Iranian Energy Minister Ali-Akbar Mehrabian has reportedly said that his country will soon begin electricity exchange with Russia through Azerbaijan.

Iran has considered two routes, one via Azerbaijan and the other via Armenia and Georgia, for electricity exchange with Russia, Mehrabian told Iranian Students’ News Agency (ISNA), noting that Iran is holding the final negotiations for the start of the projects, Xinhua news agency reported.

The Azerbaijan route involves a less complicated process, as Iran and Azerbaijan have synchronised their power networks to the required extent, said the minister.

Iran and Russia can complement each other favourably by exporting their surplus of electricity mutually, as the latter’s electricity consumption peaks in winter while the former in summer, he added.

Mehrabian emphasised that Iran also seeks to connect its power grid to those of other regional states to ensure electricity supply sustainability throughout the year.

At present, Iran exchanges electricity with Iraq, Türkiye, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Afghanistan and Pakistan, he said, adding Iran is seeking to increase such transactions. 

Elon Musk may be upbeat about fighting fellow tech tycoon Mark Zuckerberg in a cage, but he faces a challenge from an Indian billionaire before entering the market. The Indian government’s policy on import duty, which Musk wants it to modify, has already acted as a fence keeping Tesla out of the country.

Now the SpaceX founder and self-proclaimed fan of Prime Minister Modi seeks to change how India assigns satellite broadband licenses, but Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance disagrees.

Taking different paths

After his meeting with PM Modi, Musk also mentioned how he hopes to connect remote Indian villages to the world wide web, by beaming internet from Starlink satellites.

His firm wants the Indian government to follow the global trend and directly assign licenses, instead of an auction for allotment of the spectrum.

But Jio’s parent Reliance wants a public submission of bids, so that local telcos get a level playing field to compete with foreign firms that can offer voice and data services via satellites.

Will it disrupt duopoly?

Although neither Musk nor Ambani have directly engaged with each other, the battle to dominate the satellite broadband market in India, could put them on a collision course.

As Reliance Jio Space Tech has received clearance to provide broadband from space, its current rival Airtel One Web has already put 40 satellites in space, while it needs a constellation of 588.

On the other hand, Musk’s Starlink is available in almost 50 countries, but its entry into India was disrupted when its India head Sanjay Bhargava quit and later wrote that he didn’t have time for endless meetings to discuss regulations and procedures.

The markets on Thursday morning were trading flat with Sensex at 63,182.52, up by 39.56 points and Nifty was at 18,738.55 with a gain of 12.15 points. Nestle, Tata Motors, NTPC, Bharti Airtel and Power Grid were the top gainers in the morning session whereas Kotak Bank, Axis Bank, TCS, Hindustan Unilever and Tata Steel were the top losers.

Markets on Wednesday

The markets on Wednesday closed higher for the fourth straight session with Sensex at 63,142.96, up by 350.08 and Nifty at 18,726.40 with a gain of 127.40 points. All sectors were in the green with FMCG, Power, oil and gas, capital goods, realty and metal up by 1 per cent each.

Global markets

Ahead of key economic and policy events next week the Dow Jones Industrial Average added 91.74 points to 33,665.02. However, the S&P 500 dropped by 16.33 at 4,267.52 and Nasdaq ended lower at 13,104.90 down by 171.52 points.

The Asian stock markets on Thursday were mixed with Hong Kong’s Hang Seng was at 19,227.84 with a loss of 24.16 points, South Korea’s KOSPI was relatively flat at 2,610.52 with a dip of 5.08 points and Japan’s Nikkei 225 dropped 6.83 points at 32,906.91. However, Singapore’s SGX Nifty was higher with a gain of 11 points at 18,823.

Oil prices

After oil prices saw a jump of 1 per cent on Wednesday, they were relatively stable on Thursday as investors took into consideration the increasing demand concerns over a global economic slowdown in the backdrop of expected fall in supply from Saudi output cuts. Brent crude futures were down 1 cents at $76.94 per barrel and US West Texas Intermediate crude was at $72.58 per barrel with a gain of 11 cents.