Casino king ready to gamble big on India

Las Vegas Sands Corporation, operator of Asia’s biggest gambling resort, will consider spending $12 billion to build a strip of casinos in India similar to its project in Macau, chairman Sheldon Adelson said.

“We would like to build a Cotai Strip in India,” US billionaire businessman Adelson told reporters at a briefing in Macau on Thursday. “We would be happy to spend $12 billion there” if India invites the company, he said. Adelson didn’t give details of the potential investment. India now has only one legal casino, in Goa.

The Las Vegas (Nevada) based Sands is investing more than $15 billion to build casinos in Singapore and in Macau, the only place in China where casinos are legal, as gambling revenue growth in its home market slows. The company and rival Wynn Resorts Ltd, also headquartered in Las Vegas, are vying for the casino market in Asia, where economic growth is faster than in the US and Europe.

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Sebi mulls lower entry level for fast-track issues

More relief may be round the corner for companies making public issues. After unveiling the twin measures of easing the pricing norms for qualified institutional placements (QIPs) and collapsing the rights issue timelines, market regulator Securities & Exchange Board of India (Sebi) is considering lowering the market capitalisation threshold for fast-track issuances by companies to make such issues easier to execute.

The regulator had, in August 2007, unveiled norms for fast-track issuance of securities (FTIs), a simplified process for making public issues, where it had set a condition that such issues would be allowed in the case of companies that had an average free float market capitalisation of at least Rs 10,000 crore or more during the previous year.

Companies and industry associations have petitioned Sebi to reduce this threshold to Rs 5,000 crore, so that the relatively small companies can find capital raising easier in the present choppy market conditions.

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Broking biz is Mohanlal's new company

Unabashed by setbacks in several business ventures, Malayalam cinema superstar Mohanlal has now launched a broking firm co-partnering Fedex Securities and four others.

Kozhikode-based Baby Marine Exports, Smart Financial, Thakker Group and SM Hegde of Videocon partner Mohanlal and Fedex in the new venture titled Hedge Equities. In the launch function held here on Monday, The promoters claimed that the company will enable customers reap rich profits regardless of market swings.

Hedge Equities plans to open 16 branches in Kerala.The promoters claimed that only 5% of the population in Kerala invests in stocks as compared to 40% in Mumbai and Gujarat. The focus of the firm is likely to be south India, where the actor could help in communicating with the target audience.

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Why are you so different from your mother?

Ever wondered why the daughter is often different from the mother even though both have the same genetic material? Well, a new study has revealed how this happens in yeast cells.

In their study, a team at Northwestern University has discovered a new mechanism for cell fate determination–how one cell, the daughter, becomes dramatically different from the mother.

In fact, the study of yeast has shown why mothers and daughters differ in how they express their genes, the ‘PloS Biology' journal reported.

Many of the fundamental mechanisms for cell division in yeast are conserved, or very similar, in mammals;many of the proteins involved in human disease are related to proteins that are involved in yeast cell division.

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Foreign investors face hard math on Third Generation entry

Third generation (3G) services, which provides for faster data download and video streaming, would be a tough call for foreign telecom firms as the investment would not make economic sense for them.

The new players would have to invest upwards of Rs 17,000 crore to support a measly customer base of 50 lakh.

Since they would have to provide voice and data on a 2.1 GHz spectrum, the quality of service would also suffer.

Though none of the global telecom firms were willing to come on record, they expressed such concerns off the record to FE.

This is how the numbers work: Any global telecom player with experience in 3G services, if gets the 2.1 GHz spectrum through the auction, would first have to acquire a mandatory universal access service licence (UASL).

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Audi R8 sold out in India before launch

With 15 orders already in the bag for its super luxury R8 sports car scheduled for launch in November, German luxury car maker Audi AG says the model is sold out for this year. Priced at Rs 1.3 crore in India, the R8 will be imported directly from Germany and will not be available for test drives. The car will not go through homologation or approval by the authorities due to the low volumes. Bookings for the car started in June.

“In Germany, people have to wait for months for delivery of the R8. Since the car is partly handmade, the numbers are limited. The car is almost sold out globally this year,” said an Audi spokesperson on the sidelines of the opening of the new corporate sales office of Volkswagen and Audi here on Wednesday. There are at present only two or three R8s on Indian roads bought through direct imports.

A total of 2,952 units of the R8 were sold worldwide. With a mid-engine, the 420-horse power vehicle has permanent all-wheel drive and an all-aluminum space frame body.

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Air services unaffected but Kolkata grounded

The country-wide 12-hour strike call given by the central public sector trade unions left air services in the country largely unaffected.

The country's two busiest airports,New Delhi and Mumbai, were barely affected as they were privately run and had a contingency plan in place. The Kolkata airport was the worst affected with most international and domestic flights scheduled for take-off or landing on Wednesday either postponed or eventually cancelled.

Nearly 15,000 workers baggage handlers, cleaners and ground staff-at127 government-run airports walked off their jobs early Wednesday morning.

In Delhi, Airports Authority of India officials said going by the number of flights across the country, the schedules were running" almost normally".

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Advance tax growth slows

The economic slowdown appears to be casting its shadow over corporate profitability expectations. So while direct tax proceeds have almost doubled in the first four months of the fiscal,the advance tax kitty has not risen proportionately.

While corporate collections from direct tax up to end-July increased by 46.95% over the previous fiscal, advance tax collections rose by a mere 18%. Until July 31 this year, the government netted Rs 23,500 crore in advance tax, against Rs 19,900 crore in the same period a year earlier. In 2007, advance tax collections from the first installment increased 35%, against Rs 14,700 crore up to July 31,2006.

"There has been an increase in corporate advance tax collections, but it is lower than what was recorded last fiscal," an official source told FE.

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EAC sees monetary tightening

Even as global ratings agency Moody's warned on Monday that India's sovereign ratings outlook could be lowered (from the current ‘stable' outlook) if the country's fiscal policy fails to check external shocks or aggravates inflation concerns, the government is finally beginning to accept the prospect of economic growth moderating to around 8% this fiscal, from 9.0% GDP growth in 2007-08.

The Prime Minister's Economic Advisory Council (EAC), in its upcoming economic outlook report, is likely to pare GDP growth projections for 200809 to 7.5-8%, from its earlier estimate of 8.5%. The key reasons for tempering expectations, according to the EAC, are soaring inflation, rising crude oil prices, as well as the slowdown in industrial activity and food grain supplies.

In its quarterly review of monetary policy last week, where key rates were raised again, the Reserve Bank of India already lowered GDP growth projections to 8% from its earlier estimate of 8 8.5%. The EAC's economic outlook report is expected to suggest further tightening of monetary policy. So, another round of rate hikes appears imminent, say government officials.

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Airbus, Boeing see sharp growth in Indian demand

Despite a slowdown in the economy and the aviation sector, Airbus and Boeing have projected a sharp growth in the demand for aircraft in India. Close on the heels of Boeing predicting that India will need 1,001 aircraft in the next 20 years, Airbus has forecast that the sector will require 1,100 aircraft in the next 25 years.

Says Justin Dubon, regional press manager for Airbus, "India is a promising market for us.

Our forecast takes into account the industry's near-term challenges, including surging fuel prices and slowing air traffic growth. Yet, we foresee a strong demand for aircraft because India is the third largest in terms of purchasing power parity.It is also projected to be the seventh largest economy by 2017." It has predicted that the Indian market will need 1,100 passenger and freighter aircraft valued at $105 billion over the next 25 years. Since 2005, Airbus has bagged over 295 orders from Indian carriers valued roughly at $22billion.

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