Trojan horse 🎠
Budget stuff, gaming boom, and trip to Mars.
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Let’s go ahead and get started:
Market summary: 📊
Indian markets vigorously reversed directions, thanks to a pompous budget, with Sensex resuming its journey to orbit 50K. US markets had a good session too.
US:
S&P 500 - up 1.61%
Nasdaq 100 - up 2.50%
India:
Nifty 50 - up 4.74%
Sensex - up 5.00%
Soldiers, now we change directions 🧭
The Gamestop mania extends into another week, but the reddit army has momentarily paused its march, diverting attention to conquer a neighboring fort. Guesses? Good ol’ Silver. Yup, silver the metal.
The plan is the same—buy as much of the commodity as possible and squeeze the short positions held by the hedgie billionaires. However, there’s some mixed commentary going on.
Some posts on the WallStreetBets forum claim that the #SilverSqeeuze is in fact not initiated by them, and it's just some hedgies who have “infiltrated” the forum trying to misguide the band of rebel investors into moving all their attention (and capital) from Gamestop all the way over to Silver, thereby crashing prices of Gamestop and saving the life of hedge funds.
It's a nightmare.
Irrespective of what the truth is, one thing is for sure—the hedgies have scored points by placing the Trojan Horse of chaos inside the reddit fort. Real show begins now!
Budget rocked the Dalal Street 🔥
Usually, by the end of a budget day, it's just the government that’s left cheering for itself. But this time was different. Expectations were high, and GOI undoubtedly delivered.
There was a little something for everyone—from senior citizens, to gig workers, to public sector companies, to single person entities.
Quick look at some major highlights:
Infusing ₹20,000 crore in public banks to strengthen their balance sheets and avoid problems coming from loan defaults
GOI will divest stake worth nearly ₹1.75 lakh crore in public sector companies like BPCL, Air India, Shipping Corporation of India, BEML, IDBI Bank, and Pawan Hans to meet revenue targets
Regulatory amendments necessary for the LIC IPO will be placed in the parliament soon
₹35,000 crore allocated for vaccine efforts, with a total of ₹2 lakh crore in expenditure on healthcare infrastructure nationwide for the next year
Surprisingly, the insurance sector will be opened for foreign aid, with restrictions on foreign investment (FDI limit) revised from 49% to 74%
₹1,500 crores to push the citizens into embracing digital payment solutions. Fintechs are getting a world class hub in Gujarat, with hopes of 1.5 lakh jobs created. If the fintechs are okay leaving BLR and NCR that is… why would they?
Gig workers are promised social security and a minimum wage, and a website to help them find jobs. Women gig workers were promised protective measures
Senior citizens will not be required to file their income tax returns for income on savings, pension or from interest
Startups got some tax relief, with no-tax deadline extended for another year. Investors were relieved of capital gains taxes for a year, and ESOP holders were relieved of paying tax bills at time of exercising options
Single person companies had restrictions on capital & turnover, which have been eased as well. NRIs can start a single person company by residing in India for just 120 days (from 182 before)
Here’s a complete look at every little detail that came out of the session if you want to nerd out.
Sensex’s tearing rally to add 5% gains on a single day, the highest in nearly 25 years on a budget day delivered a unanimous verdict of approval of the bill! Investors seem pumped for sensex 50K by the end of this week, or even by today.
Bottomline: obviously we can’t expect to turn the country around in a single day, but the right mood has been set. Economic recovery from the pandemic has been solid so far, and this bill does what’s necessary to keep the engine running. Couldn't ask for more.
Gaming buffs had a great holiday 🎮
Japanese gaming company Nintendo grew revenues 37%, with profits soaring 92% as global gaming demand crushed it in December 2020. A lot of the money that people were saving up on restaurant food and concert tickets went to consoles, subscriptions, and new games, setting the industry on path for a record year.
Nintendo’s Switch console, continued to sell like hot cake, selling 2.4 million units for December. Gaming franchises like Pokemon, Super Mario as well as “Animal Crossing: New Horizons” continued to remain hot. Don’t kick yourself if you don’t vibe with this, but the kids are all over this stuff and iss the future.
What matters: for years, developers and investors have waited for gaming to attract more mainstream users, and 2020 may finally be that watershed year. Penetration of gaming consoles in living rooms across the world has hit all time highs, and a lot of casual viewers are getting drawn to live streams and esports bouts than ever before. We very well might be at the beginning of a lasting shift in a new form of entertainment.
Mars in 5.5 years 🚀
Not 5, not 6. Exactly 5.5. Elon Musk’s informed confidence and aggressive certainty is baffling, and that was the hot debate for those not following the budget yesterday. In a record “sold out” Clubhouse session Musk laid out his plans and hopes for the near future.
Here’s a quick roundup of the session if you’re interested.
BTW—the host of the Clubhouse sessions, Sriram Krishnan, a notable tech exec and investor in the valley, will be the newest general partner addition at Andressen Horowitz.
What else are we snackin’ 🍿
🍎 Apple innovates fast - the latest IOS update will let users unlock their phones even as they wear a mask, if the user is wearing an Apple Watch. Apple’s pace of innovation is admirable, but also gotta admire the genius of adding an implicit hook to get more people to buy Apple Watches.
🙌 Tamil Nadu welcomes Tata - TATA as well as iPhone manufacturer Pegatron have been given a nod by the Tamil Nadu state government to build their manufacturing base in the state. Both vendors will be making smartphone components out of these facilities, and are a part of the PLI scheme the government had pushed to boost domestic electronics manufacturing.
Hit that 💚 if you liked today’s issue.
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