Reliance Industries Q4 net dips 9 percent to rupees 3,546 crore

Reliance Industries (RIL), India’s largest private company by market capitalisation, on Thursday reported a 9.4% drop in its quarterly net profit, on falling fuel demand and thinning crude processing margins.

The company’s net profit for Q4 of FY09 stood at Rs 3,546 crore, compared to Rs 3,912 crore in Q4 of 2007-08 . The profits were aided by a one-time gain of Rs 993 crore in the quarter from interest on cash balance and an insurance claim of Rs 60 crore.

Reliance made a one-time provision of Rs 370 crore towards estimated claims on subsidiaries, it said, without elaborating. Before providing for the claims, profits stood at Rs 3,874 crore. Sales for the quarter dipped 24.9% to Rs 29,073 crore from 38,697 crore.

To read the full article, click here..
The read the ePaper, visit: http://epaper.financialexpress.com

Fearing meltdown, Fed bails out American International Group Inc with $85-billion package

The US government took control of American International Group Inc (AIG) in an $85-billion bailout to prevent the bankruptcy of that nation's biggest insurer and the worst financial collapse in history. The Federal Reserve will provide a two-year loan, take 79.9% of the New York-based company's stock and replace its management because " a disorderly failure of AIG could add to already significant levels of financial market fragility",according to a statement by the US central bank late on Tuesday.

The dollar fell against the yen as the Fed's bailout of AIG failed to quell concern that credit losses will deepen. AIG unravelled as the worst housing crisis since the Great Depression led to more than $18 billion in losses over the past year. A meltdown could have cost the financial industry $180 billion, according to RBC Capital Markets, because AIG provided insurance on more than $441 billion of fixed-income investments held by the world's biggest institutions, including $57.8billion in securities tied to sub prime mortgages.

The government is lending AIG the money at 8.5 percentage points above the three month Libor, or a current rate of about 11.5%.

To read the full article, click here..
To read the ePaper, visit: http://epaper.financialexpress.com