Qualcomm Investing in Indian Startups

Technology pioneer Qualcomm has announced it will invest up to $150m though Qualcomm Ventures to support India based startups focused on AI in areas like robotics, automotive, IoT and mobile.

Cardamon's Price Rise due to Weather Pressures

Cardamom, a spice prized for its aromatic flavour, has seen a price rise in recent years owing to extremes of weather. 

In 2024 had India lost crop due to heat, and in Guatemala, 60% of crop was lost that season too. 

Guatemala is the world's largest cardamom producer, having overtaken India in production in recent years due to rich volcanic soil and export driven farming.

Cardamom is the third costliest spice by weight, after saffron and vanilla.

In India, technological solutions are being found to help cardamom farmers, piloted by the Indian Cardamom Research Institute (ICRI), based in Myladumpara, Kerala.

Kyndryl Plans Investment in AI Lab in India

Kyndryl, specialist in infrastructure outsourcing and modernisation, is investing $2.25 billion over three years, including building out an AI lab in Bangalore, India.

Kyndryl was divested from IBM three years ago in November 2021, with Martin Schroeter (MBA, Carnegie Mellon) as its first CEO. Around 88,500 engineers moved to Kyndryl as part of the deal.

At the time of the divestment, Martin emphasised that Kyndryl would continue to have strong links to IBM, but being independent they were not free to work with other hyperscalers and grow the business.

Mark Carney "Disappointed" With New Trump Tariff

Donald Trump has raised trade tariffs on Canada from 25% to 35% - Mark Carney has expressed disappointment. Pakistan's tariffs have shrunk to 19% following Pakistan's nomination of Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize. India faces 25% tariffs.

UK Signs Trade Deal with India; Whisky Tariffs Down

India will reduce tariffs on whisky and gin from 150% to 75% with 40% by year 10, according to the UK government. There will be tariffs on UK car exports to India but tariffs on those cars will drop from 100% to 10%.  Many tariffs on Indian goods to the UK will be wiped out. UK companies can also bid to deliver Indian public sector services for the first time.

UBS shows strong profits and franchise strength in Q1 2025 with robust CET1

UBS has reported (30 April 2025) 2.1bn USD PBT (profit before tax) for Q1 2025 and a net profit of 1.7bn USD with RoCET1 of 9.6%.

Measures of franchise momentum have also been positive: this includes USD 32bn of net new assets into Global Wealth Management and USD 7bn of net new money into Asset Management.

UBS also calculates an underlying PBT and underlying RoCET1 which excludes P&L items which management consider not representative of underlying performance.  This gives a higher PBT number and higher RoCET1.

Capital position is strong with CET1 ratio of 14.3% and CET1 leverage ratio of 4.4% (banks have a requirement to keep their CET1 ratios above 4.5% to meet Basel standards with additional plus points if over 14%). UBS has stated this provides "a solid capital buffer to requirements during integration" (referring to Credit Suisse integration) and "given increased market volatility" (driven by US tariff policy changes).

The CET1 ratio is used to gauge a bank's solvency and capital strength.  

CET1 stands for Common Equity Tier 1 and measures the bank's "core capital" including common shares and retained earnings.  The BIS describes CET1 as the "highest quality of regulatory capital, as it absorbs losses immediately when they occur".

Tier 1 capital consists of CET1 and Additional Tier 1 (AT1) capital. Contingent convertibles (which can be converted into equity) and other kinds of hybrid securities qualify as AT1 capital. Typically these convertibles will have "triggers" to convert into common equity or be written off if CET1 ratios fall below a certain level.

Tier 2 capital consists of instruments other than common equity and is less discussed.

Growth including GenAI and cloud investments have included the roll-out of 50,000 Copilot licenses to employees (UBS has over 110,000 employees so this is under half of employees, including contractors), increased cloud usage to ~75% and an exclusive JV with 360 ONE on wealth management in India and international markets.

There are a few areas not covered by the broad results announcement - how well has Trading done, and how reliant is UBS on trading now relative to wealth and asset management.

Tesla in Talks to Invest in India

The EV market in India boasts three major players, Tata Motors, with its Nexon EV Model (whose engine is developed by Tata and Austrian firm AVL), MG Motors (Chinese-owned brand since 2005) and BYD. Tesla has strong growth ambitions aiming to sell 20 million cars globally by 2030 and building cars in India for the local market and export would go some way to achieving these goals. It has faced challenges expanding its Shanghai base where it operates a Gigafactory (its first overseas Gigafactory) due to Musk's adjacent involvement in SpaceX and potential military implications of its Starlink satellite network which currently has 4,000 satellites in low earth orbit.

Brookfield Asset Management Buys Up $2bn of Indian Office Space

Brookfield Asset Management, an alternative asset manager with $550bn in AuM, with headquarters in Toronto, has bought up $2bn of rent-yielding office and co-working spaces from RMZ Corp. Accenture, Google and HSBC are examples of clients of RMZ's spaces.

Asian Markets up 6%-8% As New US Stimulus Package Announced

Following five days of negotiations, a $1.8 trillion package has been announced by US President Donald Trump and the US Senate (which includes $250bn of direct payments to individuals and families) sending Asian shares on the up.  The Nikkei 225 (which includes companies like Nissan and Panasonic) was up 8% in a day to 19,546. The Kospi (which includes Samsung Electronics, SK Hynix) was up 5.9%. India's Nifty 50 is up 6.6%.

India Predicts 5% Growth

India's statistics ministry has predicted 5% growth in the current financial year, the lowest in 11 years, and below China and Vietnam. Vietnam is predicting 6.5% growth in 2020 in terms of real GDP. Real GDP measures economic output adjusted for price changes.

Amazon Enters EdTech Market with Indian Test Prep App

The app which is in beta targets the IIT JEE or Joint Entrance Examination which is a prerequisite for entering the Indian Institutes of Technology (and is also used by other institutions such as Indian Institute to Science) has been launched by Amazon.

SoftBank Profits from Flipkart

SoftBank's sale of its 20% stake in Flipkart to Walmart has boosted profits by $2.2bn, for the quarter ended June 30, 2018. This is a feather in the cap of SoftBank's $100bn Vision Fund. SoftBank expects to pay a deferred tax of $645K on the gain.

Qatar Said to be Buying New York's Plaza Hotel for $600m

The Plaza Hotel on Fifth Avenue (Central Park South) in midtown Manhattan, which opened its doors in 1907, is currently 75% owned by Sahara India with the remainder owned by Kingdom Holdings.
It is down the road from the Ritz-Carlton Central Park.

Qatar's Katara Hospitality is said to be buying full ownership, would add an iconic American hotel to its collection. Katara's investments include 50% holding in The Savoy and an investment in The Connaught in London.

PWC Banned from Audit Activities in India

SEBI, the Indian markets regulator, will enforce the ban from 31 March 2018. The ban comes about due to PWC's involvement in auditing Ramalinga Raju's Satyam Computers. 40% of PWC's India business is auditing.

Trading GOI and KTB Bond Futures

INDIA - Government Bond Futures and Bills and Who can Trade Them

The National Stock Exchange (NSE) of India offers futures trading on government bonds (10-year) and (91-day) bills a.k.a. 91TDB. Trading members must be registered with SEBI to trade in the Currency Derivatives segment.

Price Quote Convention

Prices are quoted "clean" i.e. without considering accrued interest.

Settlement and Delivery of GOI Bond Futures

Bond futures settle on VWAP during the last thirty minutes of trading, or theoretical value. Note that the 10 year bond futures actually allows delivery of bonds with 8-11 years of residual maturity.

Clearing of Trades

Trades are cleared by NSCCL (National Securities Clearing Corporation Limited), a wholly owned subsidiary of the NSE incorporated in 1995, and the first clearing house to be incorporated in India, starting operations in 1996. Counterparty risk is avoided by cash settlement of the daily mark to market of open positions.

KOREA

Korean Bonds

AsianBondsOnline has good coverage of Korean Won bonds, and presentation of 2, 5 and 10 year yields. In Korea, all fixed income instruments are available to foreign investors.

Bond futures trade on KRX. They are known as KTB futures (Korean Treasury Bond futures), available in 3, 5 and 10 year varieties.

The wholesale market for KTBs is known as KTS (this is also the venue to trade Monetary Stabilisation Bonds, or MSBs and Deposit Insurance Fund Bonds (DIFBs)), and is limited to government bond dealers licensed by the Financial Services Commission (founded in 2008).

The Discount Brokerages of India

India has does not have its own Charles Schwab - it has multiple. Here is a sample of discount brokerages of India.

Zerodha
RKSV - offering 5 free trades per month
SAS Online

Big Brands of Dalal Street

Overview

The BSE is an exchange for Indian equities, currency derivatives and interest rate products sometimes informally referred to as "Dalal Street" (or "Brokers' Street). It's CEO is Ashish Chauhan, who became the Deputy CEO after working at Reliance Industries.

The biggest stocks on Dalal Street

In terms of market capitalization they are Tata Consultancy Services (with a market capitalization of around 5 lakh crore rupees), Reliance Industries and ITC Ltd.

ITCs brands include Aashirvaad, Sunfeast and Kitchens of India. The ITC brand also gives its name to a range of luxury hotels in India including ITC Grand Chola in Chennai and ITC Maratha in Mumbai.

History of Stock Trading, 1875, Rise of the Sensex, 1986

BSE's history goes back to 1875 but its activity in derivatives is altogether more recent, with the S&P BSE Sensex launched in 1986 with a base year 1978-1979 with value 100. This was India's first stock index. It consists of 30 stocks and is designed to reflect the overall sentiment of the market.

History of Equity Derivatives, 2000

Equity derivatives were launched as late as June 2000.  On February 27, 2015, BSE launched LEIPS or single stock options (LEIPs being the Liquidity Enhancement Incentive Program), the running of such schemes being authorised by SEBI in June 2011. The single stocks scheme focuses on 20 securities in the BSE Sensex (examples being SBI, ICICI and HDFC bank). There are various types of incentive, one being a quote based incentive for MMs.

Currency Futures Market

Within currencies, the BSE offers futures contracts on pairs such as USD versus INR, pound, euro and yen as well versus INR.

Interesting Aspects

Shares with volume spurts are monitored (largest proportional change in ADV in lakhs). Say the ADV of a share is 1 lakh, and it suddenly trades 10 lakhs, this will be picked up by the volume spurts monitor.

"Always Keep Learning" - Useful Advice from Microsoft's new CEO

Microsoft's new CEO, Satya Nadella, hails from Hyderabad, India (the capital of Andhra Pradesh) and studied at the University of Mangalore (or Mangalapuram in Malayalam, which is close to the Arabian Sea) where he got his Bachelors in Electrical Engineering.

He has been at Microsoft since 1992. The full form of his first name is Satyanarayana.

As Microsoft's third CEO after Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer, he will be paid $1.2m a year, plus be eligible for a cash bonus of up to $3.6m. In an interview with the Deccan Chronicle, he shared some insights into his work philosophy: "You stop doing useful things if you don't learn".

Goldman's Launches India Public Sector ETF

GS (specifically GSAM) is launching a Public Sector Enterprise ETF which will feature 10 Indian public sector companies (March 2014), including ONGC, Gail, Coal India, Bharat Electronics, Engineers India (EIL) and Container Corp.

Some tickers to watch (tickers are NSE unless otherwise stated): BEL, CONCOR, GAIL.

The World's Largest Oil Importer is China

In 2013, China overtook the United States as the world's biggest importer of oil, partly due to rising car sales. According to the EIA, oil demand in China exceeded supply by 6.3 million bpd vs. 6.1 million bpd in the US. Many analysts predict this trend will continue for some years e.g. Macquarie, Wood Mackenzie. There has also been speculation that oil may be priced in RMB although this raises questions over convertibility.

India is the world's fourth largest importer of crude oil. 30% of its refining capacity is concentrated in two refineries in Jamnagar, western Gujarat, owned and operated by Reliance Industries. However, in terms of raw crude oil production, the state of Rajasthan exceeds Gujarat.