Coal India will be watched as govt starts restructuring process

Coal India (CIL) will be in focus after the Ministry of Coal after trading hours on Tuesday, 8 January 2013, said it has invited Expression of Interest (EoI) for providing consultancy for restructuring of CIL, a Maharatna Public Sector Undertaking. The planning Commission and a number of high level committees have recommended restructuring of CIL keeping in view the rapidly increasing demand for coal and the need for enhancing coal production and to make the coal industry competitive in the rapidly changing economic scenario, the coal ministry said. Since establishment of CIL in 1975, there have been significant changes in the energy policy of the country particularly after the onset of economic liberalization in the early 1990s. The coal sector has been partially opened for private investment to captive consumption. Coal development policy has evolved over a period of time leading to doing away with the administrative price mechanism/decontrol of coal price and distribution, empowerment of performing public sector coal companies, etc, the coal ministry said. State-run Bank of India after trading hours on Tuesday, 8 January 2013, said that the board of directors of the bank has approved the raising of Tier-I capital of the bank by issue fresh equity shares to the Government of India (promoters) or to other investors, on preferential basis or otherwise, subject to necessary approvals. IndusInd Bank and Gujarat NRE Coke will declare their October-December 2012 quarter results today, 9 January 2013. Shares of PSU OMCs will be watched after media report suggested that the government is planning to hike the price of subsidised LPG cylinders — capped at six a year — by Rs 130 during January-March 2013. It also plans to hike diesel prices by Rs 1.5 a litre every month, which will take the hike to Rs 4.5 a litre during the period. On kerosene, the proposal is that the prices be either increased by Rs 0.35 a litre per month or Re 1 a litre per quarter till March 2015, report added. PSU OMCs are currently (effective 1 January 2013) incurring daily under-recovery of about Rs 389 crore on the sale of diesel, PDS kerosene and domestic LPG. Shares of aluminium makers will be in focus as US aluminum giant Alcoa Inc. swung to a fourth-quarter profit and said it expects global aluminum demand to grow 7% in 2013, compared with 6% in 2012. Alcoa's results were announced after trading hours in the United States on Tuesday, 8 January 2013. Shares of shipping companies will be in focus after the Baltic Dry Index, which tracks rates to ship dry commodities, jumped 3% in London on Tuesday, 8 January 2013. The board of JK Cement has approved issuing equity shares worth upto to Rs 200 crore, with a greenshoe option, to qualified institutional buyers (QIB), subject to shareholder's approval. The company will seek shareholders' approval at an extraordinary general meeting on 9 February 2013.