Finshots Daily

In today’s Finshots, we look at the film exhibition business and see why movie theatres in North India are showing dubbed Telugu flicks.

In today’s Finshots, we talk about the most recent tradeable financial instrument — “water futures.”

Steelmakers have been making an impressive comeback of late. A meteoric rise in production, robust recovery in demand and record high selling prices have all pushed the incumbents in the industry on a profitable path. And through it all, the stock price of major steel producers have been on a rally like no other. So we thought we could look at the industry, understand the dynamics propelling it and see how this recovery is currently manifesting in an ever-changing world.

On Tuesday, the federal government, including 46 states in the US sued Facebook for engaging in monopolistic or anti-competitive practices. And while many people have sued the company in the past, the sheer scale and influence of this lawsuit deserves special merit. So we thought we could look at the case more closely and explain why Facebook is being accused of exploiting its dominance in the social media space.

On December 2nd, Down To Earth released an extensive investigative report on the menace of adulterated honey and we need to talk about it.

Australia is all set to introduce a law that would force companies like Google and Facebook to pay media companies for their news content. As chairman of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission noted — “There is a fundamental bargaining power imbalance between news media businesses and the major digital platforms, partly because news businesses have no option but to deal with the platforms, and have had little ability to negotiate over payment for their content or other issues. We wanted a model that would address this bargaining power imbalance and result in fair payment for content, which avoided unproductive and drawn-out negotiations, and wouldn’t reduce the availability of Australian news on Google and Facebook.” And while there is considerable euphoria surrounding this bill, there is also good reason to exercise caution. So we thought we could look at this more closely and see how it might impact the media ecosystem in Australia. Possibly even the world?

On Monday, news agencies started reporting that President Nicolas Maduro had seized total control of Venezuela’s political institutions with a sweeping victory in legislative elections. And while there was considerable euphoria within the Venezuelan ruling class, ground reports from the country are truly disheartening, to say the least. 96% of the country’s population currently lives in poverty and about one-third of these people lack enough nutritious food for normal human growth and development. According to one survey, 60% of Venezuelans shed at least 11 kilograms in weight over the recent past due to malnutrition. And with the pandemic and the lockdown in place, the food crisis has reached truly incredible proportions. Whatever little food that Venezuelans still produce is currently rotting because farmers don’t have the means to carry their produce to the markets due to an unprecedented shortage of overpriced fuel. Imagine this happening in a country that boasts the largest oil reserves in the world. It is simply crazy. So we thought maybe we could look at how Venezuela got here and see why the government's policies to control prices have failed so miserably.

Spotify has reportedly confirmed that they are testing a Stories feature within the app. And while reactions to the announcement were mixed, we thought we could look at the feature more closely and see why so many companies are adopting “Stories”.

This week Shree Cement’s stock price breached its yearly high. And while that isn’t surprising in itself, the rally came against the backdrop of stellar results for the months of July, August and September, when most businesses were still struggling to cope with the pandemic. So we thought we could look at Shree Cement and its performance, particularly considering it’s part of the Nifty 50 now.

In today's Finshots, we talk about pepper imports and RBI's latest diktat for HDFC Bank.