CCP’s Capital Allocation is Shifting Towards Tech Capex
As technology adoption becomes ubiquitous, the competitive advantages of winning businesses will be determined by their quality of capital allocation across four distinct layers – Enterprise Resource Planning or ERP (backbone), operational optimization (muscles), data analytics (brain) and customer interface (face). While a traditional business begins its tech investment journey from the first layer (ERP) […]
How Nikhat Zareen punched her way to becoming a champion
A week after our men’s badminton team won the Thomas Cup, the world cup for team badminton, we have another world champion in Nikhat Zareen who won the flyweight title at the recent world boxing championships. Regular readers would note that we would jump at featuring against-the-odds kind of success stories. Nikhat’s is one such […]
What We Should Remember About Bear Markets
They say investing is more of a behavioural science than anything else. And no better time to understand this than a bear market when emotions can drive irrational decisions (not too different that that in a bull market except nobody cares then). This blog by a British asset allocator gives us some pertinent pointers on […]
Sorry, But for You, Oil Trades at $250 a Barrel
Fuel prices feed into inflation in many ways causing a ripple effect resulting in inflation getting entrenched. For instance, the raging food inflation has a significant component of fuel as a drive through transportation and fertiliser costs. The Indian government clearly recognises that and hence last week cut taxes on fuel to do its bit […]
George Soros on Russia, China and The Fight of Our Lives
Rising interest rates aren’t the only nor the key fundamental issue that the world markets, financial or otherwise, need to be worried about. Interest rate hikes are a response to rising inflation which in turn is partly explained by excessive demand caused by the massive stimulus to handle Covid related weakness but also supply issues. […]
Pimco: navigating the end of the bond bull market
From the early 1980s until earlier this year, the US ten year bond yield has steadily fallen – from 15%+ in 1980 gradually to 1% at the height of the Covid panic. This created not just a 40-year bull market in bonds, it also created a swathe of gigantic asset classes such as junk bonds, […]
The long history of fragrant food in India, from massaging hens with musk to cooking in leaves
Like most Indians, most Marcellus staff members have an obsession about eating well. However, whilst we are willing to invest significant time and money to satiate our eating obsessions, this piece from Priyadarshini Chatterjee confirms that our efforts pale in front of what our ancestors were capable of: “In any gustatory experience, aroma is as important […]
Japan 1970s, not USA 1970s, is the better guide to what lies ahead for India
Contrary to the fashionable view that the Indian stock market will crater alongside the American stock market (as the Federal Reserve pursues aggressive rate tightening), we believe that India is more likely to follow the trajectory of Japan in the 1970s. As oil prices rose 10x through the 1970s, the US stock market went nowhere […]
Well Placed in a World with Rising Rates
Even after the RBI’s 40bps repo rate hike on 4th May 2022, repo rates are still 70bps below pre-Covid levels while inflation is trending well above pre-Covid levels. Hence we expect interest rates to rise further over the next few quarters. During three of the four rising interest cycles over the past two decades, the Bank […]
How do we know which Promoter(s) to back?
Taking a call on a small cap company is, to a large extent, taking a call on the promoter(s). Besides the promoter’s track record of capital allocation and experience of dealing with crises, another important assessment of promoter quality is the extent to which she is financially & emotionally invested in single mindedly running the […]
‘This is the real World Cup…proud of team’
They are calling it the 1983 moment for Indian badminton. The reference to India’s first cricket world cup win is only apt as it drove the whole nation to get obsessed about one sport to the extent now we are consistently at the top of world cricket. With last Sunday’s Thomas Cup (a world cup […]
You Eat a Credit Card’s Worth of Plastic Every Week
Many of us have been aghast at the pictures showing the vast plastic dump somewhere in the Pacific. “…plastic is omnipresent. Plastic is cheap and easy to make and mold. We use this miracle polymer to store and transport food, make our clothes and cosmetics, cars and boats, detergents and fertilizers, transfuse our blood and […]
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