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NHAI slashes market borrowing goal
New Delhi: The National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) has slashed its market borrowing target for the current year by more than half.

While the budgetary target for market borrowings for the current year was Rs8,500 crore, the NHAI had revised its target to Rs4,082 crore, ministry officials said.

This is the second year in a row that the NHAI will not meet its market borrowing goals. Last year, against a target of Rs3,300 crore, NHAI did not raise any funds at all.

At the same time the government imposed a 50-paise additional fuel cess during the current year exclusively for development of national highways.

Compared with 40 per cent of the project cost support earmarked for the build-operate-transfer project, the average viability gap funding till now has been 15 per cent of the project cost. This had enabled the authority to have spare funds, the officials said.
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Patni Computer debuts at NYSE
Patni Computer Systems has made its debut on the US bourses. Its ADS listed on the NYSE under `PTI' symbol. The ADR closed at $23.84 against the issue price of $20.34. Each ADS represents two equity shares.
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Metal prices at all-time high
New Delhi: Prices of precious and base metals are at all time new highs.

Copper prices globally are at an all-time high, platinum is at a 25-year high, gold at 24-year high, silver at 18-year high, zinc at 16-year high, aluminium at 10-year high and tin at eight-year high.

According to a note by Barclays' Capital, an international brokerage, internationally, the demand for commodity investments is showing no signs of subsiding.

Short positions held by speculators in the US commodity markets is more than ever before. This indicates that funds have started increasing their exposure to commodities, which seem to have emerged as a good hedge against inflation.

While correction is expected in most commodities, as these are highly overbought, analysts say a slight downward movement in the short-term is imperative for a sustained upward swing in the longer term.
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Governmentt to earn Rs1,500 crore higher PSU dividend
New Delhi: The government may get richer by an additional Rs1,500 crore this fiscal, due to dividend payouts by state-run companies. It is estimated that dividend earnings from PSUs may touch Rs18,000 crore against budget estimates of Rs16,090 crore.

Major contributors to the central kitty will include profit-making companies like BHEL, ONGC, GAIL, NTPC, SAIL, BSNL, MTNL, NALCO, HAL and IRFC. ONGC in particular raked in record profits due to rising crude oil prices. Oil marketing PSUs, however, will be paying lesser dividends than before, as they were already facing pressure due to under-recoveries, sources said.

The government's budget estimate for this fiscal was Rs23,500 crore, of which Rs16,090 crore was expected as dividend from PSUs. The estimated earnings from financial entities and RBI will was nearly Rs7,400 crore . Profits mainly from the RBI are likely to go up to nearly Rs8,000 crore. It hopes to mop up, at least,
Rs25,000 crore as opposed to the estimated Rs23,500 crore. The government has already written to the cash rich PSUs to consider mid-year payouts in the form of interim or special dividends and bonus issues.

A decision on interim payouts will be taken after the board meetings of PSUs this month.
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