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China EV maker Byton says business as usual despite management upheaval

FILE PHOTO: A man checks a Byton Concept T car at the Auto China 2018 motor show in Beijing
FILE PHOTO: A man checks a Byton Concept T car during a media preview at the Auto China 2018 motor show in Beijing, China April 25, 2018. REUTERS/Jason Lee

April 18, 2019

By Yilei Sun and Brenda Goh

SHANGHAI (Reuters) – Chinese electric vehicle (EV) maker Byton, which is facing a management shake-up and questions about funding an expansion, said it has received over 50,000 orders globally for its new SUV model and plans to start production at the end of this year.

“We plan to launch our first production car this July,” Daniel Kirchert, Byton’s co-founder and CEO told Reuters in an interview on Thursday, adding that the company aims to manufacture 10,000 units by the first half of 2020.

Byton’s backers include Chinese retailer Suning, automaker FAW and Contemporary Amperex Technology Co.

Kirchert’s comments, coinciding with the Shanghai Autoshow, come just days after chairman and co-founder Carsten Breitfeld quit Byton.

German daily Handelsblatt said Breitfeld is joining Byton’s domestic rival Iconiq. Another German publication, Manager Magazin, said earlier that Breitfeld’s looming departure was due to trouble funding its planned expansion in the Chinese market, causing tensions inside the company.

Kirchert confirmed the former chairman’s departure and said: “Byton has already got very strong resources, and there are 1,800 employees working on different areas including internet connectivity, engineering research and development.

“We are in the middle of a new round of fundraising, which will be of similar amount to B round. We aim to finish C round around the middle of this year.” Byton had raised $500 million in the series B round last year.

Byton, which runs offices in China, the United States and Germany, is one of several largely Chinese-funded EV startups betting on the benefits of local production to compete with Tesla Inc and other auto giants.

Its local rivals include Nasdaq-listed NIO Inc and Xpeng Motors, backed by Alibaba Group.

Byton aims to hit the 100,000 unit production level around 2021-2022, he said. The 10,000 and 100,000 unit marks are widely regarded as key production milestones for electric vehicle makers.

“Only by large-scale production can we reduce costs and provide affordable prices” he said.

Byton is building its first plant in Nanjing in eastern China with a planned annual capacity of 150,000 units in its initial phase.

China’s auto sales contracted for the first time last year since the 1990s amid a broader economic slowdown but sales of new energy vehicles (NEVs), which include electric vehicles, have remained a bright spot. In March, NEV sales rose 85.4 percent.

(Reporting by Yilei Sun and Brenda Goh; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman)

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Wirecard says compliance manager’s departure not connected to investigation

FILE PHOTO: The headquarters of Wirecard AG, an independent provider of outsourcing and white label solutions for electronic payment transactions is seen in Aschheim
FILE PHOTO: The headquarters of Wirecard AG, an independent provider of outsourcing and white label solutions for electronic payment transactions is seen in Aschheim near Munich, Germany September 6, 2018. REUTERS/Michael Dalder

March 31, 2019

FRANKFURT (Reuters) – The departure of Wirecard’s compliance manager Royston Ng has no connection to the German payments firm’s investigations into financial irregularities in Singapore, a company spokeswoman said on Sunday.

Shares in Wirecard have seen volatile trading since the Financial Times ran a series of investigative reports alleging fraud and false accounting at the firm’s Asia-Pacific office.

Local staff at the Singapore office of Wirecard may have committed crimes but these were not material to the German payment company’s financial position, an investigation by outside law firm Rajah & Tann found, Wirecard said last week.

In a message conveyed by Wirecard, Ng said that he was leaving the company to pursue other career opportunities.

Wirecard has sued the Financial Times over its reports.

(Reporting by Jörn Poltz; Writing by Arno Schuetze; Editing by Raissa Kasolowsky)

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The Collusion Lie Came at a Tremendous Cost

The collusion lie will go down in history as one of the strangest distortions of reality to dominate the American political scene. For more than two years, the national establishment and news media were fixated on a truth that turned out to be false.

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South Carolina girl, 10, who died after fight at school took no serious physical hits, state senator says

A South Carolina state senator said Tuesday there was no violent altercation between two fifth-grade students that ultimately led to one girl’s death, contradicting earlier reports of a brutal attack.

Sen. Margie Bright Matthews, a Democrat, said that after speaking to the families of both students, law enforcement and the substitute teacher in charge of the Forest Hills Elementary class, 10-year-old Raniya Wright was not violently attacked during a school fight on March 25 -- but the students were “pushing back and forth” at most.

“I’ve heard a lot of people say, ‘Oh, they were kicking her. They ganged her.’ None of that. That’s so far from the truth — not even the banging of (her) head. The head was not even an issue,” Bright Matthews said, as The Post and Courier reported.

State Sen. Margie Bright Matthews said there was no sign of an extremely violent attack.

State Sen. Margie Bright Matthews said there was no sign of an extremely violent attack. (Facebook)

SOUTH CAROLINA GIRL, 10, DIES 2 DAYS AFTER FIGHT AT SCHOOL: OFFICIALS

A redacted incident report from the Colleton County Sheriff’s Office, provided to Fox News, indicated that Wright had collapsed, and that when officers arrived at the scene she was unconscious but breathing.

Bright Matthews said Raniya apparently was still bickering with the other student, who has since been suspended, on her way to the principal's office when she then started to complain of head pain, the newspaper reported.

“She grabbed her head, then she was taken to the nurse’s office, which is steps away. Then she became nauseous, vomited, and by the time she was taken to the hospital she was unresponsive and medevaced to (the Medical University of South Carolina).”

Raniya died two days after being airlifted to the hospital but the extent of her injuries and the official cause of death have not been released, pending an autopsy report.

The Colleton County School District released a statement on Friday saying it was too “premature to come to any conclusions.”

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It also said, “As a community that will need healing, we all would best be served by not coming to any conclusions prior to the completion of the investigation.”

Bright Mathews said, in light of last month's incident, she's been asked if she would introduce anti-bullying legislation. She replied that it would be the “stupidest thing in the world” as “children are not born mean.”

Source: Fox News National

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Digital sports network DAZN to start running ads

Internet streaming service DAZN's logo is pictured in its office in Tokyo
Internet streaming service DAZN's logo is pictured in its office in Tokyo, Japan March 21, 2017. Picture taken on March 21, 2017. REUTERS/Kim Kyung-Hoon

March 13, 2019

By Hilary Russ

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Digital sports network DAZN, which launched in September with the aim of disrupting traditional sports media broadcasting, will start running advertisements some time in 2019, the company said on Wednesday.

Until now, DAZN, pronounced “Da Zone,” has been ad-free. This year it will introduce ads from German carmaker Volkswagen AG and brewery Krombacher, as well as a unit of Malta’s Tipico Group Ltd and GVC Holdings Plc subsidiary bwin Interactive Gaming AG, both of which are offshore sports betting operators.

Headquartered in the United Kingdom, DAZN operates live and on-demand streaming content in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, Japan, Canada, the United States and plans to launch soon in Brazil.

The consumer-facing content provider DAZN was part of a larger media and social gaming group called Perform Group. That group is also rebranding itself as DAZN Media, it said on Wednesday.

“DAZN has set out to change the way the world sees sport and we now feel that we are in a position to change the way brands engage with sports fans,” Stefano D’Anna, one of the group’s co-founders, said in a statement.

(Reporting by Hilary Russ; Editing by Susan Thomas)

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Report: Patriots agree to two-year deal with Gostkowski

FILE PHOTO: Super Bowl LIII - New England Patriots v Los Angeles Rams
FILE PHOTO: NFL Football - Super Bowl LIII - New England Patriots v Los Angeles Rams - Mercedes-Benz Stadium, Atlanta, Georgia, U.S. - February 3, 2019. New England Patriots' Stephen Gostkowski reacts after missing a field goal. REUTERS/Mike Segar

April 9, 2019

The New England Patriots and kicker Stephen Gostkowski have agreed to a two-year contract, ESPN reported Tuesday.

The 35-year-old Gostkowski has been the club’s kicker since 2006. He replaced Adam Vinatieri, who had departed to the Indianapolis Colts as a free agent.

Gostkowski, a four-time Pro Bowl selectio, has made 367 of 420 field-goal attempts during 13 seasons with New England. He was 27 of 32 last season.

Gostkowski has 1,743 career points, and has led the NFL in scoring on five occasions. He has topped 140 points in a season seven times.

He is 39 of 44 on field goals in 28 postseason appearances.

–Field Level Media

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3 French ministers bow out of Cabinet, eying elected posts

French President Emmanuel Macron says three Cabinet ministers have resigned, including the European Affairs minister who plans to lead the campaign by Macron's party for European Parliament seats.

The president said in a statement Wednesday that government spokesman Benjamin Griveaux and Digital Affairs minister Mounir Mahjoubi are leaving along with European Affairs minister Nathalie Loiseau.

Griveaux and Mahjoubi have said in interviews they want to run in next year's mayoral race in Paris. The current mayor is Anne Hidalgo.

A government reshuffle is expected in the coming days.

Loiseau, a career diplomat, joined Macron's government in June 2017 and was involved in France's Brexit preparations. She will head the president's pro-European Union party in the May EU parliament elections.

Griveaux has been government spokesman since November 2017. Mahjoubi became digital affairs minister in May 2017.

Source: Fox News World

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Members of The Cranberries, bassist Mike Hogan, drummer Fergal Lawler and guitarist Noel Hogan speak to Reuters during an interview in London
Members of The Cranberries, bassist Mike Hogan, drummer Fergal Lawler and guitarist Noel Hogan speak to Reuters during an interview in London, Britain, April 24, 2019. REUTERS/Gerhard Mey

April 26, 2019

By Hanna Rantala

LONDON (Reuters) – Irish rockers The Cranberries are saying goodbye with their final album released on Friday, a poignant tribute to lead singer Dolores O’Riordan who died last year.

“In the End” is the eighth studio album from the band that rose to fame in the early 1990s with hits likes “Zombie” and “Linger”, and includes the final recordings by O’Riordan, who drowned in a London hotel bath in January 2018 due to alcohol intoxication.

Work on the album began during a 2017 tour and by that winter, O’Riordan and guitarist Neil Hogan had penned and demoed 11 tracks.

With O’Riordan’s vocals recorded, Hogan, bassist Mike Hogan and drummer Fergal Lawler completed the album in tribute to her.

“When we realized how strong the songs were, that was the deciding factor really… There was no point… trying to ruin the legacy of the band,” Noel Hogan said in an interview.

“It was obvious that Dolores wanted this album done because when you hear the album, you hear the songs and how strong they are, and she was very, very excited to get in and record this.”

The Cranberries formed in Limerick in 1989 with another singer. O’Riordan replaced him a year later and the group went on to become Ireland’s best-selling rock band after U2, selling more than 40 million records.

O’Riordan, known for her strong distinctive voice singing about relationships or political violence, was 46 when she died.

“She was actually in quite a good place mentally. She was feeling quite content and strong and looking forward to a new phase of her life,” Lawler said.

“A lot of the lyrics in this album are about things ending… people might read into it differently but it was a phase of her personal life that she was talking about.”

The group previously announced their intention to split after the release of “In The End”.

“We are absolutely gutted we can’t play (the songs) live because that’s something that’s been a massive part of this band from day one,” Noel Hogan said.

“A few people have said to us about maybe even doing a one off where you have different vocalists… as kind of guests of ours. A year ago that’s definitely something we weren’t going to entertain but I don’t know, I think it’s something we need to go away and take time off for the summer and have a think about.”

Critics have generally given positive reviews of the album; NME described it as “(seeing) the band’s career go full-circle” while the Irish Times called it “an unexpected late career high and a remarkable swan song for O’Riordan”.

Their early songs still play on the radio. This week, “Dreams” was performed at the funeral of journalist Lyra McKee, who was shot dead in Londonderry last week as she watched Irish nationalist youths attack police following a raid.

“We wrote them as kids, as a hobby and 30 years later they are on radio and on TV, like all the time… That’s far more than any of us ever thought we would have,” Noel Hogan said.

“That would make Dolores really happy because she was very precious about those songs. Her babies, she called them and to have that hopefully long after we’re gone… that’s all any band can wish for.”

(Reporting by Hanna Rantala; additoinal reporting by Marie-Louise Gumuchian; Writing by Marie-Louise Gumuchian; Editing by Susan Fenton)

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2020 Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren participates in the She the People Presidential Forum in Houston
2020 Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren participates in the She the People Presidential Forum in Houston, Texas, U.S. April 24, 2019. REUTERS/Loren Elliott

April 26, 2019

By Joshua Schneyer and M.B. Pell

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Senator Elizabeth Warren will introduce a bill Friday that offers new protections for U.S. military families facing unsafe housing, following a series of Reuters reports revealing squalid conditions in privately managed base homes.

The Reuters reports and later Congressional hearings detailed widespread hazards including lead paint exposure, vermin infestations, collapsing ceilings, mold and maintenance lapses in privatized base housing communities that serve some 700,000 U.S. military family members.

(View Warren’s military housing bill here. https://tmsnrt.rs/2Dy5aht)

(Read Reuters’ Ambushed at Home series on military housing here. https://www.reuters.com/investigates/section/usa-military)

The Massachusetts Democrat’s bill would mandate both regular and unannounced spot inspections of base homes by certified, independent inspectors, holding landlords accountable for quickly fixing hazards. The military’s privatization program for years allowed real estate firms to operate base housing with scant oversight, Reuters found, leaving some tenants in unsafe homes with little recourse against landlords.

The bill would also require the Department of Defense and its private housing operators to publish reports annually detailing housing conditions, tenant complaints, maintenance response times and the financial incentives companies receive at each base. The provisions aim to enhance transparency of housing deals whose finances and operations the military had allowed to remain largely confidential under a privatization program since the late 1990s.

The measure would also require private landlords to cover moving costs for at-risk families, and healthcare costs for people with medical conditions resulting from unsafe base housing, ensuring they receive continuing coverage even after they leave the homes or the military.

“This bill will eliminate the kind of corner-cutting and neglect the Defense Department should never have let these private housing partners get away with in the first place,” Warren said in a statement Friday.

The proposed legislation comes after February Senate hearings where Warren, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee who is seeking the Democratic nomination for the 2020 U.S. presidential election, slammed private real estate firms for endangering service families, and sought answers about why military branches weren’t providing more oversight.

Her legislation would direct the Defense Department to allow local housing code enforcers onto federal bases, following concerns they were sometimes denied access. Warren’s office said a companion bill in the House of Representatives would be introduced by Rep. Deb Haaland, Democrat of New Mexico.

In response to the housing crisis, military branches are developing a tenant bill of rights and hiring hundreds of new housing staff. The branches recently dispatched commanders to survey base housing worldwide for safety hazards, resulting in thousands of work orders and hundreds of tenants being moved. The Defense Department has pledged to renegotiate its 50-year contracts with private real estate firms.

Congress has been quick to take its own measures. Earlier legislation proposed by senators Dianne Feinstein and Kamala Harris of California, along with Mark Warner and Tim Kaine of Virginia, would compel base commanders to withhold rent payments and incentive fees from the private ventures if they allow home hazards to persist.

(Editing by Ronnie Greene)

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FILE PHOTO: Offices of Deloitte are seen in London
FILE PHOTO: Offices of Deloitte are seen in London, Britain, September 25, 2017. REUTERS/Hannah McKay/File Photo

April 26, 2019

By Noor Zainab Hussain and Tanishaa Nadkar

(Reuters) – Deloitte quit as Ferrexpo’s auditor on Friday, knocking its shares by more than 20 percent, days after saying it was unable to conclude whether the iron ore miner’s CEO controlled a charity being investigated over its use of company donations.

Blooming Land, which coordinates Ferrexpo’s Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) program, came under scrutiny after auditors found holes in the charity’s statements.

Ferrexpo on Tuesday said findings of an ongoing independent investigation launched in February indicated some Blooming Land funds could have been “misappropriated”. It did not provide any details or publish its findings.

Shares in Ferrexpo, the third largest exporter of pellets to the global steel industry, were 23.4 percent lower at 206.1 pence at 1022 GMT following news of Deloitte’s resignation.

“Ferrexpo’s shares are deeply discounted vs peers … following the resignation of Deloitte, we expect downside risks to dominate Ferrexpo’s shares near term.” JP Morgan analyst Dominic O’Kane said in a note on Friday.

Swiss-headquartered Ferrexpo did not provide a reason for the resignation of Deloitte, which declined to comment, while Blooming Land did not respond to a request for comment.

Funding for Blooming Land’s CSR activities is provided by one of Ferrexpo’s units in Ukraine and Khimreaktiv LLC, an entity ultimately controlled by Ferrexpo’s CEO and majority owner Kostyantin Zhevago, Ferrexpo said on Tuesday.

Ferrexpo’s board has found that Zhevago did not have significant influence or control over the charity, but Deloitte said it was unable reach a conclusion on this.

Reuters was not immediately able to contact Zhevago.

In a qualified opinion, a statement addressing an incomplete audit, Deloitte said it had been unable to conclude whether $33.5 million of CSR donations to Blooming Land between 2017 and 2018 was used for “legitimate business payments for charitable purposes”.

Deloitte said on Tuesday that total CSR payments made to Blooming Land by Ferrexpo since 2013 total about $110 million.

Ferrexpo, whose major mines are in Ukraine, has said that the investigation was ongoing and new evidence pointed to potential discrepancies.

Zhevago, 45, who ranked 1,511 on Forbes magazine’s list of billionaires for 2019 with a net worth of $1.4 billion, owns the FC Vorskla soccer club and has been a member of Ukraine’s parliament since 1998.

(Reporting by Noor Zainab Hussain and Tanishaa Nadkar in Bengaluru and additional reporting by Pavel Polityuk in Kiev; editing by Gopakumar Warrier, Bernard Orr)

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Children walk past a damaged building in the aftermath of the Cyclone Kenneth in Pemba
Children walk past a damaged building in the aftermath of the Cyclone Kenneth in Pemba, Mozambique April 26, 2019 in this still image obtained from social media. SolidarMed via REUTERS ATTENTION EDITORS – THIS IMAGE HAS BEEN SUPPLIED BY A THIRD PARTY. MANDATORY CREDIT. NO RESALES. NO ARCHIVES

April 26, 2019

By Emma Rumney and Stephen Eisenhammer

JOHANNESBURG/LUANDA (Reuters) – Cyclone Kenneth killed at least one person and left a trail of destruction in northern Mozambique, destroying houses, ripping up trees and knocking out power, authorities said on Friday.

The cyclone brought storm surges and wind gusts of up to 280 km per hour (174 mph) when it made landfall on Thursday evening, after killing three people in the island nation of Comoros.

It was the most powerful storm on record to hit Mozambique’s northern coast and came just six weeks after Cyclone Idai battered the impoverished nation, causing devastating floods and killing more than 1,000 people across a swathe of southern Africa.

The World Food Programme warned that Kenneth could dump as much as 600 millimeters of rain on the region over the next 10 days – twice that brought by Cyclone Idai.

One woman in the port town of Pemba died after being hit by a falling tree, the Emergency Operations Committee for Cabo Delgado (COE) said in a statement, while another person was injured.

In rural areas outside Pemba, many homes are made of mud. In the main town on the island of Ibo, 90 percent of the houses were destroyed, officials said. Around 15,000 people were out in the open or in “overcrowded” shelters and there was a need for tents, food and water, they said.

There were also reports of a large number of homes and some infrastructure destroyed in Macomia district, a mainland district adjacent to Ibo.

A local group, the Friends of Pemba Association, had earlier reported that they could not reach people in Muidumbe, a district further inland.

Mark Lowcock, United Nations under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs, warned the storm could require another major humanitarian operation in Mozambique.

“Cyclone Kenneth marks the first time two cyclones have made landfall in Mozambique during the same season, further stressing the government’s limited resources,” he said in a statement.

FLOOD WARNINGS

Shaquila Alberto, owner of the beach-front Messano Flower Lodge in Macomia, said there were many fallen trees there, and in rural areas people’s homes had been damaged. Some areas of nearby Pemba had no power.

“Even my workers, they said the roof and all the things fell down,” she said by phone.

Further south, in Pemba, Elton Ernesto, a receptionist at Raphael’s Hotel, said there were fallen trees but not too much damage. The hotel had power and water, he said, while phones rang in the background. “The rain has stopped,” he added.

However Michael Charles, an official for the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC), said heavy rains over the next few days were likely to bring a “second wave of destruction” in the form of flooding.

“The houses are not all solid, and the topography is very sandy,” Charles said.

In the days after Cyclone Idai, heavy inland rains prompted rivers to burst their banks, submerging entire villages, cutting areas off from aid and ruining crops. There were concerns the same could happen again in northern Mozambique.

Before Kenneth hit, the government and aid workers moved around 30,000 people to safer buildings such as schools, however authorities said that around 680,000 people were in the path of the storm.

(Reporting by Emma Rumney and Stephen Eisenhammer; Writing by Emma Rumney; Editing by Janet Lawrence and Alexandra Zavis)

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A worker holds a nozzle to pump petrol into a vehicle at a fuel station in Mumbai
FILE PHOTO: A worker holds a nozzle to pump petrol into a vehicle at a fuel station in Mumbai, India, May 21, 2018. REUTERS/Francis Mascarenhas

April 26, 2019

By Manoj Kumar and Nidhi Verma

NEW DELHI (Reuters) – Surging global oil prices will pose a first big challenge to India’s new government, whoever wins an election now under way, especially as domestic prices have been allowed to lag, meaning consumers are in for a painful surge as they catch up.

For oil-import dependent India, higher global prices could lead to a weaker rupee, higher inflation, the ruling out of interest rate cuts and could further weigh on twin current account and budget deficits, economists warned.

But compounding the future pain, state-run fuel suppliers and retailers have held off passing on to consumers the higher prices during a staggered general election, which began on April 11 and ends on May 23, according to sources familiar with the situation.

That delay is expected to be unwound once the election is over. And there could be additional price increases to make up for losses or profits missed during the period of delayed increases, the sources said.

In some major Asian countries, such as Japan and South Korea, pump prices are adjusted periodically so they move largely in tandem with international crude prices.

That was what was supposed to happen in India but the election means there have been many days when pump prices have been unchanged.

In New Delhi, for example, while crude oil prices have gone up by nearly $9 a barrel, or about 12 percent, in the past six weeks, gasoline prices have only risen by 0.47 rupees a liter, or 0.6 percent.

State-controlled fuel suppliers and retailers declined to say why they had delayed price increases, or discuss whether there has been any pressure from the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

A government spokesman declined to comment.

The opposition Congress party said Modi’s government was violating its own policy of daily price revision by advising the state oil companies to hold prices steady.

“The government should cut fuel taxes otherwise consumers will have to pay much higher oil prices once the elections are over,” said Akhilesh Pratap Singh, a senior leader of the Congress party.

(GRAPHIC: India Polls: Fuel price hike lags crude surge – https://tmsnrt.rs/2XLlxik)

Nitin Goyal, treasurer at the All India Petroleum Dealers Association, representing fuel stations in 25 states, said prices were similarly held down for 19 days in the southern state of Karnataka last year, when it held state assembly elections.

Only for them to surge after the vote.

“Consumers should be ready for a rude shock of a massive jump in retail prices, similar to the level we have seen in the Karnataka state election,” Goyal said.

‘CREDIT NEGATIVE’

Sri Paravaikkarasu, director for Asia oil at Singapore-based consultancy FGE, said retail prices of gasoline and gasoil prices would have been up to 6 percent, or about 4 rupee, higher if they had been allowed to rise in line with global prices.

“Indian pump prices have failed to keep up with the recent uptrend in crude prices,” Paravaikkarasu said.

“With the country’s general elections underway, the incumbent government has been keeping pump prices relatively unchanged.”

India had switched to a daily price revision in June 2017 from a revision every two weeks, as the government allowed retailers to set prices.

But the government faced protests last October when retailers raised prices by up to 10 rupees a liter after the crude oil price went above $80 a barrel, forcing it to cut fuel taxes.

Global prices rose to their highest level in 2019 on Thursday, days after the United States announced all Iran sanction waivers would end by May, pressuring importers including India to stop buying Tehran’s oil. [O/R]

Higher oil prices will mean Asia’s third largest economy is likely to see growth of less than 7 percent rate this fiscal year, economists said. Growth slowed to 6.6 percent in the October-December quarter, the slowest in five quarters.

Rating agency CARE has warned that a 10 percent rise in global oil prices could increase demand for dollars, putting pressure on the rupee and widening the current account deficit.

India’s oil import bill rose by nearly one-third in the fiscal year ending March 31 to $140.5 billion, against $108 billion the previous year.

“The increase in international oil prices is a credit negative for the Indian economy,” ICRA, the Indian arm of the Fitch rating agency, said in a note.

“Every $10/ bbl increase in crude oil prices increases the fiscal deficit by about 0.1 percent of GDP.”

Any big price rise would also build a case for the central bank to keep rates steady, or even raise them.

The Reserve Bank of India’s Monetary Policy Committee, which cut the benchmark policy repo rate by 25 basis points this month, warned that rising oil and food prices could push up inflation.

Policymakers are worried that a sustained increase in the oil price in the range of $70-75/barrel or higher can move the rupee down by 3-4 percent on an annual basis.

The rupee has depreciated by 1.24 percent against the dollar since a year high in mid-March.

($1 = 70.1800 Indian rupees)

(Reporting by Manoj Kumar and Nidhi Verma; Editing by Martin Howell and Rob Birsel)

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