Suzlon Group Company wins 150MW order in US:

RE Power Systems SE, the German unit of Indian wind turbine supplier Suzlon Group, said on Thursday that it has won an order to supply 73 turbines with an overall power output of 150MW.

The order, from an unnamed US wind power developer based on the east coast of the country, are destined for a project in Oklahoma. This is the group’s second largest project in the US market.

“This order once again underscores our strong competitive positioning as a group in the US market. With our competitive product portfolio, extensive service capabilities and a robust track record, we are well positioned to grab opportunities in the high growth expected in the US market in 2012,” Suzlon group chairman Tulsi Tanti said in an exchange filing.

The delivery and initial operation of the turbines is planned for the second half of 2012.

The world’s fifth-largest wind turbine maker and its subsidiaries had a collective order backlog of 4,734MW, worth around $6.5 billion as on 21 October. It has since announced additional orders worth 997.5MW, including the current order.

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Gujarat International Finance Tech-City or GIFT is an under-construction city in the Indian state of Gujarat. Work on the proposed Rs 78,000-crore nano city has now started, and the first occupant may move in by March.

By the time the first phase is completed in three-and-a-half years, this special economic zone (SEZ) would have tried out, on a small scale, some contemporary urban design ideas.

GIFT would have a command and control centre to monitor the IT infrastructure and respond quickly during emergencies (a fire anywhere, for example, will trigger an automatic response). The city will use the energy-efficient district cooling system instead of air-conditioning.

It will also use an automated waste collection system that sucks away garbage from buildings at high speed. Says GIFT Director Ramakant Jha: "We will now try on a pilot scale many technologies that will be used when the city is developed fully."

District cooling, which uses chilled water to cool buildings, is being tried in a few places such as Toronto, Cornell University and Masdar City in Abu Dhabi. Its proponents say the technology consumes 90% less energy compared with traditional air-conditioning.

In automated vacuum waste collection systems, garbage is sorted out and then sucked away at high speed through underground tubes to a central location, which can be as far as 20 km away. It is being used in cities such as London, Montreal, Stockholm and Barcelona. No Indian city has these technologies yet.

GIFT was conceived in 2007 and the idea was developed initially by a set of consultants such as McKinsey and urban development specialist Fairwood Consultants. It is being planned as a top-notch global financial centre to rival London, New York and Hong Kong.


The stock exchanges of London, Tokyo and Singapore have evinced interest in setting up offices in GIFT, as have many Indian banks. Singapore Co-operation Enterprises, a government agency, has just signed an agreement with GIFT to develop a banking enclave.

"Liberty to transact in foreign currency at the IFSC in GIFT will significantly raise foreign firms' investment and participation in India," says SS Thakur, former chairman of HDFC and former controller of foreign exchange in the Reserve Bank of India. Similar financial centres in Hong Kong, Dubai, China, Malaysia, the UK (London) and the US (New York) contribute 5-60% of GDP of their respective countries. GIFT is expected to create 10 lakh jobs in 10 years.

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LAP commonly known as property loan is a loan provided by the bank/financial institution against the mortgage of your property (residential or commercial) provided the same has not been put up as security for any other purpose. LAP differs from a mortgage/home loan which is a taken to buy a property. LAP is a loan taken by putting up the existing property as a security against the loan.

When you find yourself in a spot of bother as far as finances are concerned, due to medical emergencies or losses in business or requirements to fund your child’s education or any other need, let not liquidation/sale of assets be your only option to solve the current cash flow problems. Financial markets now provide several loan products that will help you to keep intact your assets but at the same time provide you with the finances you need to tide over the situation. Some of the products available include personal loans and Loan against property (LAP)

Personal loans:

These are loans given to individuals without any security, collateral or guarantor on the same. Hence they are unsecured loans. The quantum of loan to be given will be based on the credit rating and the monthly income of the individual. The processing of this loan is very quick because of minimal paper work. The rate of interest on this type of loan is very high and is second only to the interest rates charged by credit card companies.

When is a personal best taken?

If there is an urgent need for cash, personal loans may be an option because of the quick processing.
Paying off your credit card dues because the interest charged on credit cards is very high. Therefore taking a personal loan may reduce the amount of interest that you will pay. Personal loans are very expensive and should be resorted to only if you have no other choice and you are in need of short-term cash.

Loan against property (LAP)  :

LAP commonly known as property loan is a loan provided by the bank/financial institution against the mortgage of your property (residential or commercial) provided the same has not been put up as security for any other purpose. LAP differs from a mortgage/home loan which is a taken to buy a property. LAP is a loan taken by putting up the existing property as a security against the loan. The maximum loan amount would be anywhere in the range of 40% and 60% depending on the market conditions and other factors. The borrower can either opt for an overdraft option where he is required to pay interest only on the amount withdrawn or a lump sum loan amount. The disadvantage of an overdraft facility is that the interest rate charged may be higher, in some cases up to 0.5% and also annual processing fees will be charged. Besides, if you want the overdraft facility, you have to take the loan only from the bank as other financial institutions do not offer saving/current account. In case of a lump sum loan, processing fees are charged only once when the loan is taken and also the individual can approach either a bank or financial institution for the loan.

When is an LAP best taken?

• Long tenure loans: For individuals requiring funding for a long periods of time, LAP can come very handy because the tenure of these loans can be a maximum period of 15 years
• Large Loan amount: Individuals requiring substantial funds also should consider this loan option as a large loan is possible. Of course it depends on the property value. There is no restriction as in case of personal loans where the maximum loan permissible is Rs. 10 lakhs.
• Lower rate of interest: On account of the security provided in terms of the house, the rate of interest charged by banks tends to be much lower than personal loans

Macquarie Research has cut its 2012-13 GDP forecast to 6.9% from 7.9% citing lack of policy reforms and lagged impact of monetary policy tightening
The knives are out and they are chopping economic growth forecasts. Each day brings more news which confirms the trend of a slowing economy. The fact that economic growth will slow down in the current financial year and the government will miss its fiscal deficit target is a no-brainer.

Now, the pundits are gazing still further into the future. The picture they see is gloomier. Macquarie Research has cut its 2012-13 GDP forecast to 6.9% from 7.9% citing lack of policy reforms and lagged impact of monetary policy tightening.

Tanvee Gupta Jain of Macquarie said in a note: Incorporating the lack of policy reforms and the lagged impact of monetary tightening in the context of a continued weak global economic environment, we are now downgrading our FY13 GDP growth forecast to 6.9% from 7.9% ‘with downside risks’ estimated earlier. While the global environment is likely to remain uncertain, we believe domestic factors will dominate the growth outlook.

Macquarie is not the only one. Ambit Capital on 17 October has cut its next year GDP growth forecast to 6.2% from an earlier estimate of 7.2%.

Ritika Mankar of Ambit Capital said in a note: We are cutting our GDP growth forecast … as the persistence of macroeconomic uncertainty translates into weak investment demand growth which in turn affects industrial sector growth and services sector growth.

Note that economists are shying away from cutting current year forecasts. Motilal Oswal in its report dated 11 November has downgraded the current year GDP growth estimate to 7.2% from 7.6% earlier. BNP Paribas has sounded even more pessimistic. It expects the economy to witness ‘hardish landing.’

Richard Iley of BNP Paribas said in a note: While any marked improvement in WPI inflation is still a few months away, the latest activity data confirms that our long-held expectation for a hardish landing for the economy is now materialising. Given our forecast for a US recession and stagnation in the euro zone, GDP growth looks on course to drop below 7% in the coming quarters.

Richard Iley adds further: The risk is that the RBI’s revised growth projection is still too optimistic. Our GDP forecasts have been well below consensus since at least early summer. Current targets are for growth of just 7.2% for 2011-12 and 7.1% for 2012-13.

EU parliament gives final approval to short-selling law. European Commission to debate sovereign ratings “blackouts”
The European Union pushed ahead with its regulatory crackdown on Tuesday by giving the green light to curbs on trading sovereign-debt related derivatives at the heart of the euro zone crisis.

The bloc’s financial services chief Michel Barnier will also unveil a measure at 1400 GMT to inject competition into the credit ratings sector dominated by the Big Three: Standard & Poor’s, Moody’s and Fitch Ratings.

Many EU policymakers are keen to push ahead with the new rules, saying a ratings downgrade of Greek sovereign debt in 2010 made it more expensive and harder to mount the country’s first bailout package.

The mistaken downgrade by S&P of France’s banking industry system will reinforce the EU’s determination to regulate agencies more closely, Barnier said last week.

The draft law, part of a broad regulatory push prompted by the financial crisis, will propose a temporary “blackout” on sovereign debt ratings in exceptional circumstances.

The “blackouts” element has proved divisive, and Barnier was due to meet with fellow European commissioners at 1200 GMT to thrash out its scope in the draft law as member states like Britain mount a last - minute effort to scrap the provision.

EU states and the European Parliament, which is meeting in Strasbourg this week, will have the final say on the measure, with some changes likely.

Short-selling:

Parliament on Tuesday voted by 507 to 25 in favour of an EU law that restrict “naked” or uncovered selling of shares and sovereign debt. This refers to when a seller has made no prior arrangements to borrow the security.

EU states have already given the nod to the law, which was jointly agreed with parliament and is due to take effect within a year.

It also bans naked sovereign credit default swaps (CDS), where there is no ownership of the underlying government debt the CDS contract “insures” against default.

Policymakers want to crack down on what they see as speculation by hedge funds and others betting on falls in euro zone bond prices.

“The parliament has successfully fought for very strict conditions for short-selling to contain destructive speculation. The new transparency rules will help stabilise financial markets,” Markus Ferber, a German member of parliament’s centre-right party, said.

The draft law on ratings agencies, the EU’s third measure to regulate the industry since the financial crisis began in 2007, will avoid trying to create an EU answer to the US dominance of the sector.

Instead, it will seek to inject more competition by requiring users of ratings, such as companies and banks, to “rotate” or switch agencies on a regular basis so that some of the 10 or so smaller agencies registered in Europe, such as Euler Hermes​, can pick up more business.

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Scientist Daniel Nocera said MIT’s technique has seen more than a year of preliminary research and hopes to produce enough electricity from a bottle-and-half of water, however dirty, to power a small home

In the first such effort, Tata group chairman Ratan Tata has signed on a leading scientist from the globally renowned Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to commercialize cutting-edge research that promises to produce cheap power from water.

Daniel Nocera, a professor of chemistry and energy, and his group of elite scientists at MIT attracted attention from Tata when he heard they had found a way towards one of science’s holy grails—to imitate photosynthesis, the process by which plants breathe, and produce power while doing so.

“I met him in September, and in October we signed,” Nocera said on the sidelines of EmTech India, a technology conference organized by MIT’s magazine for innovation, Technology Review.

Nocera would not disclose any more details of the deal. “I think you should ask Mr Tata that,” he said, before flying to Mumbai to meet Tata on Monday.

As he did with the Nano small car and the Swach non-electric water purifier, Tata hopes Nocera’s solution will be the latest in the group’s effort to serve the “bottom of the pyramid” and turn a profit while doing so, said a Tata group executive who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Tata’s hope is that Nocera’s “personalized energy” can produce a stand-alone, mini-power plant, perhaps a refrigerator-sized box, that could reinvent rural electricity supply and bring power to about three billion people worldwide who don’t have it.

Nocera said MIT’s technique has seen more than a year of preliminary research and hopes to produce enough electricity from a bottle-and-half of water, however dirty, to power a small home.

“We hope to have a prototype in a year-and-a-half,” said Nocera, whose other backers include Bob Metcalfe, co-inventor of the Ethernet and a former director of the US’ Central Intelligence Agency.

It is too early to say which Tata company will take MIT’s technology to market, the Tata official said. The Swach water purifier was developed by three Tata companies.

The deal with MIT is fundamentally new for the Tatas because Nocera’s technology is at a very early stage. As Nocera acknowledged, his research has not yet been published, though it is being submitted to the journal Science.

The idea of imitating the tiny chemical engines in plants, which essentially generate power from the sun by splitting water molecules, is not new and has energized science since the 19th century. Commercially available electrolyses devices can split water, but they are costly and need clean water.

Nocera’s solution can use even human waste water, “from the front and back”, as he put it euphemistically.

It was only 45 days ago that Nocera’s scientists made their biggest breakthrough, plunging an artificial silicon “leaf”, coated with a proprietary solution of cobalt and phosphate, into a jar of water and coaxed it to generate power at efficiencies that now exceed solar panels.

Still, the process of cracking the “most guarded secret of plants”, as Science magazine put it in 1912, is still in the research stage, and there are many issues that need to be solved. That includes dealing with the waste gases produced and how to get the system into a box that can be manufactured and sold on a mass scale.

“Mr Tata told me, ‘You know what you’re getting with me, right? Patience’,” said Nocera, who is also the energy industry’s go-to man for global energy calculations.

Nocera estimates that the world consumes 14 terawatts (TW) of power today. By 2050, it will need 16TW. If his solution works, said Nocera, it would need a swimming pool full of water every day to meet the world’s electricity needs. For the Tatas, the bet on Nocera and MIT is obviously likely to be a big one.

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A shift in speculative activity from equity cash market to derivatives market could be a factor, a Morgan Stanley​ study says

How long have investors in the Indian markets been holding on to stocks in the backdrop of high volatility and tepid returns in the past four years? Morgan Stanley has come out with an interesting report which addresses this question.

The study finds that investors are holding on to equity investments much longer now than they were during the bull phase between 2003 and 2007.

Back then, the average holding period was around 20 months, or a little over a year-and-a-half. It now stands at around 35 months, or nearly three years, having almost doubled compared with the bull phase. To be sure, the rise has been gradual since mid-2003, but has accelerated since 2009.

The average holding period for foreign institutional investors (FIIs), who account for a large part of trading in the cash market, had steadily come down to as low as 14 months by the end of the bull market in early 2008. Since 2009, it started rising sharply and now stands at 22 months, Morgan Stanley’s calculations show. This is the highest level for FIIs since 2004.

Why are investors holding on to stocks longer now than they did during the bull phase between 2003 and 2007, when the Indian markets rose by over 500%?

Morgan Stanley points out that one factor may be the shift of speculative activity from the equity cash market to the derivatives market.

Cash market turnover now amounts to less than 10% of derivatives market turnover. The extent of intraday trading in the cash market has come down. With less speculative activity in the cash market, the calculation of investors’ holding period would naturally be influenced.

Even so, it’s interesting to note that investors, including FIIs, are holding on to Indian stocks for longer periods.

In the past, such a rise in the level of holding period of stocks had occurred during bear markers and right before the onset of a bull phase, such as between mid-2000 and 2003.

But with the uncertainty in the global economy, and considering that Indian markets have already doubled from their lows during the financial crisis, it seems unlikely that they are on the verge of another bull run.

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