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Trading of S&P CNX Nifty futures on the Singapore stock exchange indicates a gain of 11 points at the opening bell. Asian shares eased on Thursday as investors turned increasingly cautious as hopes of stimulus action by central banks thinned ahead of a European Central Bank's meeting later in the day and after the US Federal Reserve took no action a day earlier. State Bank of India (SBI) and the National Scheduled Tribe Finance and Development Corporation (NSTFDC) on Wednesday, 1 August 2012, signed a Refinance Agreement for channelizing concessional loans to the Scheduled Tribes. Ambuja Cements on Wednesday said its cement dispatches rose 1.25% to 16.97 lakh tones in July 2012 over July 2011. Cement production rose 1.13% to 16.87 lakh tones in July 2012 over July 2011. Tata Motors' total sales (including exports) of Tata commercial and passenger vehicles rose 15% to 73,491 vehicles in July 2012 over July 2011. The company's domestic sales of Tata commercial and passenger vehicles rose 18% to 68,627 units in July 2012 over July 2011. Cumulative sales (including exports) during April-July 2012 rose 2% to 2.62 lakh units from the year ago period. Adani Enterprises turns ex-dividend today, 2 August 2012, for dividend of Rs 1 per share for the year ended 31 March 2012. Shares of power generation, power distribution and power transmission firms will be in focus after M. Veerappa Moily after taking charge of the power ministry on Wednesday, 1 August 2012, said his ministry will keep the momentum of generation of capacity addition to achieve the increased target of more than 80,000 MW during the XII Plan Five Year Plan. "I recognize that this would require firmer fuel supply arrangement than hitherto indicated and I am confident that with the efforts and cooperation of Ministry of Coal, the situation would improve and bankable Fuel Supply Agreements would be signed. I may also inform you that in the first year of the 12th Plan, the achievement so far has been 6,216 MW against a target of nearly 16,000 MW (excluding nuclear)", Mr. Moily said. Among the other challenges before the power sector today is the financial health of the Distribution Companies that need to be remedied for the long term sustainability of the sector, Mr. Moily said. "I am told that Distribution Companies, particularly in some states, are under huge financial stress and my endeavour would be to quickly finalise a debt restructuring scheme which is at present under inter-Ministerial consultations. I would seek the cooperation of the State Governments in taking long term measures, even if they appear stiff, for turning around the distribution utilities so that they could serve the consumers better", Mr. Moily said. He also said that the power ministry proposes to extend the coverage under the R-APDRP scheme to include more towns so that their power distribution system can be modernised and their distribution losses brought down to 15%. Under the Rajiv Gandhi Gramin VidyutikaranYojana, already 1.05 lac unelectrified villages have been covered and 1.97 crore BPL households provided free electricity connections. The balance from the Phase 1 of the programme, namely, 6000 odd villages and about 35 lakh BPL families will be completed this year itself, Mr. Moily said. Mahindra & Mahindra (M&M) and Telephonics Corporation (Telephonics) and a subsidiary of Griffon Corporation on Wednesday 1 August 2012 announced the formation of a joint venture (JV). The JV to be called Mahindra Telephonics Integrated Systems will provide the Indian Ministry of Defence and the Indian civil sector with radar and surveillance systems, identification friend or foe (IFF) devices and communication systems. In addition, the JV intends to provide systems for air traffic management services, homeland security and other emerging surveillance requirements. Key benchmark indices eked out small gains after witnessing intraday volatility on Wednesday, 1 August 2012. The BSE Sensex rose 21.20 points or 0.12% to settle at 17,257.38 on that day, its highest closing level since 19 July 2012. Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) bought shares worth Rs 441.46 crore on 1 August 2012, as per provisional figures on the stock exchanges. FIIs made substantial purchases of Indian stocks last month. FIIs bought shares worth net Rs 9691 crore from the secondary equity markets in July 2012. At least five low-intensity blasts hit Pune on Wednesday evening and sixth bomb was defused. The explosions took place between 19.28 and 19.35 IST during rush hour in the heart of the city. The blasts took place outside the Balgandharva auditorium used to stage plays, at a statue near that theatre, opposite a McDonalds outlet and near a bank. Incidentally, Sushil Kumar Shinde, who took over as Home Minister, was scheduled to be in the city on Wednesday night to preside over a prize-giving ceremony. The government on Wednesday formally allowed foreign direct investment (FDI) from Pakistan, the latest in a series of confidence building measures to build trust between the two nuclear-armed neighbours. Pakistani citizens and companies will be allowed to invest in all sectors apart from defence, space and atomic energy, a government statement said. The move to allow FDI from Pakistan had been announced by India's trade minister earlier this year. Shrinking export orders and sluggish output dragged Indian manufacturing growth in July down to its weakest pace since last November, a business survey showed on Wednesday. The HSBC manufacturing Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI), which gauges business activity at India's factories but not utilities, fell to 52.9 in July, from 55 in June -- its biggest one-month drop since September last year. Still, the index has remained above the 50 mark that divides growth and contraction for more than three years. Manufacturing accounts for around 15% of India's gross domestic product India's merchandise exports declined 5.45% to $25.06 billion in June 2012, data released by the Ministry of Commerce & Industry showed. Cumulative value of exports for the period April-June 2012 declined 1.7% to $75.20 billion from a year earlier. India's imports declined 13.46% to $35.37 billion in June 2012. Cumulative value of imports for the period April-June 2012 declined 6.1% to $115.25 billion from a year earlier. Oil imports declined 4.43% to $12.68 billion in June 2012. Oil imports during April-June 2012 rose 5.48% to $41.58 billion from a year earlier. Trade deficit narrowed to $10.30 billion in June 2012 from $14.36 billion a year earlier, according to the data. The trade deficit for April-June 2012 narrowed to $40.05 billion from $46.23 billion during April-June 2011. The government on Tuesday, 31 July 2012, announced a key cabinet reshuffle with Home Minister P. Chidambaram named as the new Finance Minister. Power minister Sushilkumar Shinde was named as the new Home Minister. Minister of Corporate Affairs M. Veerappa Moily has been assigned the additional charge of the Ministry of Power. The post of the Finance Minister was left empty after Pranab Mukherjee resigned from the post to contest Presidential election. Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh handled the Finance Ministry portfolio for a brief period after Pranab Mukherjee's resignation as Finance Minister on 26 June 2012. This is the third time that Chidambaram is holding the Finance Ministry portfolio. A panel of ministers on Tuesday, 31 July 2012, approved steps to contain the impact of a near-drought situation. The steps include providing diesel-price subsidies to farmers, increasing the subsidy on seed supplies, and removal of the import tax on oil meals, Farm Minister Sharad Pawar told reporters on Tuesday. He said there is a major decline in planting areas of rice, coarse cereals and lentils due to weak monsoon rains. The diesel-price subsidy announced by the government will be 50% on the sale price for drought-hit farmers and total expenditure would be around Rs 1260 crore, which would be shared equally by the central government and respective state governments. The monsoon rainfall until July 31 was 19% below the long-term average, with some areas getting little or no rain and some others seeing excessive rain and flooding. There will be an impact on foodgrain output, but it is too early to give any estimate, Mr. Pawar said. The worst affected states due to scanty rains are Punjab, Haryana, Karnataka, and parts of Maharashtra and Gujarat, he added. Punjab and Haryana are major rice producers. Maharashtra and Gujarat are major producers of oilseeds and cotton. With the monsoon season almost halfway through, India is facing the prospect of a full-blown drought in some of its provinces. Mr. Pawar said the government will raise subsidies for the supply of various seeds for alternate crops in affected areas. Minister of State for Agriculture Harish Rawat early this week said rainfall in August, a critical month for summer crops, is likely to be 84%-85% of the long-term average, below the previous forecast of 96%. The monsoon rains--which make up around 70% of India's annual rainfall--are crucial to the nation's agriculture sector and broader economy. More than 60% of the country's farmland is rain-fed. The timing, distribution and quantity of rainfall are all important for crops. The four-month southwest monsoon season that starts from June accounts for almost 70% of total annual moisture that Indian soil receives in a year. A bad monsoon will have a larger impact on inflation than on growth as agriculture output constitutes a relatively small portion of India's economy, Indian central bank officials said on Wednesday, 1 August 2012, in a conference call following the release of its monetary policy review on Tuesday, 31 July 2012. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Tuesday, 31 July 2012, kept its key policy rate viz. the repo rate unchanged at 8% after first quarter review of Monetary Policy 2012-13 in an effort to keep a lid on inflation and inflation expectations. The RBI, however, lowered banks' statutory liquidity ratio, or the part of deposits that must be invested mainly in government bonds, by a percentage point to 23% to ensure that liquidity pressures do not constrain the flow of credit to productive sectors of the economy. RBI Governor D Subbarao on Wednesday said India's current account deficit in the current fiscal year may be lower than the record $78.2 billion figure posted in the financial year that ended March 31. RBI Deputy Governor Subir Gokarn said on Wednesday the maturities of the currency forward contracts sold by the central bank as part of its intervention to protect the Indian rupee were evenly distributed. He added that he doesn't foresee a liquidity crunch in the domestic banking system when the RBI has to sell foreign currency and buy rupees to redeem the contracts. Principal adviser to the Planning Commission Pronab Sen last week said slowing investment due to weak confidence in the economy is hurting growth. Mr. Sen said Indian companies aren't facing any shortage of funds. Many of them are sitting on piles of cash and aren't even repatriating overseas borrowings, he added. The government should take steps to meet the fiscal deficit target set out in the budget and that would improve sentiment and revive investments, Mr. Sen said. He said the government should scale back its spending and slash subsidies on fuels, food and fertilizers to help check its budget deficit. Slowing growth in investment remains a cause for concern for India. Investment makes up 35% of India's economic activity. The services purchasing managers' index for July 2012 is expected to be released tomorrow, 3 August 2012. HSBC's services purchasing managers' index, which gauges the activity of around 400 firms in India, dropped to 54.3 in June from 54.7 in May. However, it has kept above the 50 mark that signifies growth since November. Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh has decided to refer the issue of implications on FIIs and portfolio investors of the amendment made to the Income Tax Act relating to the taxation of non-resident transfer of assets where the underlying asset is in India to the Expert Committee on anti-avoidance tax proposal viz. the General Anti-Avoidance Rules (GAAR). "It is necessary to have clarity on the tax liability of portfolio investors and foreign institutional investors as a result of this amendment particularly when the investment is made through a registered stock exchange in accordance with SEBI guidelines and purely in the form of portfolio investment", the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) said in a statement issued Monday, 30 July 2012. Any clarification needs to be harmonised with the GAAR guidelines and will have to address any residual concerns outside of GAAR, the PMO said. Dr. Singh last month constituted an expert committee on anti-avoidance tax proposal viz. the General Anti-Avoidance Rules (GAAR) to undertake stakeholder consultations and finalise the guidelines for GAAR by 30 September 2012. An India-Mauritius joint panel will discuss a series of proposals to review the double taxation avoidance treaty between the two nations on 22-24 August in Mauritius. India has been looking to negotiate the double taxation avoidance agreement with Mauritius for the past few years to check so-called round tripping and other potential abuses. Round tripping entails moving money out of one country to another, and getting it back under the garb of foreign capital. Capital gains tax is close to zero in Mauritius and almost 40% of investments into India come through the island nation. Under the bilateral agreement, capital gains from sale of securities can be taxed only in Mauritius. The India-Mauritius joint working group will also discuss the inclusion of a so-called limitation of benefit clause, similar to the Singapore tax treaty with India, to ensure only genuine Mauritius-based companies are benefited. India's tax agreement with Singapore says that only those companies that spend a minimum of $200,000 (about Rs 1 crore) in Singapore can avail the benefits of the treaty. Sanctity of tax residency certificates issued by a country to companies operating in its jurisdiction to enable the firms to claim tax benefits under various treaties is another issue between India and Mauritius. While India in this year's national budget said the certificates are a necessary but not sufficient condition, Mauritius wants those issued by it honoured. Draft guidelines issued by Indian government for implementing the controversial anti-avoidance tax proposal viz. the GAAR state that GAAR provisions should be invoked on a foreign institutional investor (FII), if it chooses to take a treaty benefit, but would not in any case be invoked in the case of the non-resident investors of the FII. The draft guidelines suggested that the onus of proving wrongdoing should be on the authorities. Voting for the country's new vice president takes places on 7 August 2012 -- a day before the monsoon session of parliament kicks off. The monsoon session of the parliament will begin on 8 August 2012 and the session will conclude on 7 September 2012, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Pawan Kumar Bansal said on Wednesday, 18 July 2012. The government hasn't yet finalized the agenda for the session, but the expectation is that Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh -- who took charge of the finance ministry after Mr. Pranab Mukherjee resigned to contest the presidential elections -- will try and push through long-pending legislations. These could include the Direct Tax Code and the insurance, pension and banking bills. The government would also place before lawmakers the first demand for additional spending for this fiscal year which began April 1. Corporate affairs minister Veerappa Moily said in a newspaper interview published on 11 July 2012 that the government is hopeful of the passage of the pension bill in the monsoon session of parliament. Investors' focus is currently on Q1 June 2012 earnings. DLF and Steel Authority of India unveil Q1 results on 6 August 2012. Mahindra & Mahindra and Bharti Airtel unveil Q1 results on 8 August 2012. Tata Motors and Ranbaxy Laboratories unveil quarterly results on 9 August 2012. State Bank of India, Sun Pharmaceuticals Industries, Siemens and BPCL announce quarterly results on 10 August 2012. ONGC announces Q1 results on 11 August 2012. Tata Steel and Coal India unveil Q1 results on 13 August 2012. Hindalco Industries and IDFC will unveil Q1 results on 14 August 2012. Asian shares eased on Thursday as investors turned increasingly cautious as hopes of stimulus action by central banks thinned ahead of a European Central Bank's meeting later in the day and after the US Federal Reserve took no action a day earlier. Key benchmark indices in China, Hong Kong, South Korea, Singapore, and Taiwan fell by between 0.02% to 0.4%. Key benchmark indices in Japan and Indonesia rose by between 0.31% to 0.5%. China's central bank drained a net 86 billion yuan ($13.6 billion) from the banking system this week via its regular open-market operations, highlighting its concerns that inflation may rebound later this year despite recent data showing the country's July manufacturing activity undershot market expectations. Premier Wen Jiabao warned on Tuesday that China's economic growth continues to face downward pressure and called for more efforts to enhance policy fine-tuning to ensure growth. Mr. Wen's comments came one day before data issued Wednesday showed China's official manufacturing Purchasing Managers Index fell in July for a third consecutive month to 50.1 compared with 50.2 in June. That was the least since November last year. The Governing Council of the European Central Bank (ECB) holds a monthly monetary policy review on interest rates for the euro area on today, 2 August 2012. Resistance by German officials to resuming ECB purchases of distressed government bonds has dampened expectations somewhat for big measures from ECB. ECB is widely expected to leave interest rates unchanged after it cut the benchmark one-week lending rate to a fresh record low last month. ECB President Mario Draghi last week said that the bank would do whatever was needed to save the euro. The Monetary Policy Committee of Bank of England also holds a monthly policy meeting on interest rates in the United Kingdom (UK) today. Germany's Federal Constitutional Court will announce a decision on lawsuits challenging the country's participation in the permanent euro-zone rescue fund, the European Stability Mechanism, and the fiscal pact on 12 September 2012. The court held a public hearing earlier this month to examine complaints that participation in the fund and the fiscal pact violated German law by taking some authority over the national budget away from parliament. US stocks fell on Wednesday after the Federal Reserve took no new monetary stimulus after a two-day policy meeting. The Federal Reserve stopped short of offering new monetary stimulus on Wednesday even as it signaled further bond buying could be in store to help a US economic recovery that it said had lost momentum this year. Fed officials described the economy as having "decelerated somewhat," a change of tone from its previous assessment in June when it said the economy had been "expanding moderately". The Fed's policymakers also reiterated their disappointment with the slow pace of progress in bringing down the nation's 8.2 percent jobless rate. "The Committee will closely monitor incoming information on economic and financial developments and will provide additional accommodation as needed," the Fed said in its statement. A report on Wednesday showed US companies added 163,000 jobs in July, more than expected. Separately, manufacturing data from the Institute for Supply Management pointed to a second month of contraction in the factory sector. Data on weekly jobless claims in the US and data on factory orders are due for release on Thursday, 2 August 2012. US retailers will also unveil monthly same-store sales data today. The influential US government data on non-farm payroll for July 2012 is due tomorrow, 3 August 2012. In June, the United States created 80,000 jobs, the third straight month of job growth of under 100,000.