Innholdsfortegnelse for 23 January 2022 i Business Today

The Indian consumer never had it better. Whether it is the latest appliance or low-value purchases, the craze around point-of-sale credit has seen consumers making a beeline for such credit options that enable them to make purchases without having to make immediate payments. Welcome to the world of Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) schemes, which are burgeoning by the day and have captured the imagination of the aspirational Indian middle class. These BNPL schemes—offered by several platforms such as Paytm, LazyPay, ZestMoney and even banks—have fuelled consumption by making it extremely easy for consumers to make purchases. The borrower gets the option of an instant, short-term loan with a deferred repayment tenure, including the facility of equated monthly instalments after the end of an interest-free period. The BNPL offerings are…

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DELHI-BASED housewife Archana Gupta wants to send her 14-year-old daughter abroad for higher studies. There is, however, one big challenge before her. The 45-year-old is worried about the depreciating rupee, which means she will have to shell out more than just the college fees to cover the currency risk. Consider this: On December 20, 2011, $1 was equal to ₹52.77, while on December 20, 2021, it was equal to ₹75.84. It is for this reason that she and her businessman husband are considering investing in equities in international markets as, along with higher returns, it also hedges against currency fluctuations. There are many like Gupta who are investing in international markets to build a fund that eliminates the currency risk. Direct investing is possible in the stocks of several countries, but…

Source: Reserve Bank of India ₹14.6 LAKH CRORE Total value of transactions done at POS terminals in Jan-Nov 2021 16.94 PER CENT The growth against ₹12.49 lakh crore in full calendar year 2020 ₹13.95 LAKH CRORE The pre-pandemic POS spending figure in the full year of 2019…

NEXT STOP: THE CONSUMER IF THINGS go as per plan, Adani Wilmar will list on the bourses in early 2022. The company is a name in the FMCG space with a portfolio of edible oil brands. Its ₹4,500-crore public issue will see Adani Group being listed outside infrastructure, a space where it has made a mark. For Group Chairman Gautam Adani, it is a way to unlock value in a business and establish itself as a B2C player. —KRISHNA GOPALAN BALANCING THE ECONOMY Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will have a tough balancing act to carry out in the 2022-23 Union Budget: accelerating growth and presenting a credible fiscal consolidation path. Sitharaman and her team of officers—led by Finance Secretary T.V. Somanathan—will need to ensure augmented spending on capital and…

▶ Have you spoken to Invesco about the proposed merger? The matter is sub-judice and we have not discussed it. We want a resolution to the issue. We do not have a problem and it was they who went to court. ▶ Tell us about the non-compete clause with Sony. The non-compete agreement was a part of the deal. The Zee promoters will get an additional 2 per cent stake in line with this, which will be transferred by Sony. This transfer is in lieu of Zee’s promoters not entering into a conflicting business. ▶ From a clear majority holding in Zee, you hold just 4 per cent today. How will this work? The emotional tag of being the largest shareholder was over in 2019. We are aware of our status…

For 59-year-old adman Sandeep Goyal, Chairman, Mogae Media, his collection of Toby mugs is a prized possession. A Toby mug, or jug, is a figural ceramic pitcher modelled in the form of a popular character—historical, fictional or generic. “Toby mugs are the original form of what we today call ‘merchandise’. They were born primarily as an extension of theatre,” says Goyal, who has around 350 of them in his office collected over a couple of decades on trips abroad. It all started in the late 1990s when he saw and liked the collection of a friend’s father in the UK. “He had 49 of them then, each one gifted by his wife on their anniversary. He told me he would will them to me,” recalls Goyal. Sure enough, a couple…

Stellar Returns from Equities… Benchmark indices S&P BSE Sensex and NSE Nifty gained 22 per cent and 24 per cent, respectively, on a year-to-date (YTD) basis TOP 5 SECTORAL GAINERS ON THE BSE IN 2021 TOP 5 GAINERS IN THE NIFTY IN 2021 YTD change as on December 31, 2021 Source: ACE Equity …But Digital Currencies were in a Different League Solana, the fifth-largest digital currency, delivered mind-boggling returns YTD change as on December 31, 2021 Source: Coingecko, Investing.com Real Estate Struggled This asset class continued to deliver negligible returns to investors YTD return on investment (RoI) as on December 22, 2021 Source: ANAROCK Property Consultants Precious Metals Lost Their Sheen this Year… Gold delivered lacklustre returns GOLD PRICE (₹/10 GM) YTD change as of Dec 31, 2021 Source: MCX…

−0.5% Year-on-year gross bank credit growth to micro and small enterprises remained negative in Oct 2021 60% Capacity utilisation at the aggregate level for manufacturing in Q1 of FY22, down from 69.4% in the previous quarter 40% Labour force participation rate compared to 43 per cent before the pandemic THERE’S A GAME afoot amongst economists and all and sundry who are engaged in the matter of forecasting economic growth. It’s called Alphabet Economics. And it’s about predicting the shape of the GDP growth rate curve, after the battering received at the hands of the Covid-19 pandemic. Will it be a V? K? L? U? Or a W? India’s former chief economic advisor K.V. Subramanian is betting big on a V-shaped revival, while others including International Monetary Fund (IMF) Chief Economist…

SINCE SUMIT VIJ laid his hands on a MacBook Air for the first time in 2009, his business has grown manifold and the Delhi-based entrepreneur has bought almost the entire Apple products line-up. But when Apple introduced its new Mac portfolio built on the in-house M1 chipset last year, he had to get it. After using several Apple products, across generations, Vij was already a satisfied Apple loyalist. Yet, the new Mac’s “unprecedented” performance surprised him. “After getting positive reviews from my friends, I purchased the base model MacBook Air from the new Apple India online store. Not only was the buying experience seamless, but the performance of this new Mac is way above anything I have experienced before. This offers more value for money than any other computer I have…

MOVIE THEATRES are the first to shut whenever Covid-19 infections go up. But when PVR Cinemas, India’s largest multiplex chain, welcomed back audiences in November, it did so with the promise of clean, sterilised cinema halls. This also meant purified air for patrons, to put them at ease about sitting in closed auditoriums. For this, the company turned to an anti-viral air purification device called Wolf Airmask, developed by home-grown start-up Allabout Innovations. “We evaluated several solutions that can make cinema halls secure,” says Kapil Agarwal, Joint Managing Director of UFO Moviez India, which installed the device across PVR’s 856 screens. “We found the Wolf Airmask to be the only device that had been tested on coronavirus in an ICMR-approved lab.” Agarwal says the company has received several enquiries about…