Market summary: 📊
No mercy in India, as markets continue to lose ground, accounting for rate hikes and Ukraine mess. US had a down day too, to cap off the week flat.
US:
S&P 500 - down 0.79%
Nasdaq - down 1.41%
India:
Nifty 50 - down 1.53%
Sensex - down 1.40%
Weekend shot of caffeine ☕
🔫 War level, UPGRADE — more proof that the Russians ain’t fooling around. Cross fire with the Ukrainians led to the Russians relentlessly shelling one of Europe’s largest nuclear power plants, located in the sleepy town of Zaporizhzhia deep in Ukraine. The plant supplies 25% of all Ukraine’s energy needs, and the Russians seem to be keen on cutting it off from the power grid. But with 6 active nuclear reactors, destruction could bring obvious horrifying consequences.
✔️ Axis ready with Citi’s check — Moneycontrol says Axis Bank is nearing a $2-$2.5 billion deal to buy out Citi Bank’s India operations as soon as next week. As part of its ongoing global clean up, Citi is putting up 4,000 employees, 35 branches, and 2.6 million white-collar, fat-wallet customers across loans and credit cards in India up for sale. Both Kotak and Axis were front runners to buy them out.
YouTube to billion in no time 🤯
What’s poppin’ — Entrackr says, Physics Wallah, an entrance-exam coaching company that started as a YouTube channel is in talks to raise roughly $100 million, its first outside money, from Westbridge capital at a $1 billion valuation!
Until 2014, Alakh Pandey was on a regular gig training teenagers for IIT-JEE in a popular coaching-center in India. That year, he kicked off a basic YouTube channel, explaining concepts and solving questions. As YouTube got popular, thanks to mobile internet boom in India, his channel grew like wildfire.
So Pandey expanded Physics Wallah beyond YouTube — mostly after 2019, when he launched their first web portal, followed by a mobile-app, which now has about 6 million users tuned in to a library of about 14,000 videos. The “company” also made an offline expansion, adding some 20+ coaching centers nationwide! TF 😄
…to finally in 2022, where they’re raising $$$ at a billion dollar valuation! Unreal, but highlights the rise and power of YouTube to build monetizable distribution.
Worth mentioning — Byju’s buying out Aakash earlier in 2021 has woken up the Indian ed-tech industry to a whole new set of possibilities of combining online with offline instruction. Unacademy, and the others gotta notice!
And while we’re on raises, ☝️
Beatoven.ai, an AI-based music generator that supplies stock-music to content creators, raised a million dollar seed round from Redstart Labs and Entrepreneur First.
Creators don’t have the $$ needed to license expensive music, but they do need quality tracks to make increasingly popular forms of content like short videos. Beatoven is building a Canva (or Copy.AI-like) content generator for these production needs.
The Japanese decided to stick together in EVs 🤝
What’s poppin’ — in the weirdest of matches, Honda and Sony are joining hands to create a new brand to build electric vehicles, expected to launch in 2025.
The new joint venture will design, market, plan, and sell these electric cars under Honda’s stewardship, while all complex manufacturing will be outsourced.
Sony meanwhile will offer its chops to build out software and a mobility platform — kinda like Teslas, collecting, aggregating, and synthesizing data, and supporting in-car entertainment.
Worth noting — more and more electronics manufacturers are jumping into the EV game lately, anticipating a smartphone-like industry shaping up in the future. We’ve seen this trend with Foxconn, Pegatron, and a few others.
And that’s a wrap for today folks! Here’s a quick look at major stuff that went down this week…
📋 NSE to offer US stocks — SEBI and NSE kicked off trading of US stocks in India earlier this week, facilitated by NSE’s International Exchange platform. Folks in India will be able to buy depository receipts of about 8 US trading stocks, like Google, Netflix, Amazon, saving $$ on forex fees, painful transfers, wire charges, and whatnot.
⚽ Football club Chelsea is up for sale — Russian billionaire, Roman Abramovich, is forced to sell the crown jewel of his empire, the England-based Chelsea Football Club, as new sanctions make it hard to do business with the rest of the world. Estimates suggest Chelsea has a 135 million+ fan base worldwide, and Forbes has put the club’s value at $3.2 billion.
🎧 PocketFM’s mega raise — the vernacular audio-content app closed a massive $65 million funding round. PocketFM is building a Spotify + Audible combined for India, grouping everything from podcasts, to books, to long stories, made available in over 8 languages. 50 million+ users tune in each month.
🍎 Apple stops serving Russian users — Apple has decided to cut off Russia from using all of Apple’s products and services following the Ukraine invasion. No iPhones will be sold there anymore, no Apple Pay working, and no access to Russian apps outside the country, leaving almost 25 million iOS users hanging.
💰 Big Venture funds ready for India — Accel India, one of the most reputed names in the VC game, raised a massive $650 million fund to keep writing those fat checks in India and Southeast Asia. The fund brings Accel India’s total AUM to $2 billion. Word on the street is Sequoia and Elevation are prepping for similar-sized raises.
👩💼 SEBI gets a lady boss — Madabhi Puri Buch, and IIM-A and St. Stephen’s alumna, will take over as the first female boss at SEBI, as GOI deviates from its practice of typically hiring men and public servants for the job. Madabhi has previously handled several high-profile market manipulation cases and is keen on beefing up SEBI’s data capabilities to stay ahead on financial crimes.
🏔️ Lastly, Wildcraft disclosed plans to IPO — local consumer brand Wildcraft, famous for making affordable hiking gear, backpacks, tents, knapsacks, and such, is prepping to hit the street with an early 2022 listing. Revenues top almost ₹1,000 crores, and Wildcraft runs 2 manufacturing units, and 200+ stores nationwide. Tight competition from Decathlon India spoils the party a bit though!
Hit that 💚 if you liked today’s issue.
You can forward this email or share FC on social media by clicking the button below. Thanks and Ciao! 😀