Business
Reeves says Budget will be ‘fair’ as tax rises expected
Jennifer Meierhans,Business reporter and
Henry Zeffman,Chief political correspondent
PA MediaChancellor Rachel Reeves has said she will make “necessary choices” in the Budget after the “world has thrown more challenges our way”.
Her Downing Street speech did not rule out a U-turn on Labour’s general election manifesto pledge not to hike income tax, VAT or National Insurance.
When journalists explicitly asked if the government was set to break that pledge she did not answer directly but said she was “setting the context for the Budget”.
Ahead of the speech, shadow chancellor Sir Mel Stride dubbed it an “emergency press conference”, adding “higher taxes are on the way” and called for Reeves to be sacked if she “breaks her promises yet again”.
If there was any doubt about tax rises before this speech, there isn’t now.
Yet Reeves repeatedly refused to get into the specifics of which taxes might go up.
Instead she began the work of explaining why a year after delivering a tax-raising Budget and vowing not to come back for more, she is in fact coming back for more.
The chancellor said she would do what is necessary, not what is popular.
The reasons she gave were poor productivity, for which she blamed Conservative government policy including Brexit, austerity and short-sighted decisions to cut infrastructure spending, persistently high global inflation and the uncertainty unleashed by Donald Trump’s tariffs.
In short, Reeves’ argument is that the failings of others are being visited upon this government, and that it falls to her to confront decisions her predecessors ducked.
She pledged to come up with a “Budget for growth with fairness at its heart” aimed at bringing down NHS waiting lists, the national debt and the cost of living.
“It is important that people understand the circumstances we are facing, the principles guiding my choices – and why I believe they will be the right choices for the country,” she said.
There are some in government who want this to be a one-and-done Budget, in that they do not want to come back again and again every year, eking out a bit more money in tax to meet the requirements of the independent forecast.
That is seen as an argument for raising billions of pounds through increasing at least one of the income tax rates.
However, no chancellor has increased the basic rate in 50 years and it would be a big risk politically, especially with public trust in politics in general, and Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer in particular, so low.
There is also the question of whether the prime minister and chancellor could land the argument that none of this was foreseeable before last year’s Budget.
The message from Reeves echoed comments made by Sir Keir to a group of Labour MPs on Monday night.
He told those gathered that the Budget would be “a Labour Budget built on Labour values” and that the government would “make the tough but fair decisions to renew our country and build it for the long term”.
It comes as the Resolution Foundation, which has close links to Labour and was previously run by Treasury minister Torsten Bell, said avoiding changes to VAT, NI or income tax “would do more harm than good”.
Hiking income tax would be the “best option” for raising cash, it said, but suggested it should be offset by a 2p cut to employee national insurance, which would “raise £6 billion overall while protecting most workers from this tax rise”.
Extending the freeze in personal tax thresholds for two more years beyond April 2028 would also raise £7.5 billion, its pre-Budget analysis suggested.
The government’s official forecaster, the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR), is widely expected to downgrade its productivity forecasts for the UK at the end of the month. That could add as much as £20bn to the amount the chancellor will need to find if she is to meet her self-imposed “non-negotiable” rules for government finances.
The two main rules are:
- Not to borrow to fund day-to-day public spending by the end of this parliament
- To get government debt falling as a share of national income by the end of this parliament
The Treasury declined to comment on “speculation” ahead of the OBR’s final forecast, which will be published on 26 November alongside the Budget.
However, the chancellor confirmed last week that both tax rises and spending cuts are options as she aims to give herself “sufficient headroom” against future economic shocks.
Reeves said in her speech on Tuesday that her commitment to her fiscal rules was “iron-clad”.
The Resolution Foundation urged the chancellor to use the Budget to give herself more fiscal headroom, meaning how much leeway she has to increase spending or cut taxes without being forced to break her own rules.
After the last Budget, Reeves had £9.9bn of headroom – but the think tank said subsequent policy U-turns and changes in the economic outlook have turned that into a £4bn black hole.
The group said Reeves should double the level of headroom to £20bn in order to “send a clear message to markets that she is serious about fixing the public finances, which in turn should reduce medium-term borrowing costs and make future fiscal events less fraught”.
Last month, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) said there was a “strong case” to increase fiscal headroom.
The think tank said the lack of a bigger buffer created instability, and could leave the chancellor “limping from one forecast to the next”.
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State Bank of India is well-positioned to support outbound financing due to its deep understanding of domestic corporates, CS Setty said.
State Bank of India (Representative)
State Bank of India’s Chairperson CS Setty on Tuesday said that the country’s largest lender is open to collaborating with foreign banks once the Reserve Bank makes it possible for local banks to do acquisition finance.
Weeks after the central bank announced its intent to allow Indian banks to fund companies for executing domestic acquisitions, Setty acknowledged that the “MNC (multinational companies) banks” are dominant in the space.
“Yes, I think some of the MNC banks are very well into this activity. We don’t mind collaborating with them,” Setty said as quoted by news agency PTI.
He said that SBI has always been doing outbound acquisition finance and has also gained considerable expertise in this aspect. He further said that SBI can also use its in-house investment banking unit SBI Capital Markets’ expertise for such deals.
State Bank of India is well-positioned to support outbound financing due to its deep understanding of domestic corporates, the SBI chairman added.
Setty added that the bank is still evaluating the Reserve Bank of India’s recent decision permitting acquisition financing and will finalise its stance shortly.
However, Setty noted that SBI has reservations about the RBI’s proposal to limit total M&A-related lending to 10% of a bank’s core capital. He said SBI, through the Indian Banks’ Association, plans to take up the matter with the regulator. He also clarified that any future merger and acquisition financing will be handled by the bank’s existing corporate finance division, and there are no plans to create a separate vertical for this purpose.
Meanwhile, Setty said that it will be launching a newer version of its mobile application Yono by the end of December this year, and added that it will be a completely revamped version of the app.
The bank is targeting to more than double the overall number of mobile banking users to 20 crore in an unspecified time, and the new version of the app will be able to handle the traffic that comes through it, Setty said
(With inputs from PTI)
Shobhit Gupta is a sub-editor at News18.com and covers India and International news. He is interested in day to day political affairs in India and geopolitics. He earned his BA Journalism (Hons) degree from Ben…Read More
Shobhit Gupta is a sub-editor at News18.com and covers India and International news. He is interested in day to day political affairs in India and geopolitics. He earned his BA Journalism (Hons) degree from Ben… Read More
November 04, 2025, 23:49 IST
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Business
‘KPop Demon Hunters’ is boosting more than just Netflix: Korean music, politics ride the craze
At South Korea’s largest amusement park, crowds of people wait for hours to be a part of the “KPop Demon Hunters” craze.
U.S. streaming giant Netflix, the distributor of the Sony Pictures Animation film, has collaborated with the Everland park outside of the capital city Seoul to create a themed zone featuring whack-a-mole, dance games and snacks from the movie.
It’s the latest iteration of the “KPop Demon Hunters” frenzy as the film takes Netflix by storm — and delivers a boost to the $10 billion K-pop music industry along with it.
Netflix said in August that “KPop Demon Hunters” had become the most popular Netflix film ever. In October, the streamer said “KPop Demon Hunters” had exceeded 325 million views.
The company has sought to capitalize on the popularity, offering two limited-window theatrical screenings for the film and striking consumer product deals with Hasbro and Mattel to get “KPop Demon Hunters” toys and merch on shelves.
Agnes Lee helped cast the movie and scout locations from Seoul as an associate producer for the film.
“K-pop and K-culture was such a huge and important part of this movie,” Lee told CNBC in Seoul. “We wanted to be authentic.”
Once popular mainly in Asia, K-pop music has become a global phenomenon. Artists like PSY, who shot to international stardom in 2012 with his viral music video “Gangnam Style,” put an international spotlight on K-pop. PSY’s hit song became YouTube’s most-watched video that year.
Since then, other K-pop acts have run up impressive numbers, too. BTS’ song “Dynamite” has exceeded 2 billion streams on Spotify. BLACKPINK’s 2023 tour became the highest-grossing by a female group on record, according to stats at the time from Touring Data.
Now, even “KPop Demon Hunters'” fictional bands are topping the global music charts.
Audrey Nuna, EJAE and Rei Ami attend the KPop Demon Hunters Special Screening at Netflix Tudum Theater on June 16, 2025 in Los Angeles, California., U.S.
Charley Gallay | Getty Images Entertainment | Getty Images
“I think people watched ‘KPop Demon Hunters’ in spite of that ‘K-pop’ in the title. And then, after watching it, they realized, ‘Oh, wow. I’m a K-pop fan,'” said Danny Chung, a K-pop producer and the voice of the film’s character, Baby Saja. “And now there’s a whole back catalogue of three decades of K-pop music that they have to dive into.”
And there’s plenty more to come: BLACKPINK is expected to release a new album. BTS is planning a comeback in 2026 after members of the band completed South Korea’s mandatory military service.
Enthusiastic investors have pumped up the stock prices of South Korea’s “Big Four” K-pop companies. Shares of HYBE, JYP Entertainment, SM Entertainment and YG Entertainment are all up double-digits year to date. YG is up more than 100%.
The impact of the film’s rise may not stop at music.
“The breakout success of ‘KPop Demon Hunters,’ which could become one of Netflix’s most-watched content items, underscores K-content phenomenon in global market,” Mirae Asset Global Investments said in an Oct. 19 report. “We believe this cultural boom is a key catalyst driving increased international consumption of Korean cosmetics and food products such as noodles.”
On the political front, speculation is high that China, which blocked K-pop and other South Korean cultural exports under President Xi Jinping’s campaign to promote what Beijing considers proper socialist values, could soften its restrictions.
The countries’ presidents had a positive meeting on the sidelines of the APEC summit in Gyeongju, South Korea.
“We continue to see K-pop as a direct beneficiary of thawing Korea-China relations,” Mirae said.
Business
EU-India Boost Clean Energy And Climate Partnership With New Industrial Transition Push: EU Diplomat
New Delhi: The European Union and India are deepening cooperation in clean energy, climate action, and industrial decarbonisation through initiatives like the Industrial Transition Accelerator (ITA), launched in India ahead of COP30 to help industries adopt green technologies and cut emissions, Bartosz Przywara, Counsellor for Energy, Climate Action and Environment, European Union delegation to India told ANI today.
“We have very strong cooperation in the area of clean energy and climate transition,” Przywara told ANI in an exclusive interview on the sidelines of the Industrial Transition Accelerator (ITA) event in New Delhi.
The event marked an opening of the new implementation phase of the project for India, Przywara said.
“It’s basically a project which facilitates the Indian industry especially those sectors which are hard to abate to adopt new technology, get financing, and get into this path of decarbonisation. And we as the European Union, of course, we are supporting this path.”
He said the EU’s support aligns with India’s broader sustainability agenda.
“We are doing something quite similar here in India, having a lot of projects and activities together with the Indian government and business associations, which aim basically at the same purpose,” he said, calling the collaboration “very successful.”
A key focus of the EU-India partnership, Przywara said, is proving that economic growth and emissions reduction can go hand in hand.
“There is a clear decoupling it is possible technologically and economically to grow while at the same time cutting emissions,” he said. Citing the EU’s record, he added,
“In the European Union, we have been growing by 68% over this period from 1990 to 2023, and at the same time we managed to cut our emissions by 38%. So India can do it as well.”
Przywara highlighted the EU-India Clean Energy and Climate Partnership, which has been active since 2016.
“It has been existing for the last nine years. We have done literally hundreds of events and activities, talking to the Indian government, exchanging best practices, and helping in establishing legislation in the area of green transition,” he said.
He also pointed to other initiatives such as the EU-India Climate Dialogue, where both sides discuss pathways to decarbonisation and carbon market development.
“The European Union has the oldest and biggest carbon market in the world–we have 20 years of experience running it, and now we are very happy to share those experiences with India,” Przywara said.
On industrial decarbonisation, he mentioned EU support for the Leadership Group for Industry Transition (LID-IT), an initiative co-founded by India and Sweden.
“It already involves 18 different countries and multiple industrial entities all around the world,” he said, describing it as a key multilateral effort to cut industrial emissions.
Przywara said that both sides are expected to further strengthen ties following recent high-level engagements.
“At the beginning of this year, the College of Commissioners visited India and held very positive discussions with the Indian government. Recently, the European Commission and High Representative for Foreign Policy issued a joint communication about the new EU-India agenda for the future,” he said.
He added that both partners are optimistic about a potential summit soon to “confirm and elevate” cooperation.
“We really have a lot to do together in the area of clean energy, climate, decarbonisation, and green transition,” Przywara said.
During the same event, Sumit Gupta, Managing Director and Senior Partner, Boston Consulting Group (BCG) told ANI today that India is well-positioned to lead the global green transition due to its low cost of renewable energy, strong industrial base, and growing innovation ecosystem.
“We’ve outlined the key challenges that these projects face and what needs to come together to actually make the transition happen whether it’s innovative financing, access to capital, technology innovations aligned with market needs, or effective project execution,” Gupta said during an exclusive interview with ANI on the sidelines of the Industrial Transition Accelerator (ITA) event.
“The question is how to get the right ecosystem of partners to execute these projects from paper to plant.”
He highlighted that India’s low cost of renewable energy offers a major advantage. “We have one of the lowest costs of energy in the world, which is a key enabler of the green transition,” he noted.
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