Puneet Goenka for Position in New Zee-Sony Entity Subash Chandra and his son Puneet Goenka may have won the war with all clearances in place for the merger of Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd with Sony Pictures Networks India (Culver Max Entertainment), but there are some battles still to be fought. Last week, Sebi upheld its interim order of 12 June restraining both of them from holding key positions in publicly traded companies till further notice. Sebi had passed the order after an investigation which found them complicit in schemes and transactions through which vast amounts of public money belonging to Zee were diverted to private entities owned and controlled by them. The regulator’s latest move has implications for their position in the Zee-Sony merger since Sebi chairperson Madhabi Puri Buch categorically said that the duo would also not be allowed to hold key positions in a resultant company that is formed pursuant to a merger of the two companies. | | | | Last Word Robust consumer demand in sectors like auto and financial services and impressive performance by state-run banks and small banks along with better operating performance allowed India Inc to post a seven-quarter high earnings growth in the three months ended June 2023. But while net profits at 3,545 companies, including banks and financials, climbed 36.8% from a year earlier, revenue growth showed the ravages of inflation and came in low single digits. Some key sectors like IT, cement, chemicals and metals saw continuing challenges with their performance under stress owing to lower realizations, cost challenges and global demand constraints. With the outlook for global growth quite muted, the slowdown and defaults in China likely to see a prolonging of the oversupply in sectors like chemicals and commodities and interest rates continuing to be high, analysts are cautious about the outlook for the future profitability. | | | | Answer to the Question The compound Indigo dye has a distinctive blue color. IndiGo, the airline, features this color prominently on its aircraft and the uniforms of its crew. | | | Do you have any questions? Send in your queries to sundeepkkhanna@gmail.com Were you forwarded this email? Did you stumble upon it online? Sign up here. | | Written by Sundeep Khanna. Edited by Saikat Chatterjee. Produced by Shad Hasnain. Send in your feedback to newsletters@livemint.com. | | | | | Download the Mint app and read premium stories | | | | | | View in Browser | Privacy Policy | Contact us You received this email because you signed up for Mint Top of the Morning or because it is included in your subscription. 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