The Tata Group is preparing for an important meeting tomorrow. Deborshi Chaki reports that Tata Sons chairman N Chandrasekaran is expected to present a revised business roadmap to the Tata Sons board on May 26 amid growing internal scrutiny around capital allocation, profitability and the group’s long-term direction. The presentation is being viewed as an exercise aimed at addressing concerns within sections of the Trusts’ leadership and bringing greater clarity to the group’s strategic direction amid rising investments and governance sensitivities.
Apple’s FY26 revenue in India is projected to be twice that of FMCG major Hindustan Unilever Ltd, pointing to a sharp shift in urban consumption as affluent Indians spend more on premium technology and discretionary products rather than traditional staples, Danish Khan reports. Apple India’s FY26 revenue is estimated at Rs 1.42 lakh crore compared with HUL’s Rs 64,468 crore.
The March quarter saw mid-cap companies posting their sharpest profit growth in five quarters. This was led by sectors such as metals, power, real estate and market infrastructure, reports Ravindra Sonavane. Small-caps, however, came under mounting pressure despite healthy revenue growth, underscoring the widening divergence within the broader market.
The summer economy is presenting both opportunities and stress points. Akshara Srivastava reports the heatwave has boosted sales of colas, ice creams and beer, with quick-commerce platforms emerging as an important channel for dairy and beverage companies. The heat wave across north India has meant that India’s power demand touched an all-time high of 270.8 gigawatts today, writes Arunima Bharadwaj. The central government said that there is an adequate supply of coal at thermal power plants. But the rising temperatures are also exposing cracks in infrastructure preparedness. Ishaan Gera writes that power shortages are resurfacing across parts of Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand even before peak summer demand has fully arrived, triggering outages and consumer complaints.
We have two interesting stories from SEBI today. Brajesh Kumar reports that a SEBI committee is likely to allow compounding of charges against trader Nirmal Kotecha. The matter will now move to the whole-time members of SEBI for closure, which was first filed by the regulator in 2017. Mutual fund distributors are open to SEBI’s proposal that pays out parts of their commissions in MF units, but ultimately want the choice left to the distributors themselves, writes Anishaa Kumar. Currently, the commissions are paid out entirely in cash.
As Brent continued to stay mostly above the $100 mark in April, India’s oil import bill surged 52% to $16.3 billion from a year ago, writes Arunima Bharadwaj. Despite import volumes declining 4.2%, the bill rose by a whopping 52% due to the closure of the Strait of Hormuz.
The macro economic picture is becoming more complicated. According to a poll of economists by Ishaan Gera, India’s GDP growth may slow to 6.6% in FY27 from an estimated 7.6% last year as elevated oil prices, inflationary pressures and the prolonged West Asia conflict weigh on consumption and business activity. For the March quarter, economists expect GDP growth of 7.4% compared with 7.8% in the preceding three months. The inflation outlook is also turning less comforting. Ishaan Gera writes that economists now expect consumer inflation to more than double to 4.9% in FY27 from around 2.1% in FY26, with higher fuel prices, food inflation risks and weather-related disruptions raising fears of a difficult mix of slower growth and rising prices.
With US Secretary of State Marco Rubio in India, trade negotiations with Washington are entering a delicate phase. Adrija Chatterjee reports that India is likely to seek greater clarity on how competing exporting nations are treated before agreeing to any new tariff structure with the US, especially after American courts struck down parts of the earlier reciprocal tariff regime, leaving the eventual duty framework in flux. With a fresh round of talks due in June, New Delhi is also closely watching the expiry of the temporary 10% tariff in July and the parallel Section 301 investigation into foreign trade practices.
Tech companies are finding themselves under growing scrutiny. Pronto, an app where users can get domestic help, has come under scrutiny from the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology after it started a pilot project that recorded videos during tasks to train its AI models, report Aihik Sur and Aryaman Gupta. The IT ministry will probe the company’s in-home recording feature. Pronto’s competitors, Urban Company and Snabbit, both distanced themselves from the controversy and clarified that this wasn’t an industry practice.
And finally, India’s post-pandemic fertility slowdown is widespread, with only a few states bucking the trend. Ishaan Gera reports that Tripura, Nagaland, and Bihar were the only ones to record higher birth rates in 2024 than in 2019, even as much of the country, especially southern and urbanised states, continued to see a sharp decline in fertility and natural population growth.