Wednesday, 24th June ’20
Good Morning: On this day in 1950 South Africa passed the group areas act formally segregating races and making apartheid official. But on this same day in 1995, the South African rugby team defeated the formidable Kiwis to win the World Cup. The trophy was given to the white South African captain by the country’s first black president and a man the whole world would go on to accept as its cherished father figure – Nelson Mandela.
In times like these, when race is such a pertinent issue still, 24th June is a remarkable date which saw one generation build walls between each other and the other break them down with love.
The Indian and Chinese militaries seem to be moving towards reconciliation. The markets have received a fillip from the much awaited thawing out. In today’s edition of The Morning Tea, we hope that as you start your day, you get the best insights and have a wonderful day ahead of you.
MARKETS
- V-Shaped recovery of the Indian economy is possible, says India’s Top Economic Adviser, Krishnamurthy Subramanian, in an interview with Bloomberg. He says that in the event of a vaccine being produced in the latter half of the year, then there can be recovery expected by the end of the year. Or else, the recovery would have to wait till next year.
- SBI records 3.6x jump in frauds at ₹44,622 crores in FY20 against ₹12,387 crores in the previous financial year. As per the latest annual report, there were a total of 6964 fraud cases recorded and the bank has made provisions for the entire amount spread over the next four quarters.
- PPF Interest rate may fall below 7% for the first time in 46 years. Public Provident Fund (PPF), which is linked to 10-year government bond, was fixed at 7.1% at the end of March’20. The next revision is coming up next week where the new rate will be announced. PPF is one of the popular choices for investment, especially for the middle-class. This may result in investors looking to invest in other debt financial instruments such as tax-free bonds, debt mutual funds, etc.
- Federal Bank to raise Rs. 12000 crores through various borrowing instruments. Rs. 8000 crores are expected to be raised via debt instruments such as long term bonds, non-convertible debentures, etc. while Rs. 4000 crores through a mix of debt and equity shares.
TECHNOLOGY & INNOVATION
- Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference highlights: iOS 14 brought in a spate of interface changes like app drawers, picture in picture and widgets now being able to live on the home screen. Some radical changes include a dedicated EV routing option on Apple maps and the ability to share approximate locations to allay privacy concerns. A COVID inspired update on the Apple watch opens a 20-second countdown once it senses the user washing their hands.
- The government leads the charge to get e-commerce sites to introduce a Make in India filter by doing the same on its e-procurement portal Government e-Marketplace (GeM). It is now mandatory for sellers to disclose the country of origin on their listings on the government platform.
- Google’s net US ad revenues will decline this year primarily because of a sharp pullback in travel advertiser spending, which in the past has been heavily concentrated on Google’s search ad product. This is the first time Google will see a drop in its revenues since 2008. The piece of the ad revenue pie up for grabs should be lapped up by the next in line – usual suspects Facebook and Amazon.
PRODUCTS & STARTUPS
- 91 Springboard business hub, a co-working space provider has raised Rs 45 crores with the identity of investors not disclosed. They raise funding at a time when a lot of collaboration and co-work is anticipated when the Covid-19 situation mitigates. Other prominent co-working space startups of India are Awfis space (has raised Rs 212 crore in Series D funding in 2019) and GoHive (has raised Rs 2.5 crore).
- Canva, a design firm for non-designers based out of Sydney raised $60 million at a $6 billion valuation today. This is yet another example of how the world is moving its focus towards User Experience tools. The company has gained a lot of traction in the COVID times and its revenue and user base has grown 100 percent year over year.
- Yulu Bikes, an E-mobility based transport startup in India has raised $3.96 million in fresh rounds of funding. This round was led by US-based venture firm Rocketship. This Bangalore based company focuses on the first and last mile connectivity for consumers via e-bikes and bicycles.
WHAT ELSE IS COOKING
President Trump passes an order which suspends new H1B work visas which will be in place at least till the end of the year. The recent order combined with the restriction in the issuance of Green cards would keep around 525,000 foreign workers out of the country for the rest of the year. Top execs like Sundar Pichai, Jack Dorsey, and Elon Musk took to twitter to speak against the executive order.
Novak Djokovic tests positive for Covid-19. The World No. 1 is the fourth tennis player to test positive in a span of two days. All of them were taking part in the Adria Exhibition Tournament organized by Djokovic.
“Mutual consensus to disengage” agreed in the latest military talks between India and China on the Galwan issue. In an 11 hour-long meeting, details for disengagement from all friction points in the Eastern Ladakh were discussed and will be complied with by both sides, as per reports.
BOOKS & MOVIES
Recommended Book: Anarchy by William Dalrymple – William, who is an authority on everything colonial and pre-independence, lifts the curtains on the formative years of a small trading firm, that not only became one of the first true multinational corporations of the world but whose influence extended far beyond the subcontinent, the East India company.
Recommended Movie: American factory – a documentary that focuses on the factory opened by a Chinese billionaire over the proverbial ashes of a now-defunct GM establishment. The filmmakers do not judge any party who is given free rein to voice their opinions even if it is in contravention to the American way.
Check out: https://www.zooniverse.org/projects/hiro-ono/ai4mars Help the Mars rover curiosity maneuver the treacherous terrain of the red planet by marking rough edges and sketchy spots. This interactive tool helps NASA with its machine learning algorithms which train the rover.
MORNING TEA CHALLENGES
- Take out a moment for yourself: Today’s challenge is to discover the monk in you. You can delve in the depths of your mind with a simple 5 minute or a 10-minute meditation. In practicing mindfulness, we hope that you discover peace and awareness and a feeling of being. Take the help of mobile applications such as Calm or guided meditation on YouTube here.
- Your bucket list: Everybody knows what a bucket list is and so many millionaires had one. Let’s take a small step today and pick out 3 items that we’d love to do in this lifetime. We’ll post it as a reply to this tweet, to create a community of dreams today. Take help from Annette’s amazing list here.
YOU SHOULD KNOW
- Flipkart kicked off its Big Savings Days sale this week. Consider this as a younger brother to their Big Billion Day Sale. Good time to buy though, if you are in the market for some new gadgets. Check out this article for top deals.
- Are you a student? You can claim a free 1 year Creator Tableau license by registering at their website. Tableau is the best Data visualization tool in the Business Intelligence industry. Make kick-ass dashboards, infographics, and do state of the art analytical analysis using it.
- Just because someone you know is an extrovert, sociable, and confident, doesn’t mean they can’t have anxiety. So, please be considerate of people around you, irrespective of their personality. Your quick judgment may have an adverse effect on them opening up and eventually, push them away.
MORNING TEA LISTICLES
Top 10 Indian companies by market cap:
- Reliance- 1163k crore
- TCS- 763k crore
- HDFC Bank- 571k crore
- HUL- 506k cr
- HDFC- 318k crore
- Bharti Airtel- 315k crore
- Infosys- 306k crore
- Kotak Mahindra- 274k crore
- ICICI Bank- 243k crore
- ITC- 228k crore
Written by Akansh Bhatt, Piyush Vijayan and Shashank Dobhal.
