ONGC's 42.8 cr shares FPO to open on Sept 20

Finally after several postponements, follow-on public offer of state-run Oil and Natural Gas Corporation(ONGC) will open for subscription on September 20, 2011.

Government will offer 42.8 crore shares through this FPO, which will close on September 23. A total of 8.5 crore shares are reserved for employees of the company.

After the news, the share erased some gains to trade at Rs 258.40, up just 0.56%, with volumes of 6,628,580 shares. It was up nearly 2%.

If we consider FPO price at Rs 250 a share, the issue size comes to Rs 10,700 crore. Market capitalisation of the company stands at Rs 221,073.86 crore.

In the financial year 2010-11, the company reported sales turnover of Rs 66,154.88 crore and net profit of Rs 18,924.00 crore.

Oil & gas, tech, capital goods push Sensex in green

The market bounced back in the afternoon trade led by oil & gas, technology, capital goods and auto (four-wheeler) stocks. European markets, which lost 3.5-5% yesterday, too gained further on the back of short covering; France's CAC, Germany's DAX and Britain's FTSE were up over 1%.

The 30-share BSE Sensex was trading at 16,753, up 39 points and the 50-share NSE Nifty rose 13 points to 5,029. But the market breadth was in favour of declines; about 616 shares gained while 784 shares dropped.

Reliance Industries recovered all its losses and gained over 2%. ONGC too rose nearly 2%.

In the technology space, TCS, HCL Tech and Wipro were up 1-2%; Infosys went up 0.5%. M&M, Tata Motors and Maruti from auto pack rallied 2-3%.

BHEL, HDFC Bank, HDFC, Kotak Mahindra Bank, L&T, Axis Bank, SAIL and Hindalco were other gainers.

Gold hits record high of Rs 28350/10 gms

India's benchmark gold futures jumped nearly 2% on Monday afternoon to hit a record high of Rs 28,350, buoyed by a rally in the world market and on a weak rupee.

At 2:42 pm, the October contract on the Multi Commodity Exchange rose 1.96% to Rs 28,334 per 10 grams.

Moser Baer approves raising up to $125 mn

Loss-making Moser Baer India has approved raising up to USD 125 million by issuing equity or bonds in India or overseas, the compact disc maker said on Monday, sending its shares up as much as 4.8%.

The company has also approved getting into a consulting agreement with France-based Harcourt, it said in a statement to the Bombay Stock Exchange, without giving details.

Moser Baer, the world's second-biggest maker of optical storage media, has been posting losses for the last five quarters, and has been forced to look more aggressively at expanding its solar business.

Moser Baer shares, valued at Rs 370 crore, were up about 1% at Rs 22.30 at 12:40 pm. They earlier touched a high of Rs 23.15.

Not possible to deregulate diesel at current prices

Although the government is keen on deregulating diesel, it has remained a distant dream for it.

In an interview to CNBC-TV18, RPN Singh, Minister of State of Petroleum & Natural Gas said, it is not possible to deregulate diesel at current prices.

However, he said, the Finance Ministry is keen on deregulating diesel and may do so, if prices cool off. 

He further said, the government will not deregulate kerosene and domestic LPG. “We will continue to subsidise kerosene and domestic LPG,” he added.

The government, he said, is mulling options to bring down oil marketing companies' (OMCs) under-recoveries and is looking at limiting subsidised cylinder supply.

Commenting on KG basin, he said, it is unfortunate that the gas production has fallen. “We are monitoring the natural gas production in KG basin. We are certain that RILwill manage to up the gas production.”