Warren 💰
Good Glamm struggles, IPOs incoming, and a New e-commerce king.
🗓 Good morning, Monday is here.
The 94 year old Warren Buffett sent his annual letter to shareholders. Despite 2024 being a record year for the S&P, ol-Warren managed to marginally exceed the market’s returns through his Berkshire.
The letter has many gems of wisdom. Check it out for yourself.
📉 Back home, markets in India face a tough test as earnings remain, at best, lukewarm. Rate cuts and income tax reductions could potentially spark a market turnaround—but when?
In contrast, China is singing a happy song. Xi Jinping’s gesture of support toward Chinese tech has re-energized the markets, with stocks like Alibaba surging nearly 70% this year. Foreign investors are back in love with the markets there.
💡 Spotlight: India’s auto sector took a beating on Friday afters rumors emerged that the government may make it easy to import EVs, opening doors for the likes of Tesla.
M&M tanked 6%, marking its worst single-day drop in seven months. Tata Motors slipped over 2%. Hyundai Motors India also dipped 2.5%. Too harsh?
1 Big Thing: Delta Corp calls it quits on online gaming 🎰
Delta Corp is exiting the online gaming business. The casino giant is selling its digital gambling portfolio which includes platforms like Adda52 for ₹491 crore in a cash-and-stock deal.
The buyer is Head Digital Works (HDW), a gaming studio based in Hyderabad, and operates widely popular online rummy and poker platforms under the A23 brand.
Some backdrop: Delta’s luck has been running cold for a while now. In Goa, their most lucrative offline casino markets, have been fending off competition from multiple players. Digital was supposed to be the next lever of growth for the company.
Delta Corp acquired Adda52 for ₹182 crore in 2016 and had big plans of a ₹550 crore IPO for Deltatech Gaming. But the 28% GST on real-money gaming threw a wrench in the plans. Adding to the chaos, Deltatech Gaming received a ₹6,384 crore retrospective GST notice, part of a wider crackdown on gaming firms.
Even as the Supreme Court stayed GST show cause notices worth ₹1.5 lakh crore against gaming firms, regulatory uncertainty continues to cloud the industry, making it too much of a headache for them to deal with.
Zoom out: Delta Corp, while exiting direct gaming operations, will still hold a small stake in HDW, ensuring it has a foot in the door if the sector stabilizes.
2. Not so glam anymore 💔
Life doesn’t seem to be getting any better for The Good Glamm Group.
New-age marketing agency, Wubba Lubba Dub Dub (WLDD) is looking to acquire digital media platform ScoopWhoop from GGG per Entrackr.
The deal is expected to be valued at ₹18-20 crore, just a fraction of what GGG originally paid for the digital media platform. WLDD has apparently already issued a term sheet, and due diligence is underway.
Context: this potential sale is the latest sign of turbulence for GGG. Just last week, Sirona, a menstrual hygiene brand, walked away from the group, repurchasing its brand after filing a default notice over unpaid dues.
Some backstory: ScoopWhoop, once a go-to digital content platform for young Indians, was acquired by GGG in 2021 for ₹100 crore.
But traffic since has dwindled, GGG has its own problems, and now the sale is being considered to stabilize and help pay off salary and other obligations.
The buyer, WLDD, seems pretty fascinating. The company is a pioneer in meme-based marketing services, and runs a services business offering creative services as well as influencer marketing and more.
3. The IPO train keeps rolling 🥳
National Securities Depository Limited (NSDL) is gearing up for a ₹3,000 crore IPO as early as next month.
NSDL is a depository that helps investors store and trade securities like stocks, bonds, and mutual funds in digital form.
The depository had secured SEBI approval for its IPO back in September 2024, but the real push is coming from the need to obtain Market Infrastructure Institution (MII) approval before its 12-month DRHP deadline expires.
MIIs include stock exchanges, clearing corporations, and depositories like NSDL, which play a critical role in keeping capital markets running smoothly.
Depositories like NSDL and CDSL act as intermediaries, digitizing securities such as stocks, bonds, and mutual funds for investors.
The company’s fundamentals are strong, too. Its December quarter results showed a 30% jump in net profit.
While we’re on IPOs,
BoAt is making moves toward its much-anticipated stock market debut. The wearables giant is reportedly preparing a confidential DRHP filing and is eyeing an IPO in FY26 to raise ₹2,000 crore.
The company, which scrapped its initial IPO plans in 2022 due to market conditions, is now targeting a valuation north of $1.5 billion, which is yet to be finalised.
4. Will the real e-commerce king please stand up? 🫡
For the first time ever, Amazon is now the highest quarterly revenue generating company worldwide, after they surpassed Walmart’s quarterly revenue figures a couple weeks back.
Walmart has earned the top revenue generating distinction after beating Exxon Mobil in 2012, and held on to it for over 13 years.
The deets: in Q4 FY24, Amazon pulled in $187.8 billion, edging past Walmart’s $180.5 billion. However, on an annual basis, Walmart is still in the lead, projected to generate $708.7 billion next year, with Amazon close behind at $700.8 billion. The gap is narrowing fast.
The milestone is symbolic of disruption that has been decades in the making.
How did we get here: Unlike Walmart, Amazon’s revenue base goes beyond just retail. While its e-commerce empire remains the core driver, its cloud computing business, AWS, now contributes 17% of total revenue. Another 17% comes from seller services and advertising, making it a well-diversified revenue machine.
Big picture: despite being a theme for decades, e-commerce is far from done. Last year, e-commerce revenues grew to $5.8 trillion, and yet formed less than 20% of all retail spending worldwide.
5. Big daily movers 🚀
🚆 Rail Vikas Nigam Ltd (RVNL) surged 3% after signing a ₹13,253 crore agreement with BSNL to develop and operate the middle-mile network for BharatNet, BSNL’s rural broadband expansion project.
This comes shortly after RVNL secured a ₹554 crore order last week and a ₹335.4 crore contract from South Indian Railway to install Kavach across 790 km of railway tracks.
Despite the order wins, RVNL shares ended 3.42% lower amid broader market weakness.
6. Story in data — Rajasthan’s solar win 🔥
Rajasthan has emerged as India's solar powerhouse, responsible for nearly 18GW of solar installed capacity as of the end of 2024, leading all states.
This growth is driven by vast desert landscapes and strong policy support.
FYI India has a goal of achieving 300 GW of solar power by 2030.
What else are we snackin’ 🍿
🇯🇵 Inflation spike: Japan’s January inflation hit a 2-year high, surging 4% YoY.
☕ Zepto surge: Zepto Café is now delivering 100,000 orders a day, hitting a $100M annual GMV run rate.
🚀 Swiggy expands: Swiggy is investing ₹1,000 crore in its supply chain arm Scootsy to boost Instamart’s expansion.
📉 Nifty shuffle: BPCL and Britannia are out of Nifty 50, making way for Jio Financial Services and Zomato in the index reshuffle.
That’s a wrap! Don’t let the Monday blues get to you.
And if you’d like to place your brand on this newsletter, let us know.
Hit that 💚 if you liked this issue.
