News digest: LTCG tax, monetary policy review, stock markets, and more
LTCG shadow looms large over Tata group's plan to reduce cross-holdings The long-term capital gains (LTCG) tax, proposed in the Union Budget 2018-19, will make it costly for the Tata group to consolidate promoter holdings in various listed companies owned by Tata Sons, the group’s holding company, from the next financial year, 2018-19. Read more. Monetary policy: RBI to pause for sure on Feb 7, but for how much longer? The monetary policy announcement on February 7 will be one of the most critical ones in recent times for analysts because it will set the stage for the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI’s) course of action. The policy, coming a week after the Budget,
could reverse the rate-cutting cycle for good and may hint at the central bank turning hawkish. Read more. Multiple factors to keep markets on tenterhooks after Friday's fall Market players are worried about the direction the stock markets will take this week, following Friday’s bloodbath in US equities and the correction in bond prices. The yield on the benchmark 10-year treasury note touched a four-year high as fears of inflation and aggressive rate hikes by the US Federal Reserve spooked investors. Read more. India may use BEPS route to tax digital entities like Google, Facebook Sensing that the Union Budget’s intention to tax Facebook, Netflix, or Google may take years to materialise, India may propose it strongly under the international tax framework of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. The framework, technically called the multilateral instrument (MLI) to implement tax-related measures to prevent base erosion and profit shifting (BEPS), will avoid the need to amend individual bilateral treaties. Read more. Nabh Nirman project: Rs 2-trn bill to manage the rush in Indian skies The government is planning to start a massive airport building project, in a move to handle the rush in Indian skies. The project would mean 100 new airports in the next 10 years, preparing the country to handle one-billion air trips per year. The plan, Nabh (NextGen Airports for Bharat) Nirman, roughly outlined by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley in his Budget speech, will entail an expenditure of Rs 2 trillion and will see India easing its regulations to attract global airport construction companies as well as a possible public listing of the Airports Authority of India (AAI). Read more.