Reliance Capital has sold its stake in Paytm’s parent One97

Communications to China’s Alibaba in a deal estimated at

.̀ 275 crore, reports Payal Ganguly. The deal signifies an

over-27-fold return on investment for Reliance Cap.��PAGE 8

Fat Profit: Rel Cap Exits One97

THEECON MICTIMESINTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY

NEW DELHI / GURGAON | 24 + 4 PAGES EACH OF BRAND EQUITY & ET PANACHE | .̀ 3.00 OR .̀ 7.00 ALONG WITH TOI WEDNESDAY, 8 MARCH 2017BENNETT, COLEMAN & CO. LTD. WWW.ECONOMICTIMES.COM

BRANDS: CREATING DESIRE��5 SPORTS: THE GREAT GAMES��22AROUND THE WORLD��19

Parle Adds Fizz to Frooti,Signs Up Alia Bhatt

Republicans Unveil Plan to Repeal, Replace Obamacare

Ashwin’s Super 6 HelpsIndia Level Test Series

Oppo Pips Vivo with .̀ 1,079-cr Bid toBag Team India Sponsorship Rights Oppo Mobiles has won the right to emblazon its

logo on the jerseys of India’s cricket team for

five years by outbidding fellow Chinese brand

Vivo .̀1,079 crore to .̀ 768 crore. Both companies

belong to BBK Electronics Corp. Oppo will pay

.̀ 4.17 crore per bilateral match and .̀1.51crore

for ICC matches that India is involved in, sharply

up from the base price of .̀ 2.2 crore and .̀ 70

lakh, respectively.

Companies: Pursuit of Profit��14

llllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll

Energy Sector Reforms may IncludeSubsidy Cuts, Price Controls The government will soon outline comprehensi-

ve energy sector reforms that could free up

sectors such as coal, electricity and fertilisers of

subsidies and price controls, helping produce

more power and make generation projects

commercially viable for private companies.

Economy: Macro, Micro & More��17

Inside story

Should banks be allowed to charge cashtransactions in the name of digital push?

www.economictimes.com

Are mid-level employees resistant to change?

TODAY’S QUESTION

24%YES

75%NO

1%CAN’T SAY

-0.18

-0.17

0.14

0.03

0.06

0

0

0.40

% CHANGE

Re/US $

Gold Std*

Silver (`/kg)

Brent ($)

*(`/10gm) Compiled by ETIG Database

Nifty

Sensex

BSE Midcap

BSE Smallcap

LAST

8,946.90

28,999.56

13,503.84

13,675.18

66.67

29,550.00

42,800.00

55.36

Market Tracker

Market notTied to PollFate: Mobius

Indulal PM & Baiju Kalesh

Mumbai: Brookfield Asset Ma-nagement, the world’s second-biggest alternative assets mana-ger, is in talks with lenders ofdebt-laden Jaiprakash PowerVentures to acquire the firm’sthree power plants, two peoplewith direct knowledge of the de-velopment said.

The discussions are in initialstages and there is no certaintythat a transaction will take place.A deal, if it happens, could closeat an equity value of .̀ 4,500-5,000crore, one of the two people said.

The transaction will mark Bro-okfield’s first investment in Indi-

a’s power sector. The asset mana-ger has already committed about$4.6 billion in the country in tollroads and telecom towers.

Jaiprakash Power Ventures’major lenders such as ICICI

Bank, IDBI Bank and Punjab Na-tional Bank took control after thefirm failed to repay loans on time.

Brookfield did not comment onthe talks and Jaiprakash Associ-ates did not respond to an emai-

led questionnaire.Last month, Jaiprakash Power

Ventures allotted 305.8 crore sha-res to its 23 lenders as part of adebt restructuring scheme. Theallotment brought down Jaipra-kash Associates’ holding in thecompany to 29.74%.

The group has been trying to sellassets, including core ones, in thepast two years after intense pres-sure from lenders. In July last ye-ar, the group sold its cement busi-ness to Aditya Birla Group firmUltraTech for .̀ 19,500 crore.

JP’s power portfolio of 4,000 mwincludes one hydro power plantand two thermal units.

Betting Big on Indian Infra��15

Brookfield in Talks to Buy JP’s Power Assets Lenders looking to sell off three operational units in a deal likely to be valued at around .̀ 5,000 cr

Not a Snap Deal:Lifeline May CutValuation by HalfSoftBank in talks to

invest up to $300 m

in Jasper at valuation

of less than $3 billion

mains an arduous task. Cab-hai-ling company Ola is raising ca-pital from SoftBank at a 40%drop in valuation, ET reportedin November, citing people awa-re of that transaction.

Gurgaon-based Jasper waslast valued at $6.5 billion when itraised $200 million in fundingled by Canada’s Ontario Tea-chers’ Pension Plan in Februa-ry 2016. It was valued below $3billion in late 2014 to early 2015during stake sales by sharehol-ders to other investors.

‘Sign of Bullishness’��15

Biswarup.Gooptu@timesgroup.com

New Delhi: Snapdeal owner Ja-sper Infotech is inching closerto securing a lifeline from Ja-pan’s SoftBank Corp, its largestshareholder, but the transac-tion could drag its valuation tounder $3 billion.

SoftBank is negotiating to in-vest $100-150 million in Jasper intranches, according to three pe-ople familiar with develop-ments. A fourth person said ove-rall investment could be as highas $300 million in Jasper, whichis grappling with slowing salesand has been forced to cut jobs.

Jasper and SoftBank have beengoing back and forth the last twomonths on crucial terms of thedeal, including on the invest-ment size and the valuation, the-se people said, declining to beidentified. Jasper’s board hasheld talks with SoftBank for rai-sing funds at a valuation of $1.5-2.5 billion, they said.

If the transaction goes thro-ugh, it would be the latest in-stance of a top-tier Indian Inter-net company’s valuation takinga hit, as raising fresh capital re-

JAPANESE CO MAY RAISE STAKE TO ABOUT 40%

Some Relief

The money is expected to come in tranches, with the fi rst expected to be remitted in the fi rst few months of the upcoming fi scal

If successful, SoftBank to exercise greater control over Jasper’s fi nances going forward

Snapdeal valuation is likely to be 3-4 times its gross merchandisesales, and is notnecessarily a badoutcome for the co

Fund-raising for, or a potential saleof, FreeCharge continues to bein limbo

Sale Season4000 MW:JaiprakashPower’s portfolio

`12,000 CRORENet debt(`67,500 cr: JP Asso-ciates’ total debt)

Who Owns What in JP Power51%: Consortium of lendersincluding ICICI Bank, IDBI Bank and PNB

29.74%: JP Group’s stake

19.26%: Public shareholders and institutions

Lenders looking to sell power assets

Leap Green Energy, a

company promoted by

India’s first Formula One

driver Narain Karthikeyan, has

bought all windfarms owned by

Inox Renewables for an undisclosed

amount, report Mohit Bhalla.��13

Karthikeyan Co BuysInox’s Windfarms

Says scrapping banking transaction charges subsidises the wealthy

Saloni Shukla & MC Govardhana Rangan

Mumbai: Banks are not Shylocksbent on sucking out money fromcustomers, but those seeking hig-her levels of service must be opento paying for the convenience, saidAditya Puri, MD of HDFC Bank.

India’s longest serving bank chiefalso said strong third-quarter GDPgrowth has proved demonising ofdemonetisation was wrong.

Scrapping all banking chargesends up subsidising the wealthycarrying out high-end transactionsand reduces banks’ ability to offerservices to the poor, Puri said.

“You don’t go to Oberoi Hotel andask for Mahesh Lunch Home ra-tes,” Aditya Puri told ET in an in-terview. “We are not here to chargeusury costs, let us be very clear. Asyou go higher up on the type of pro-duct, it is perfectly reasonable tocharge. There is a segment of thepopulation which should not be

Customers Need to Payfor Better Service: Puri

Unless BJP suffers a

significant upset in the

ongoing state elec-

tions, any adverse

outcome will not lead

to any big fall in the

market, said Mark

Mobius, executive

chairman of Templeton

Emerging Markets

Group. In an interview

with Sanam Mirchan-

dani, Mobius said India

is his most preferred

emerging market after

China.��PAGE 10

Admit that the impact (of

demonetisation) has not

been drastic. To start say-

ing impact on parts of the

informal economy was not

reflected… we are talking

about this for 20 years

ADITYA PURI MD, HDFC Bank

FULL INTERVIEW��20

charged, which we agree with.”Recent charges levied by banks

for ATM transactions and cash de-posits beyond a limit have drawncriticism, especially in case of SBI,which restored the minimum ba-lance amount after scrapping it in2012. Opposition to charges on useof debit and credit cards at mer-chants is also strong, especially af-ter demonetisation, which has ledto a surge in digital payments.

‘Impact of DeMo not Drastic’��15ARINDAM