Over 20,000 evacuated across Moscow over various bomb threats – reports

21:00 More than 20,000 people were evacuated from over 30 shopping centers, railway stations and universities in Moscow, following “almost simultaneous” warnings that they had been rigged with explosives. So far, no bombs have been found at any of the locations, reports RT.

20:45 The initial public offer (IPO) of Matrimony.com, which runs online match-making portals, has been oversubscribed 4.41 times on the last day of the issue today, reports PTI.

The IPO received bids for 1,24,09,980 shares against the total issue size of 28,11,280 shares, data available with the NSE till 1915 hrs showed.

The category reserved for qualified institutional buyers (QIBs) was oversubscribed 1.88 times, non-institutional investors 41 per cent and retail individual investors 17.99 times.

20:15 Rishi Kapoor lashes out at Rahul Gandhi. Tweets:

"Rahul Gandhi.In the 106 years of Indian cinema of India, Kapoor's contribution is 90 years. And each generation is chosen by public on merit. So don't bullshit people on "Dynasty" You have to earn people's respect and love through hard work not zabardasti and gundagardi."

07:00 pm The Ministry of Railways said on Wednesday it has decided to allow m-Aadhar, a digital version of the Aadhar card, as proof of identity for travellers in any reserved class.

The m- Aadhar is a mobile app launched by the Unique Identification Authority of India on which a person can download his/her Aadhaar card.

It can, however, be downloaded only on the mobile number to which Aadhar has been linked.

06:00pm AIADMK leader TTV Dinakaran on Wednesday lashed out at the party faction led by Tamil Nadu Chief Minister E Palaniswami and O Panneerselvam, accusing them of targeting his supporters, reports News18.

This comes a day after police officials from Coimbatore visited a resort in Coorg, Karnataka where MLAs supporting Dinakaran have been holed up.

Tamil Nadu police said they visited Paddington resort where MLAs loyal to Dinakaran are staying in Coorg searching for P. Palaniappan, an MLA and a former minister, who was not there.

04:23 pm Authors from the UK and the US dominated the 2017 Man Booker Prize shortlist announced today, as the only long-listed Indian writer, Arundhati Roy, failed to make the cut. Roy, who won the literary award worth 50,000 pounds for her debut book 'The God of Small Things' in 1997, had featured on the long-list for her latest novel 'The Ministry of Utmost Happiness'.

04:07 Police have arrested the IT head of the controversial Dera Sacha Sauda, whose chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh is undergoing 20 years imprisonment in two rape cases, for allegedly tampering with computers at the sect's headquarters ahead of a search by the authorities. "Police arrested Vineet Kumar, IT head of Dera Sacha Sauda, and seized 60 hard disks on the information provided by the accused," Sirsa Superintendent of Police Ashwin Shenvi said.

During investigations, it came to light that the Dera authorities had changed several hard disks before the search operation at its headquarters in Sirsa, he said. Kumar was summoned by police for questioning at Sirsa after he was evasive in his replies on the computer cell of the Dera, he said.

04:05 India has been placed at a low 103 rank, the lowest among BRICS economies, on the WEF's Global Human Capital Index, which has been topped by Norway, reports PTI. India also ranks "among the lowest in the world" when it comes to the employment gender gap, but has fared well when it comes to development of skills needed for the future with a rank of 65 out of total 130 countries surveyed.

The list compiled by Geneva-based World Economic Forum (WEF) takes into account "the knowledge and skills people possess that enable them to create value in the global economic system" to measure the 'human capital' rank of a country. India was ranked 105th on this list last year, while Finland was on the top which has pushed by Norway to second place this year.

03:57 This fiscal, India Inc has extinguished shares worth nearly Rs 235 billion through 20 buybacks - 2.3 times more than the Rs 100 billion raised by way of initial public offerings. Last fiscal, companies repurchased shares worth Rs 340 billion through 49 buybacks while 25 IPOs had raised Rs 282 billion cumulatively. In the last two years, buybacks have gained currency as a tool to reward shareholders after the government imposed an additional 10% tax on dividends.

03:44 Shares of the Indian Oil Corporation, Bharat Petroleum Corporation, and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation tumbled on news that government may ask the oil marketing companies to absorb further increase in global crude oil prices. The stock of the nation’s largest company IOCL fell as much as 6.2%. Shares of another state-run refiner BPCL plunged 8.4% while HPCL lost 8%.

As petrol and diesel prices have hit three-year highs in some cities, the government seems to have swung into action to protect the consumers from the rising fuel bills, possibly bringing back the ghosts of the era of regulation. The government is unlikely to pass further rise in fuel prices due to higher inflation.

03:15 Ericsson India files insolvency case against Reliance Communications, reports Cogencis. The former is against the merger of RComm-Aircel due to past dues. The RComm stock is currently trading down 2%.

02:30 Chinese traders along the border with North Korea and some regular visitors to the isolated country said scarcer and costlier fuel, as well as earlier UN sanctions banning the export of commodities such as seafood and coal, are now taking a toll, reports Reuters. Several Chinese traders said the sanctions had stymied North Korean businesses’ ability to raise hard currency to trade.

02:27 For British workers, the lowest jobless rate in more than four decades isn’t enough to maintain their standard of living, reports Bloomberg. Basic wages rose an annual 2.1% in the three months through July, unchanged from the second quarter, Office for National Statistics figures showed. Pay fell 0.4% when adjusted for inflation, which is now running just shy of 3%.

02:21 The Jubilant Foodworks scrip fell close to 5% after Deutsche Bank said live bugs were found in Domino's pizza seasoning sachet. “The food bugs incidence could potentially be serious for Domino's franchise in India,” it stated.

02:10 The global oil surplus is beginning to shrink due to stronger-than-expected European and US demand growth, as well as production declines in Opec and non-Opec countries, the International Energy Agency said. The agency, which coordinates the energy policies of industrial nations, raised its 2017 global oil demand growth estimate to 1.6 million barrels per day from 1.5 million bpd.

02:00 The initial public offer (IPO) of Matrimony.com, which runs online match-making portals, was oversubscribed 2.49 times so far on the last day of bidding. The company, which aims to raise over Rs 500 crore, received bids for 7,011,855 shares against the total issue size of 2,811,280 shares. The issue was fully subscribed on Day 2.

01:51 Nomura has pegged India’s FY18 GDP around 7.1%. The Japanese financial services major said, post-GST, restocking is likely to drive a faster pace of industrial output growth in the coming quarters. It sees the ongoing remonetisation drive having a positive impact on the cash-intensive services sectors, which in turn will help augur growth numbers.

01:41 The initial public offering of Capacit’e Infraprojects has been subscribed 23% on Day 1. With a total issue size of 11,428,572 shares, the company received bids for 2,684,460 shares, while 2,223,240 shares received bids at the cut off price. The Rs 400-crore IPO, which closes on September 15, has a price band of Rs 245 to Rs 250 per share.

01:37 Bitcoin is now considered the "most crowded trade," as measured by sentiment in the monthly global Bank of America Merrill Lynch Fund Managers survey. That means investors believe there are too many people on one side of the trade and it could be due for a reversal, reports CNBC.

Bitcoin's price has surged about 330% this year, the beneficiary of a jump in interest for the cryptocurrency and a growing field of competitors, as well as a flight to alternative assets and, some fear, a speculative bubble.

The Merrill survey is one of the most followed and respected on Wall Street. Conducted during the week that ended Thursday, more than 200 global fund managers with at least USD 600 billion under management were surveyed.

01:31 North Korea is trying to steal bitcoin and other virtual currencies to avoid sanctions and fund Kim Jong Un's regime, a report by cyber security firm FireEye stated. North Korean hackers, it added, had targeted at least three South Korean cryptocurrency exchanges with the suspected aim of stealing the digital tokens.

According to FireEye, hackers used spear phishing — a fraudulent method of sending emails to make them look like they were sent by someone you know – and dispersed malware to obtain virtual cash illicitly. The cyber security firm logged suspicious activity affecting the exchanges over several months. In April, four wallets on the Seoul-based cryptocurrency exchange Yapizon were compromised, but could not be clearly linked to North Korean involvement. Later in May, the firm monitored a spear phishing attack that successfully compromised an exchange.

01:25 Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said dormant accounts under Jan Dhan Yojana have fallen below 20% from 77% earlier as state resources are flowing directly to the targeted population. “Bulk of dormant accounts have become operational. More the direct benefit transfer expands, more will be the operationalisation of accounts,” Jaitley stated.

01:16 Retail fuel prices have touched a key milestone, hitting three-year highs in several cities across the country. The price of petrol in Mumbai has risen to Rs 79.48 per litre, a level last seen in August 2014. Similarly, the price of diesel is at a three-year high in the metro cities of Kolkata and Chennai at Rs 61.37 and 61.84 per litre, respectively.

12:58 Bharat Petroleum Corporation aims to reap a profit of Rs 10,000 crore in FY18. Speaking to CNBC-TV18, D Rajkumar, its Chairman and Managing Director, sees current quarter gross refining margin likely to be in the USD 6.5-7 per barrel range. The maharatna’s June-quarter gross refining margin, or profit earned on each barrel of crude processed, slipped to USD 4.88 per barrel as compared with USD 6.09 per barrel in the same period of 2016.

12:45 An official of the Ryan Group moved the Supreme Court seeking transfer of the student murder case from outside a local court at Sohna, alleging the bar has restrained lawyers from representing the accused in the sensational case, reports PTI. A bench comprising Chief Justice Dipak Misra and Justices Amitava Roy and AM Khanwilkar considered the submission of senior advocate KTS Tulsi that the fundamental right of a person to be represented by a lawyer of his choice is getting infringed. The bench assured the counsel of Francis Thomas, northern zone head of Ryan Group, that it will hear the petition on September 18.

12:37 Skymetweather’s CEO Jatin Singh pegs the rainfall deficiency at 6%. Though he forecasts rains “creeping up a little bit in the next couple of days”, he sees the deficit stabilising at 5%.For September, Skymet forecasts rainfall to be 10% percent below normal.

12:18 Vikram Pandit, who ran Citigroup during the financial crisis, said developments in technology could see some 30% of banking jobs disappearing in the next five years, reports Bloomberg. Artificial intelligence and robotics reduce the need for staff in roles such as back-office functions, Pandit, 60, said.

12:00 Good Afternoon Moneycontrol users. This blog will keep track of key global and local developments impacting business and markets through the day. Important local and global political developments will also find resonance here.

11:58 Leon Cooperman, the billionaire founder of hedge fund Omega Advisors, says a market correction could start “very soon,” reports Bloomberg. Cooperman, who’s known for his bullish stock picks, said any number of events could prompt markets to fall. “North Korea, a disappointing earnings report, anything…We can have a 5-8% correction anytime. We’re getting closer to one,” Cooperman stated.

11:46 The US Food and Drug Administration (USFDA) has classified Unit IV of Aurobindo Pharma’s Hyderabad plant as voluntary action indicated (VAI). The classification suggested that the matter has not escalated to the extent of slapping warnings letter or import alert.

11:25 South Korea has found traces of radioactive xenon gas and confirmed them to be from the North Korea’s nuclear test earlier this month. The country's Nuclear Safety and Security Commission said its land-based xenon detector in the northeastern part of the country found traces of xenon-133 isotope on nine occasions, while its mobile equipment off the country's east coast detected traces of the isotope four times. However, South Korea has still not been able to determine whether the test was for a conventional nuke or a hydrogen bomb.

11:18 North Korea's latest nuclear test probably had a yield of 250 kilotons, a US monitoring group said. US website 38 North, which is linked to Johns Hopkins University, raised its estimate for the yield of the blast to "roughly 250 kilotons". The figure is more than 16 times the size of the 15-kiloton US bomb that destroyed Hiroshima in 1945. Governmental estimates of the yield vary from South Korea's 50 kilotons to Japan's 160.

11:10 Japanese wholesale prices rose at the fastest annual pace in nearly nine years in August as robust Chinese demand boosted commodity prices, offering glimmers of hope consumer inflation will accelerate toward the central bank’s 2% target. Wholesale prices rose 2.9% in August from a year earlier, increasing for the eighth straight month and marking the fastest pace of growth since October 2008, Bank of Japan data showed on Wednesday.

10:34 NTPC will look to phase out 1,460mw of old depreciated plants over time, reports Hindu Business Line. One plant of 460mw at Talcher (Odisha) and another of 1,000mw at Singrauli (Madhya Pradesh) will be retired. NTPC will be setting up two plants – of 1,320mw each – in both these places and the investment across these projects are expected to be in the tune of Rs 20,000 crore.

10:33 Coal India may look at diversification of other metals like copper and nickel through overseas mines, reports Hindu Business Line. The company is firming up such plans and geographies like Africa.

10:31 US job openings rose to a record high in July, suggesting a slowdown in job growth in August was an aberration and that the labour market was strong before the recent disruptive hurricanes. Job openings, a measure of labour demand, increased by 54,000 to a seasonally adjusted 6.2 million. Hiring increased 69,000 to 5.5 million in July, lifting the hiring rate to a near 1-1/2-year high of 3.8% from 3.7% in June.

10:26 Apple enthusiasts in India will be able to buy the latest iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus and iPhone X, at a price starting from Rs 64,000 within days of availability of the smartphones in the US and other markets. The new line up, announced late last night in the US, will compete with flagship devices from the stables of Samsung, LG and other players in India. The iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus will be available in 64GB and 256GB variants, priced at Rs 64,000. These will be available at Apple authorised resellers from September 29, Apple India said in a statement.

10:23 Telecom operator Bharti Airtel announced a strategic partnership with South Korean telecom operator SK Telecom to build the most advanced telecom network in India. The two companies will also collaborate on an on-going basis to evolve standards for 5G and advanced technologies like network functions virtualisation (NFV), software-defined networking (SDN) and Internet of Things (IoT), Bharti Airtel said in a statement.

10:06 Thomson Reuters data, based on the latest annual earnings reports, shows India’s corporate debt rose to a seven-year high at the end of March. More than a fifth of large companies did not earn enough to pay interest on their loans and the pace of new loans fell to the lowest in more than six decades.

The data shows net debt for 288 companies with a market capitalisation of more than USD 500 million, covering most big firms in India, has hit at least a seven-year high of Rs 18 trillion. Soured debt was 12% of total loans held by lenders at the end of March. Analysis also showed more than a fifth of 513 Indian companies had interest cover of less than 1%.

09:49 Infosys will open its North Carolina technology and innovation hub in Raleigh in early 2018. The hub is expected to hire 2,000 American workers by 2021.

09:45 British property belonging to one of the world’s most wanted gangsters and second richest criminal ever after Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar has been frozen, reports UK’s Mirror. Kaskar Dawood Ibrahim, 61, an Indian national, who goes by 21 aliases, is estimated to be worth USD 6.7 billion by Forbes, while rewards totalling USD 25 million are on offer for his capture.

09:41 A report in the Hindu Business Line says that the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) is examining if profits from share buybacks can be subject to long term capital gains tax. But could this move stop the buyback surge on D-Street, click here to find out.

09:21 Which stocks and sectors are on the wish-list of foreign and domestic brokerages today, click here to find out

09:19 Egypt has reportedly severed military ties with North Korea. According to an AP report, the announcement was made by the Egyptian defence minister during his visit to Seoul.

09:16 India has become the only major developing country where US President Donald Trump’s business is roaring. It has the most construction projects with Trump licencing deals of any country outside of the US. So, how did India become the world leader in Trump projects? To read this complete story, click here

09:10 South Korea has conducted its first live-fire drill for an advanced air-launched cruise missile that will strengthen its pre-emptive strike capability against North Korea in the event of crisis, the Washington Post reports. The South Korean military said the Taurus missile fired from an F-15 fighter jet travelled through obstacles at low altitudes before hitting a target off the country’s western coast. To keep track of happenings in the Korean Peninsula, click here

09:02 Rejecting the latest round of United Nations sanctions, North Korea vowed to accelerate its plans to acquire a nuclear weapon that can strike the US homeland. In its first official response to the new resolution, North Korea’s foreign ministry said the sanctions justified its nuclear push and strengthened its will to “follow this road at a faster pace without the slightest diversion until this fight to the finish is over.”

“The adoption of another illegal and evil ‘resolution on sanctions’ piloted by the US served as an occasion for the DPRK to verify that the road it chose to go down was absolutely right. The DPRK will redouble the efforts to increase its strength to safeguard the country’s sovereignty and right to existence,” the ministry said.

08:53 Retail developer Phoenix Mills is buying back stakes from various investors in four of its mall projects for around Rs 1,350 crore, making it the sole owner of the assets, Mint reports.

08:53 The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) has approved a Dairy Processing and Infrastructure Development Fund with an outlay of Rs 10,881 crore for FY18 to FY29 to boost the dairy sector.

08:53 ITC will create a new brand to foray into the fresh vegetables domain. The diversified conglomerate is likely to enter the market with fresh potato — a first-of-its-kind in India — followed by some more fresh vegetables. It is also planning to launch fruit pulps and juices in order to become top food company in India.

08:53 The Cabinet has approved a Rs 3,000 crore project to acquire seismic data for prospecting of oil and natural gas reserves. National oil companies Oil and Natural Gas Corp and Oil India will implement the project.

08:49 State-run banks could be in focus on Wednesday as investors could react to the buzz around recapitalisation. CNBC-TV18 reports the Centre is considering providing recapitalisation bonds to public sector banks (PSBs). The proposal is believed to be in the early stages, with the recapitalisation amount still unknown.

08:41 Religare Enterprises won shareholders’ approval for its plan to use the proceeds of the sale of its health insurance business to repay Axis Bank’s Rs 450 crore loan, dealing a setback to a group of lenders that wanted the promoters to clear the debt.

08:41 Private lender Bandhan Bank has taken the first concrete step towards its proposed initial public offering by hiring Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase along with three others to advise it on the share sale issue.

08:41 The initial public offering (IPO) of Mumbai-based construction company Capacite Infraprojects opens today.

08:34 Tata Sons said it would raise its shareholding in Tata Global Beverages and Tata Chemicals by up to 6.84% and 4.39%, respectively.

08:26 Bharat Petroleum Corporation (BPCL) has lined up capital expenditure of Rs 1.08 trillion for the next five years. The Maharatna company will spend the money on capacity expansion of refineries as well as marketing and upstream activities, its Chairman and Managing Director D Rajkumar said. The public sector oil retailer said the company will focus primarily on going global to further expand the business, especially in upstream activities.

08:22 Jet Airways’ net profit more than doubled in the June quarter as healthy domestic growth offset muted earnings from its global operations. It was also bumped up by higher other income and gains on foreign exchange. Profit rose to Rs 53.5 crore in the three months to June from Rs 25.88 crore a year ago. Revenue increased 11.4% to Rs 5,953.92 crore from Rs 5341.26 crore last year. A higher other income during the quarter that included income from the completion of a real estate development project and gains on account of foreign currency fluctuation, also boosted profits.

08:19 In its official response to the newly imposed sanctions, the North Korean Foreign Ministry said that UN resolution only reaffirmed the country's belief that its push for nuclear weapons "was absolutely right". It vowed to “follow this road at a faster pace without the slightest diversion until this fight to the finish is over”, and added that it will establish a 'practical equilibrium' with the United States.

08:16 SBI Life Insurance, a subsidiary of the country's largest lender State Bank of India (SBI), will hit the capital market on September 20 to raise up to Rs 8,400 crore. The initial share sale offer will open on September 20 and close on September 22. This would be the second listing of a life insurer after ICICI Prudential Life Insurance, which went public last year.

08:14 More than 100,000 directors in firms identified as defaulters stare at disqualification as the government continues its crackdown against shell companies. The move follows the cancellation of registration of around 210,000 companies and restrictions on the operation of bank accounts by their directors. A Ministry of Corporate Affairs statement said it had zeroed in on 106,578 directors for disqualification as of September 12 for associating with companies that had not filed financial statements or annual returns for three straight years.

08:08 The Cabinet has approved a proposal to separate Bharat Sanchar Nigam’s (BSNL) mobile tower assets into a new unit, a move that will potentially generate revenues and improve finances of the state-run telecom firm. “This approval authorises BSNL to monetise its telecom tower infrastructure,” the government said in a statement on Tuesday.

08:06 The Union Cabinet approved two worker-friendly proposals on Tuesday. While one entails extra compensation to central government employees, the other proposes to extend gratuity payment norms, available at present to government employees, to staffers in the private sector companies as well as public sector firms.

The gratuity withdrawal limits for staff in private companies and public-sector units have been doubled to Rs20 lakh. At present, even if a worker accumulates more than Rs10 lakh as gratuity contribution, the withdrawal is capped at Rs10 lakh and the rest is paid out after deduction of taxes.

The Cabinet also approved an increase in the dearness allowance (DA) and dearness relief for over 11 million central government employees and pensioners.

08:01 Industrial production recovered to grow only mildly as growth in manufacturing output remained flat with introduction of goods and services tax (GST), which continued to disrupt production networks, while retail inflation quickened in August ruling out any rate cut by the central bank in the near future.

Data released by the Central Statistics Office showed Index of Industrial Production (IIP) grew at 1.2% in July from a contraction of 0.2% a month ago. Mining and electricity sectors however grew at robust 4.8% and 6.5%, respectively, in July. In terms of industries, eight out of the 23 industry groups in the manufacturing sector have shown positive growth during July 2017

Consumer Price Index based inflation continued to rise for the second consecutive month, by 3.36% from 2.36% a month ago as food inflation turned positive after three months of contraction.

07:55 Fuel consumption in India fell 6.1% in August, its fastest rate of decline since April 2003, as heavy rainfall across the country cut the use of diesel for irrigation pumps and curbed demand for auto fuels. Consumption of fuel, a proxy for oil demand in the world’s third biggest oil consumer, totalled 15.75 million tonne in August, data from the Petroleum Planning and Analysis Cell (PPAC) of the oil ministry showed. Fuel demand was down for the third straight month in August.

07:50 Japan Prime Minister Shinzo Abe wants the country’s central bank to focus on monetary policies geared at achieving its 2% inflation target, regardless of who becomes the next Bank of Japan governor, the Nikkei newspaper said.

07:49 Apple rolled out its much-anticipated iPhone X, a glass and stainless steel device with an edge-to-edge display that Chief Executive Tim Cook called “the biggest leap forward since the original iPhone.” The launch contained few surprises, with leaked details on the phone and other products including an updated Apple Watch proving largely accurate. But the iPhone X’s USD 999 price still raised eyebrows, and its November 3 ship date prompted questions about possible supply constraints ahead of the holiday season.

07:46 Tens of thousands of hard-left trade unionists marched through French cities on Tuesday to protest against President Emmanuel Macron’s labour law reforms, although turnout appeared lower than at demonstrations in previous years. Hitting back at Macron’s pledge to give no ground to “slackers”, some in Paris carried placards reading: “Slacker on Strike” while in Bordeaux demonstrators chanted: “Macron you’re screwed, the slackers are in the streets.” The interior ministry said 223,000 protesters turned out across the country, compared with about 400,000 during March 2016’s demonstration.

07:42 Britain and the European Union postponed a new round of Brexit negotiations by a week until the end of the month in what EU diplomats said was to allow time for Prime Minister Theresa May to make a key speech in about 10 days.

07:40 Britain’s government partially abandoned a cap on public-sector pay, saying it would raise wages for police and prison guard by more than its long-standing 1% limit. Workers in Britain are unhappy over pay growth since the financial crisis which has fallen by more in inflation-adjusted terms than in any other major economy, dropping by an adjusted 0.5% as inflation rose following last year’s Brexit vote.

07:38 US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin cast doubt on President Donald Trump’s goal of cutting the corporate tax rate to 15%, even as the president moved to inject new urgency into a sluggish effort in Congress to lower taxes.“Ideally, he’d like to get it down to 15%. I don’t know if we’ll be able to achieve that given the budget issues, but we’re going to get this down to a very competitive level,” Mnuchin told a conference in New York hosted by CNBC.

07:36 Some of the ads bought by Russians on Facebook last year promoted events during the US presidential campaign, Facebook said on Tuesday, indicating that alleged meddling ahead of the 2016 election went beyond social media. Its takedown of what the company last week called Russian-affiliated pages included shutting down “several promoted events.”

07:34 The US poverty rate fell for the second straight year in 2016, while median income rose to an all-time high of USD 59,000 as the economy made up ground lost during the 2007-09 recession, federal government data released on Tuesday showed.

07:33 Frustrated US lawmakers called on Tuesday for a high-powered response to North Korea’s nuclear tests, saying Washington should act alone if necessary to stiffen sanctions on companies from China, Russia and any country doing business with Pyongyang, reports Reuters. “I believe the response from the United States and our allies should be supercharged,” said Representative Ed Royce, chairman of the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee. “We need to use every ounce of leverage ... to put maximum pressure on this rogue regime,” the Republican congressman told a hearing on North Korea. “Time is running out.”

07:30 Bitcoin “is a fraud” and will blow up, Jamie Dimon, Chief Executive of JPMorgan Chase & Co, said. “The currency isn’t going to work. You can’t have a business where people can invent a currency out of thin air and think that people who are buying it are really smart,” Dimon stated.

07:28 China’s move last week to ban initial coin offerings (ICO) has caused chaos among start-ups looking to raise money through the novel fund-raising scheme, prompting halts, about-turns and re-thinks, reports Reuters. China is cracking down on fundraising through launches of token-based digital currencies, targeting ICOs in a market that has ballooned this year in what has been a bonanza for digital currency entrepreneurs. The boom has fuelled a jump in the value of cryptocurrencies, but raised fears of a potential bubble.

07:24 The US Supreme Court allowed President Donald Trump to broadly implement a ban on refugees entering the country from around the world. The justices granted a request from the Trump administration to block a federal appeals court decision that, according to the Justice Department, would have allowed up to 24,000 additional refugees to enter the United States than would otherwise have been eligible.

07:23 US President Donald Trump said the UN sanctions on North Korea agreed this week were a small step and nothing compared to what would have to happen to deal with the country’s nuclear program. US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin warned China, North Korea’s main ally and trading partner, that if it did not follow through on the new measures, Washington would “put additional sanctions on them and prevent them from accessing the US and international dollar system.”

07:21 Gold prices held steady on Wednesday as the dollar remained firm, with safe-haven demand for the metal buoyed after US President Donald Trump’s latest comments on tensions over North Korea. SPDR Gold Trust, the world’s largest gold-backed exchange-traded fund, said its holdings rose 0.35% to 838.64 tonne on Tuesday from 835.68 tonne on Monday.

07:12 Oil prices were mixed early on Wednesday, but largely held on to gains in the previous session after OPEC said it expected higher demand for its crude next year. US crude stockpiles rose more than expected last week in the wake of Hurricane Harvey, according to an industry report, although analysts have warned stocks data may not give a full picture in coming weeks because of weather disruptions.

07:09 Major Wall Street indexes hit record closing highs on Tuesday, with financial stocks leading the charge, but gains were stunted by a decline in Apple shares after it unveiled its latest line of iPhones. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 61.49 points, or 0.28%, to 22,118.86, the S&P 500 gained 8.37 points, or 0.34%, to 2,496.48 and the Nasdaq Composite added 22.018 points, or 0.34%, to 6,454.28.

07:03 Asian shares inched up to a 10-year high on Wednesday, cheered by record highs on Wall Street, while the dollar’s rise against the yen helped boost Japanese shares. The S&P 500, Dow Jones Industrial and Nasdaq Composite all marked record finishes as investors' concerns faded about North Korean tensions as well as the impact of Hurricane Irma.

06:57 Good Morning Moneycontrol users. This blog will keep track of key global and local developments impacting business and markets through the day. Important local and global political developments will also find resonance here.