India In-Focus — Shares up; Yes Bank among gainers; India blocks Krafton’s game on data concerns

Indian shares kicked off August trading on a positive note on Monday, after clocking their best month since November 2020 in the previous session.

Among the gainers was Yes Bank, which jumped more than 5 percent following its decision last week to raise $1.1 billion.

The lender also said late on Friday that it would sell up to 10 percent stake to US private-equity firms Carlyle Group Inc. and Advent International.

The NSE Nifty 50 index was up 0.3 percent at 17,210.35, as of 0352 GMT, and the S&P BSE Sensex rose 0.27 percent to 57,723.67.

The benchmark indexes posted their first monthly gain in four, advancing more than 8 percent each in July.

India blocks Krafton’s game on concerns over data sharing in China

India’s government blocked a popular battle-royale format game from Krafton Inc., a South Korean company backed by China’s Tencent, as it was concerned about its data sharing and mining in China, an Indian government source said.

New Delhi used powers it has under India’s information technology law to block Battlegrounds Mobile India, relying on a provision it has invoked since 2020 to ban several other Chinese apps on national security concerns, said the government official and another source with direct knowledge.

The Indian government has not publicly announced the blocking. But the app was removed from Alphabet Inc’s Google Play Store and Apple Inc’s App Store as of Thursday evening in India.

The removal of BGMI, which had more than 100 million users in India, comes after the South Asian country’s 2020 ban of another Krafton title, PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds.