The Indian government sent the highest ever user data requests to Facebook, second only to the US, in the first six months of 2020, the social media giant said in its biannual transparency report released on November 19. The Indian government sent a total of 35,560 user data requests during January-June, over 33 percent more than 26,698 queries made in the second half of 2019.

Infosys on Friday announced the renewal of their highly successful partnership for a further 3 years. The agreement will see Infosys continue as Global Technology Services Partner and Digital Innovation Partner of the ATP, through 2023. Through the extended partnership, Infosys will continue to develop and accelerate innovations in advanced technologies such as AI, Data Analytics, and Cloud.

Ashima Ltd, one of India's leading cotton manufacturers, informed the exchanges on Friday regarding the company's plan to expand its business horizon. In a meeting of the Board of Directors held on November 20, 2020 the company has decided to adopt a new line of business. Ashima Ltd intends to enter into Real Estate business, the company intimated via a regulatory filing.

Pennar Industries on Friday gained to an intraday high of Rs21 per piece, resulting in over 19% return in stock price on Sensex after the company announced that it has bagged orders worth Rs517cr across its business verticals during September 2020 quarter. Railways vertical received orders worth Rs249cr from BEML, Rites, Integrated Coach Factory, Universal Engineering and others.

Home-grown digital financial services platform Paytm on Friday announced that within a year of launching the LPG cylinder bookings service, it has registered over 5 million bookings. With this, Paytm has become the largest enabler of LPG cylinder bookings in the country. Paytm started ‘Book a Cylinder’ facility last year by partnering with HP Gas, followed by Indian Oil's Indane.

RBI has levied a fine of Rs10 lakh on Muthoot Finance for non-compliance with directions issued by RBI on the maintenance of Loan to Value ratio in gold loans and on obtaining a copy of PAN card of the borrower while granting gold loans over Rs5 lakh. RBI had issued a notice to the company advising it to show cause as to why penalty should not be imposed.

RBI in a notification on Thursday said, the statutory inspection of Manappuram Finance Limited concerning its financial position as on March 31, 2019, revealed, inter alia, non-compliance with the abovementioned directions issued by RBI. Thus RBI imposed a monetary penalty of Rs5 lakh on Manappuram Finance Limited, Thrissur.

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Shares of Bharti Infratel advanced more than 12% in Friday’s intraday trade after the company said its proposed merger with Indus Towers to create a mega tower company has been completed. The scrip traded 12.21% higher at Rs 208.60 at around 13.05 pm IST.The debt-ridden Vodafone Idea has received about Rs 3,760 crore cash for its 11.15 per cent holding in Indus.

Mphasis, an Information Technology (IT) solutions provider specialising in cloud and cognitive services, announced its acquisition of Datalytyx, a leading next-gen data engineering and consultancy company. Headquartered in London, United Kingdom, Datalytyx provides Next-gen Data Engineering, Data Ops and Master Data Management solutions on Snowflake and Talend environments to clients globally.

Indian banks, that were under a lot of pressure following the impact of Covid lockdown, have recovered strongly in the last couple of months. Most of the banks have seen a revival in their valuations and fee income even as their non-performing assets remain under control, a report by DART said. Most banks were put under additional stress on their books after they had to extend moratoriums.

Leading stock exchange BSE is mulling to sell a minority stake in its mutual fund distribution platform StAR MF, ET NOW reported quoting sources. The report further added that ICICI Securities has been appointed as banker to the transaction. Top fintech companies, banks and global investors are lined up for StAR MF platform stake, the report said, adding BSE did not respond to ET NOW queries.

IT-major Wipro once again becomes a member of the global Dow Jones Sustainability World Index – 2020 for the eleventh year in succession. Thierry Delaporte, CEO and Managing Director, Wipro Limited, said, “It is an honor to be named to the Dow Jones Sustainability World Index in recognition of our comprehensive sustainability approach...”

With a continued commitment towards sustainable development, the country’s largest lender, State Bank of India (SBI) has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the Luxembourg Stock Exchange (LuxSe). The MoU will help SBI and LuxSE to set up a long-term cooperation mechanism and promote ESG (Environmental, Social, and Corporate Governance) and green finance.

Adani Enterprises Limited has raised Rs34.30cr by allotment of NCDs of the face value of Rs10 lakh each on private placement basis. “The company has raised Rs34.30cr on November 19, 2020 by allotment of 343 Secured, Rated, Listed, Redeemable, Principal Protected Market Linked Non-Convertible Debentures (MLD) of the face value of Rs10,00,000/- each on private placement basis.