Daily Market News Update — 26th-27th May 2026

Midnight News Update: 26-27 May 2026

Amid falling coal output in April 2026, as per core sector data, Coal India has assured that it has enough buffers available to meet peak power demand. Demand for electricity touched an all-time high this year due to an extremely hot summer. Coal India has assured that it has nearly 168 MT of coal buffer stocks to meet surge in demand from power units. The combined inventory of coal at coal-based power plants and at mine-heads was sufficient to meet nearly 19-days of coal demand. Coal India has a pivotal role in coal supply in India as it accounts for 80% of total coal output.

Bharti Airtel has defended its “ Priority Postpaid Service” as not being in violation of net neutrality conditions. Interestingly, even Jio has supported this view of Airtel and underlined that this is a common practice globally. The entire debate started after Bharti Airtel started offering 5G slicing to its Priority Postpaid customers, especially to give them easy access during times of network congestion. Bharti also underlined that there was no degradation of service for prepaid users. The PPS is offered in a content-neutral manner. PPS promises consistent speed during congestion.

Several payment companies are protesting against the recent RBI proposal to limit peer-to-peer (P2P) wallet transactions to ₹25,000 per month and reduce cash loading limits to ₹10,000. Payment companies have protested that such discrimination against prepaid payment instruments (PPIs) can lead to exodus from wallets. They are OK with other stipulations pertaining to greater security and clearer rules for refunds and grievance redressal. According to payment companies, the current limit of ₹2 lakhs for wallet balance was already very inadequate to be meaningful.

One of the recent trends is that mutual funds are cutting down on exit loads. Generally, mutual funds used to charge an exit load of up to 1% for exit before 1 year. There are 2 changes happening. Firstly, the lock-in period is being reduced to around 90 days, and the rate of exit load is also being reduced. What is driving this shift? The first factor is the rising competition from new-age sales channels and the other factor is the zero-to-low exit loads offered by most passive funds. Also, the scrapping of additional 5 bps compensation has reduced the incentive to hold on to customers.

With FPIs selling Indian equities worth more than ₹2,20,000 crore since the start of 2026, the total FPI selling in 2026 has already crossed the FPI selling in all of 2025. In the last few months, several factors accentuated FPI selling in Indian equities. This included rich valuations of Indian stocks, weak quarterly numbers, geopolitical risk, supply chain bottlenecks, and the absence of Indian companies in the artificial intelligence (AI) matrix. The month of March 2026 was the worst month of FPI selling in history at ₹1.17 trillion. Even after the war ends, valuation risks still remain.

SEBI is evaluating the launch of tokenization of corporate bond markets, the first test case in use of blockchain technology underlying cryptos. Blockchain is a distribution ledger technology, which can improve liquidity in bond markets and enable instant and autonomous settlements. However, it will be launched on a test basis to get a full grasp of risks involved in implementation in the Indian context. The launch will be subject to final approval from the RBI. While India has been sceptical of cryptos; it has been open to the use of the underlying distributed ledger technology.

A recent report by Kotak has brought out some interesting aspects of consumption in India. Indians spent more than ₹1.45 trillion on foreign travel during FY26. A bigger chunk of the wallet is going towards items like; live events, purchase of premium smartphones, etc. On the flip side, the report also underlined that Indians are carrying more of EMI obligations and lower financial savings than a few years ago. Broadly, bulk of the consumer spending was going towards concerts, OTT spends, quick commerce, smart phones, wearables, and foreign travel; a big shift from 3 years back.

Quick service restaurants (QSR) chains have turned cautious as inflation fears have clouded the FY27 outlook. There are several headwinds at play. Rising commodity costs, higher fuel costs and a surge in logistics costs is making life tougher for QSR companies. This includes traditional chains like Domino’s, Burger King, McDonalds etc. In terms of priorities, QSR companies are slowing their store rollouts, tightening operating costs, and leaning heavily on value offerings to maintain growth in a crowded price-sensitive market. Gas shortages have also been hitting QSRs.