Finshots’ Post

800 million Indians use the internet, but less than 3% use it for educational purposes🤔 Majority Indians use the Internet for OTT, Social Media, Gaming, etc. Do you think internet consumption patterns shed light on our society’s potential? Let us know in the comments and follow Finshots for more!

RBI is worried about Uttar Pradesh and Bihar! Here is why-- Before we get into that, here is a short story for you. Roopa is a small vegetable vendor in a bustling market. She dreams of expanding her business by buying more stock (not the kind you're thinking about) and perhaps setting up a proper stall. Her biggest hurdle? Money. Traditional banks won’t lend to her because she has no credit history or collateral to offer. And that’s where Microfinance Institutions (MFIs) step in. MFIs provide small unsecure or collateral-free loans to low-income folks, typically those with annual household earnings of ₹3 lakhs or less. These loans help micro-businesses like Roopa’s, get the capital they need to grow. While that sounds great, microfinance has been growing at a breakneck speed in the states of Uttar Pradesh (UP) and Bihar of late. For context, these states account for over a quarter of total microfinance loans across the country. And have been among the fastest-growing states in terms of Assets Under Management (AUM) or the total value of loans that MFIs have disbursed since 2019. This makes sense, considering that their combined per capita incomes in FY23 were about 30% lower than the national average of ₹2 lakhs, according to official data for 22 states and union territories. But this rapid spread has caught the RBI’s (Reserve Bank of India’s) eye. A few days ago, it sounded the alarm about microfinance lenders moving too quickly and advised them to ease up on loan approvals in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. Why is it worried, you ask? Check out today's newsletter to get the complete story- https://bit.ly/3xGblPS And don't forget to follow Finshots for more insightful content!

TCS earned Rs 2.41 lakh crore last year, which is more than the GDP of 74 countries in the world!🤯 This is despite the slowdown in the IT sector. The company is set to announce its Q1 FY25 results today. How do you think their results will look like, let us know in the comments and follow Finshots for more!

Energy and Infra have been the top gainers in India's stock markets in the past year, while Real Estate has been the top loser! 🤯 What do you think could be the reason behind this? Let us know in the comments and follow Finshots for more! #nifty #stockmarkets #fno #news

Gold Smugglers love India! Here is why-- Before that you need some context. Last year, an unbelievable heist known as Project 24 Karat went down at Canada’s Pearson International Airport. Some very clever thieves targeted a massive 400 kg shipment of gold coming in from Switzerland. With a little help from some airline employees and forged documents, they waltzed right into the Air Canada Cargo terminal where the gold was being kept. And then made off with the entire consignment, worth about $20 million, vanishing without a trace. Authorities only realised what happened when the gold was reported missing. Despite several arrests, tracking down the missing gold is proving to be a real challenge. That’s because smuggled gold bars and coins often get melted down, wiping out any identifying marks that could trace it back to its original source. And now, investigators believe that some of this stolen gold has likely been smuggled into India. Why do they think so? You see, India has a deep love affair with gold. No Indian wedding, celebration or festivity is complete without it. And this passion for gold means that India's average annual demand is about 8 lakh kg. But here's the catch. India doesn't produce nearly enough gold to meet this huge demand. In fact, the country only produces a little over 1,000 kg of gold each year, all of it from the Hutti Gold Mines. And so we end up importing a lot of gold to make up for the shortfall. This is the starting point that makes India a gold smugglers’ paradise. But that is not just it. There is more to this. Get the full scoop in today's newsletter. And don't forget to follow Finshots for more!

Did you know, you probably belong in the top 10% in India? 🤔 As per the World Inequality Report, the top 1% in India holds over 22% of the total income while the bottom 50% holds only 15%. Do you think the income inequality in India will widen the gulf between the rich and the poor? Let us know in the comments and follow Finshots for more!

Koo was supposed to beat Elon Musk's Twitter. But now it has shut down, what went wrong? Back when there were rising tensions between Twitter and the Indian government over content and censorship, one company stood out promising to abide by local rules. That was Koo. They said there were building a Twitter for India, but one that’s best suited to adapt to the diverse needs of what is an extremely diverse country. And yet, despite raising boatloads of money and really giving it a fair shot, the company seems to have finally shut down. So what went wrong for Koo? One popular explanation is that Koo raised too much money too quickly without fully validating the idea — an all too common theme among Indian startups. However, in reality, Koo probably needed the money to even stand a chance at competing against Twitter. They raised $70 million in total. But they started small with an undisclosed seed round and a $4 million Series A round in Feb 2021. This money helped them build a team and support the growing user base (which in early 2021 reached a high of 4.5 million). Now you may not know this, but on an app like Koo, millions of users translate to millions of tiny updates that require rapid analysis and delivery. These computations cost money and the infrastructure (tech) costs alone added up to a neat ~$3 million that year (FY22). So the fundraise made sense. It’s another matter that they also raised $30 million in May of that same year and a bulk of it (~$16 million) was spent on advertising and promotion revenues. That’s ~60% of their total expense. One can only surmise then that the company was spending large sums of money to drive app installs. Kind of makes sense, but then again, you’d expect a social media platform to leverage network effects to drive app installs i.e. a friend of a friend who’s on Koo asking you to install the app because they’re on it. This is how Twitter became a thing about a decade ago. And Twitter wasn’t spending 60% of their expenses on advertising and promotion. In fact, back in 2010, Twitter was spending a meagre ~6% of its expenses on marketing and promotion. So clearly, Koo wasn’t all-organic. But that was not the only problem. Get the full scoop here- https://bit.ly/3VNdK36 And don't forget to follow Finshots for more insightful content!

Flipkart has almost 50% market share among e-commerce platforms when it comes to fashion as per Moneycontrol! 🤯 27% through Flipkart and the rest through Myntra. Do you think companies like Meesho, Ajio, or Nykaa can break Flipkart’s monopoly? Let us know in the comments and follow Finshots for more!

Govt is about to reduce petrol prices?🤔 It almost seems so. Do you think govt should stop charging taxes on petrol? Let us know in the comments and follow Finshots for more!