Good morning. A big week starts with markets nervous, a rate decision and a tax meeting ahead, and a war far away landing closer to home.
In today's newsletter: an Indian-owned drug plant hit in Ukraine, costlier deep-sea gas, and Brazil heads to a runoff.
What's Happening This Week
Mon: Supreme Court on the CEC. The Supreme Court hears pleas seeking Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar's resignation today, after three days of street protests over the voter-roll revision. |
Tue: Tamil Nadu bypolls. Madurantakam and Dharapuram vote in five-cornered byelections, a test for Chief Minister Vijay's TVK. |
Wed: RBI rate decision. Economists polled expect the RBI to raise the repo rate by 0.25% on costlier crude, which would push loan EMIs up. |
Wed: GST Council. The GST Council may clear sweeping compliance reforms, with relief for e-commerce sellers and businesses buying from small vendors. |
All week: 29 listings. The primary market sees 29 companies list this week, with grey-market signals ranging from flat debuts to gains of up to 59%. |
Russian drones hit Indian-owned Kusum pharma plant in Ukraine's Sumy, one killed
Russian drones struck a pharmaceutical site owned by India's Kusum Group in Ukraine's Sumy region, killing one person, Ukraine's embassy in India said.
The Sumy plant had kept running throughout the war. Its main structure was badly damaged, and the property is valued at nearly ₹400 crore.
Kusum, run by Indian national Rajeev Gupta, started out in 1994 by exporting Indian medicines to Ukraine and built the Sumy facility in 2009.
The strike came the same day External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said India is talking to both Moscow and Kyiv about agreements on grains and maritime safety.
Indian companies working in Ukraine are now direct casualties of the war, which puts pressure on New Delhi's effort to stay close to Russia while presenting itself as a go-between. If you work for, or invest in, an Indian firm with operations in a conflict zone, this is the risk in plain view.
It is not the first hit on Kusum. In April 2025 its main warehouse in Kyiv was destroyed, with losses of nearly $25 million, and Russia's embassy in Delhi denied responsibility then.
Government raises price cap on deep-sea gas to $9.89, Reliance-BP to benefit
The government has raised the ceiling price for gas from difficult fields like Reliance-BP's KG-D6 block to $9.89 per million British thermal units, for six months from October 1.
That is up from $8.90 earlier. The cap on gas from the older fields of state-run ONGC and Oil India stays at $7, so only the deep-sea and other hard-to-produce gas gets costlier.
The separate pricing for these fields exists to encourage investment in India's technically tough gas reserves. Producers win; buyers of that gas pay more.
Brazil heads to an October 25 runoff between Lula and Flávio Bolsonaro
With over 98% of votes counted, Flávio Bolsonaro led with over 47% against President Lula da Silva's 44%. Neither crossed 50%, so the two meet again on October 25.
Lula, 80, wants a fourth term. Bolsonaro, 45, is the son of imprisoned former president Jair Bolsonaro, and his lead narrowed as counting went on.
The runoff result could shift Brazil's ties with the US and China.
Breaking.exe
AI goes official. Donald Trump announced a Super Intelligence Force after a White House accord in which top tech companies confirmed their responsibilities on advanced AI. |
AI slop wins. Google froze its open-source bug bounty programme after a significant rise in AI-generated submissions swamped it. |
Quantum through air. IIT-Gandhinagar scientists demonstrated a quantum key link across 5.56 km of open air, described as India's first free-space link of its kind at that distance. |
Tech for tuskers. AI alerts and a 'Plan Bee' scheme helped the Railways save 255 elephants from train collisions in the northeast. |
Finance 101
Four days down. Sensex and Nifty fell for a fourth straight session on heavy foreign selling, rising bond yields and costly crude, wiping out ₹5 lakh crore in market value. |
Luxury for seniors. DLF sold out its first senior living project in Gurugram for ₹1,985 crore, at an average of ₹11.5 crore per apartment. |
UPI fee pushback. In a survey of 67,000 UPI users, 76% said they may switch to cards or cash above ₹2,000 if shops pass on a 0.4% fee. |
Closing bell rethink. SEBI received around 20,000 comments on its plan for a closing auction session, a new way of setting the day's final stock prices. |
Pangaea Revisited
Yemen escalates. Yemen's government announced an all-out war to retake territory from the Houthis, amid strikes traded between the Houthis and the Saudi-led coalition. |
Hormuz stays shut. Iran said the Strait of Hormuz will not reopen until the US meets seven conditions, and plans to expand the range of its missiles. |
Pakistan marches. Supporters of jailed former prime minister Imran Khan set off towards Islamabad after talks with the government failed. |
Bombers pulled. The US Air Force removed all its bombers from Britain's RAF Fairford, used to strike Iran, after a suspected terror plot against the base. |
Also, Also, Also
Check your masala. FSSAI ordered a recall of Everest cumin powder over unsafe pesticide levels. |
Irani Cup. Rest of India won the Irani Cup by 167 runs against Jammu and Kashmir in Srinagar, with seven wickets falling in an hour after lunch. |
Diljit is back. Diljit Dosanjh announced a seven-city India leg of his Aura tour, starting in Delhi-NCR on November 1. |
Formula 1. Max Verstappen won the Bahrain Grand Prix, his first win of 2026 and 72nd of his career. |