Gold price today jumped to Rs 55,250 from Rs 55,040 per 10 gm, while silver was trending at Rs 61,000 per kg, according to the Good Returns website.

Gold jewellery prices vary across India, the second-largest consumer of the metal, due to excise duty, state taxes, and making changes.

In New Delhi, the gold price of 22-carat rose to Rs 50,650 per 10 gm, while in Chennai it climbed to Rs 49,220. In Mumbai, the rate was Rs 51,230 according to the Good Returns website. The price of 24-carat gold in Chennai was Rs 53,380 per 10 gm.

On the MCX, December gold futures fell 4.80 per cent to Rs 49,665 per 10 gm, while silver December futures were at Rs 60,725 per kg.

Gold prices rose for the fourth consecutive day on Monday, gaining Rs 277 to Rs 52,183 per 10 gram in the national capital on a strong global trend, according to HDFC Securities.

In the previous trade, the yellow metal had closed at Rs 51,906 per 10 gram. Silver prices also jumped Rs 694 to Rs 65,699 per kilogram from Rs 65,005 per kilogram in the previous trade.

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Eli Lilly & Co.’s antibody therapy was granted an emergency-use authorisation by U.S. drug regulators for treating Covid-19, widening access to a treatment that early data suggests is effective in keeping people infected with the coronavirus out of the hospital.

The Food and Drug Administration authorised the experimental treatment, called bamlanivimab, for use against mild-to-moderate Covid-19 in adults, including those who are 65 and older, and pediatric patients, the agency said on its website.

Shares of the Indianapolis-based Lilly gained 4.5% in late trading on Monday. Through the close, the stock had advanced 8.3% so far this year.

The clearance gives doctors an option for tackling the virus in high-risk patients before they’re sick enough to require hospitalisation. Other treatments that received the regulatory go-ahead, such as convalescent plasma, a component collected from the blood of recovered Covid patients containing immune factors, and Gilead Sciences Inc.’s antiviral remdesivir, are intended for use in severely ill Covid-19 patients.

Now begins an even more difficult challenge: distribution. Lilly said in a statement Monday that bamlanivimab should be administered “as soon as possible after a positive Covid-19 test and within 10 days of symptom onset.” Lilly will begin shipping the antibody therapy immediately to AmerisourceBergen Corp., which will distribute it as directed by the U.S. government. Americans will have no out-of-pocket costs for the medicine, the company said, while acknowledging that health-care facilities may charge a fee for the product’s intravenous administration.

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WhatsApp has launched a new shopping button on its app that will allow users to browse through a business’ catalogue, the Facebook-owned messaging service said in a press release.

With the new feature, people will be able to see a storefront icon, right next to the business’ name. This will make it easier for users to discover a catalogue and look at what goods or services are offered, WhatsApp said in the emailed release. Earlier, users had to click on the business profile to see if it offered a ready list of items. The button will also help businesses boost the visibility of their products. “This will make it easier for businesses to have their products discovered which can help increase sales,” the email said.

The shopping button will replace the voice call button. Now, users will have to tap on the call button to select either a voice or video call. The new feature has been launched worldwide, the messaging service added.

According to WhatsApp, more than 175 million people message a WhatsApp Business account every day, and more than 40 million people view a business’ catalogue each month – including more than 3 million in India.

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Blue Star Limited, an air conditioning and commercial refrigeration major, has won a project worth Rs 128 crore from Wistron Infocomm. The project involves Mechanical Electrical and Plumbing (MEP) work for their factory expansion. Wistron is a Taiwan-based contract manufacturer of electronic goods and is one of the major manufacturers of iPhones for Apple.

The latest project is one of the largest, fast-track projects, being executed by Blue Star in the factories’ segment.

The scope includes supply, installation, testing and commissioning of a HVAC system of 4000 tonne capacity, HT and LT electrical work with switchgear, transformer and DG sets, fire-fighting system, plumbing, compressed air system,and sophisticated Building Management System. Wistron has been producing Apple devices at its existing factory at Kolar, Bengaluru, and has now embarked upon its phase-II expansion as part of which it is constructing a large manufacturing block and an IT building.

B Thiagarajan, managing director, Blue Star Limited, said that the company is witnessing steady growth in the inflow of orders for bundled services and continues to enjoy market leadership.

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Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday will inaugurate and lay the foundation stone of various development projects in Varanasi via video conferencing.

“Tomorrow an important chapter is going to be added in Varanasi’s development journey. I will inaugurate and lay the foundation stone of many projects through video conferencing at 10.30 am. These include agriculture and tourism as well as other infrastructure-related projects,” he tweeted on Sunday.

As per the official website of the Prime Minister, the total cost implication of these projects is Rs 614 crore. Prime Minister will also interact with the beneficiaries of these projects during the event.

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath will also be present on the occasion.The projects to be inaugurated include Sarnath Light and Sound show, up-gradation of Lal Bahadur Shastri Hospital Ramnagar, sewerage related works, infrastructure facilities for protection and conservation of cows, multipurpose seed storehouse, agriculture produce warehouse of 100 MT, IPDS phase 2, a housing complex for players in Sampurnanand Stadium, Varanasi city smart lighting work, along with 105 Anganwadi Kendras and 102 Gau Ashray Kendras.

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The decision to cap market share of UPI players at 30 per cent will have implications for millions of users and even adversely impact adoption of the digital payment mechanism in the future, according to industry experts.

On Thursday, National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) said a single Third Party App Provider (TPAP) can handle only 30 per cent of overall UPI (Unified Payments Interface) transaction volumes. The cap shall be applicable with effect from January 1, 2021.

Google Pay, Walmart’s PhonePe and Paytm are among the TPAP players in the fast-growing UPI ecosystem, amid the sustained push for boosting digital payments in the country.

NPCI — which runs the UPI — will issue Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) regarding capping of transactions in due course.

“Digital payments in India is still in its infancy and any interventions at this point should be made with a view to accelerate consumer choice and innovation. A choice-based and open model is key to drive this momentum,” Google Pay and Next Billion User initiatives, India Business Head Sajith Sivanandan said in a statement.

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Expanding its immersive audio equipment category in the country, US-based audio equipment major Skullcandy on Friday launched its latest true wireless earbuds ‘Spoke’ for Rs 7,999 in the Indian market.

With Bluetooth capabilities and a wide range of useful features such as the ability to use either bud solo, dual microphones for calls, auto on, and easy connectivity, Spoke aims to allow users to truly experience freedom without wires.

“For those looking at wearing true wireless earbuds at an affordable price from Skullcandy, Spoke is it. We have packed it with all the essential, must-have features, and we can’t wait for people to start listening without anything holding them back,” Amlan Bhattacharjya, CEO, Brand Eyes, Official Distributor of Skullcandy in India, said in a statement.

Spoke comes loaded with controls such as call, track and volume control, active assistant, EQ modes and use either solo bud feature in it.

With an IPX4 rating, Spoke is sweat as well as water-resistant comes with more than 14 hours of battery life.

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Facebook-owned instant messaging platform WhatsApp on Thursday introduced ‘Disappearing Messages’ feature, which will roll out to users this month through an update. The feature will be available as an option for both individual and group chats. It allows the user to send a self-disappearing message, which gets deleted after seven days. WhatsApp’s Disappearing Messages feature will be available for Android, iOS, and KaiOS devices. It will also be available for WhatsApp Web and Desktop clients.WhatsApp’s Disappearing Messages feature: How it works

WhatsApp will soon let users send message that self-disappear after seven days. Once enabled from settings, the new messages sent in the individual or group chat will disappear automatically. Important to note, the Disappearing Messages setting will not affect messages sent previously or received in the chat. In an individual chat, either user can turn disappearing messages on or off. In a group chat, however, only group admins will have the rights to turn disappearing messages on or off.

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Sony on Thursday launched a new 65-inch 4K HDR OLED TV in A8H series for Rs 2,79,990 in the India market.

The TV comes with powerful 4K HDR picture processor X1 Ultimate as well as X-Motion Clarity technology with an aim to provide an incredible refresh rate that is brighter and clearer than ever before, the company said.

“With Pixel Contrast Booster, colour and contrast are enhanced in bright areas so one can enjoy their TV viewing with full of lifelike shades and hues, more depth, fine texture and the pure black contrast that only Sony’s OLED can deliver,” the company said in a statement.

A8H features ambient optimisation technology automatically adjusting picture and sound to your environment. On conventional TVs, brightness stays the same regardless of light in a room, resulting in pictures that are too dark or bright.

It features Sony’s Android TV which supports more than 5,000 apps and games from Google Play, including YouTube, Netflix, Amazon Video and Disney+ Hotstar.

The TV also features a picture mode specially developed to enjoy Netflix Originals called the Netflix Calibrated Mode. This mode reproduces the same picture quality on the TV as the creators intended.

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From a new 23.6-megapixel sensor for 5K video recording to a dual-screen design and bigger-capacity battery, the Gorpo Hero 9 Black features that most GoPro enthusiasts had long been waiting for. Bigger than any of its previous iterations, this action camera might require some tweaking in your existing mount set-up. For example, I had to redo the J-mount set-up on the helmet to get the right point-of-view (PoV). Though changing the mount set-up to fit the GoPro Hero 9 Black can be a bit of a hassle, the upgrades and new features justify the changes in dimension. Moreover, it has built-in mounting rings which GoPro introduced with the Hero 8 Black; they do away with the need for a camera cage to mount the camera. So, even as the camera dimensions and weight have increased, these feel like a marginal change in real-life usage.

The dual-screen design is another major change that is apparent on the GoPro Hero 9 Black. The action camera has a 2.27-inch rear touch screen with a touch zoom function on the back that shows relevant information and doubles up as a digital viewfinder, and a tiny 1.4-inch square colour screen on the front that is not information rich but covers the basics and shows live preview. The dual-screen design makes the Hero 9 Black a suitable imaging accessory fit for vloggers and social media enthusiasts, besides adventurers.

Design details aside, the Hero 9 Black brings a new 23.6-megapixel sensor capable of recording up to 5K resolution videos and capturing 20MP stills. It is a major upgrade over the predecessor’s 12MP sensor capable of recording 4K videos. The 5K resolution video might seem absurd, considering the devices we use max out at 4K resolution. However, the additional resolution here would be appreciated by content creators as they get extra pixels to play around with during production. One thing that pinches here, however, is the 30-frame-per-second (fps) limit on 5K recording; adventurers might prefer to stick to the 4K resolution as the fps goes up to 60, which is a better fit for fast-paced action recording.

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