India

[Viking]

Another indicator that India has arrived… As India continues to shift from public to private ownership it looks like it is using it as an opportunity to create more home grown companies that will have the scale to be able to compete on the global stage. Interesting model of development. With big winners.

—————

How secret London talks led to Air India’s gigantic plane order
- https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/international-business/article-how-secret-london-talks-led-to-air-indias-gigantic-plane-order/

 

Air India’s record aircraft deal has put the Tata Group-owned airline in the league of aspiring global carriers.

 

On Tuesday, it provisionally agreed to acquire almost 500 jets from Airbus and Boeing to take on domestic and international rivals.

Striking the largest ever deal by one airline took months of secret talks carried out a stone’s throw from Britain’s Buckingham palace and culminating in a celebration over coastal Indian curries, according to people involved in the talks.

 

Confidentiality was lifted on Tuesday as leaders hailed the accord in a diplomatic embrace between leading G20 nations. Tata Group, which regained control of Air India last year after decades of public ownership, put out just six paragraphs.

Edited February 15, 2023 by Viking

[Herald of the Hudson]

Does anyone know of an Indian Edgar equivalent?

[PJM]

There is none.

 

For all company related filings and announcement you can look at the exchanges

https://www.nseindia.com/companies-listing/corporate-filings-application

 

For new IPO prospectus you can look at SEBI site

https://www.sebi.gov.in/sebiweb/home/HomeAction.do?doListing=yes&sid=3&ssid=15&smid=10

 

You can also check out screener.in which is a pretty good portal for scanning through all companies

 

 

[Herald of the Hudson]

Ok, thanks for the pro tip PJM

[Viking]

Here is the bull case for investing in India. Prem provided the link in his annual letter. 
—————

From Prem’s letter: “As I was writing this to you, Mr. Athappan sent me a video by Deepak Bagla, Managing Director and CEO of Invest India, who describes the amazing transformation taking place in India. It is breathtaking and prompted me to include it in this letter! (www.youtube.com/watch?v=45PrXujlQCo)”
 

 

Edited April 2, 2023 by Viking

[Castanza]

On 4/2/2023 at 12:26 AM, Viking said:

Here is the bull case for investing in India. Prem provided the link in his annual letter. 
—————

From Prem’s letter: “As I was writing this to you, Mr. Athappan sent me a video by Deepak Bagla, Managing Director and CEO of Invest India, who describes the amazing transformation taking place in India. It is breathtaking and prompted me to include it in this letter! (www.youtube.com/watch?v=45PrXujlQCo)”
 

 

 

Listened to a podcast about the IPL on Business Breakdowns a few weeks ago. All I can say is I wish there were a way to invest. 

Virat Kohli (cricket player) has more Instagram followers than Taylor Swift. 

 

I've been doing more and more digging into India and this is definitely an economic powerhouse in the making. The age demographics look very favorable and look similar (better) than the US in the 1950's. 

Edited April 3, 2023 by Castanza

[valueseek]

This is a good one. Have followed him

last 7-8 years. Has some good books. He is generally bullish but also quite practical in the way he has been vary about avoiding the corrupt companies.

 

 

[whatstheofficerproblem]

The thing with India is, most Indians don't realize the power they hold. If the entirety of India is a market, a 1% penetration would mean a TAM of 14 million people. The CCP knows the power they hold as a market and their people hold as a consumer and the wealth they can generate for companies. They have played their cards right and hence is the reason why most corporations prostrate before the CCP while spreading values in the west. While I am an open market absolutist, as an Indian, I would at least for once in my lifetime like to see some big corporations stripped of their hypocrisy in my motherland, that would be the day she would truly become a 'superpower'. 

Everything else aside, the start up space is booming in India, and I don't know how many of you guys noticed this, but looks like Tencent holds stakes in most of the Indian start-ups these days.

[Xerxes]

[Spekulatius]

@Xerxes Seems like another example to show that Modi is showing more and more autocratic tendencies. Rewriting history is a classic textbook example of autocratic behavior to control the political narrative in the long run.  I realize a lot of people here like Modi and maybe I don’t know what I am talking about, but I suspect they like Modi because he has delivered some results l even though his process leans autocratic. Thats a dangerous path to go down though.

[ICUMD]

One of the most unfortunate events in my opinion was the partition of India into India and Pakistan in 1947. A division of territory based on religious faith:  Hindu or Muslim. 

 

Muslim separatists 'won' their own territory in gaining Pakistan in 1947.  Orthodox Hindu's feel India is theirs.

 

 

[Xerxes]

5 hours ago, Spekulatius said:

@Xerxes Seems like another example to show that Modi is showing more and more autocratic tendencies. Rewriting history is a classic textbook example of autocratic behavior to control the political narrative in the long run.  I realize a lot of people here like Modi and maybe I don’t know what I am talking about, but I suspect they like Modi because he has delivered some results l even though his process leans autocratic. Thats a dangerous path to go down though.

For now he seems to understand that he cannot be Deng and Xi at the same time, so he is being just Deng, developing India economically, while “bidding his time and hiding his strength”  

 

it starts with text books, and than that generation grows up to become decision makers. Thankfully there is a democratic process and will still be fully functional.

[Xerxes]

5 hours ago, ICUMD said:

One of the most unfortunate events in my opinion was the partition of India into India and Pakistan in 1947. A division of territory based on religious faith:  Hindu or Muslim. 

 

Muslim separatists 'won' their own territory in gaining Pakistan in 1947.  Orthodox Hindu's feel India is theirs.

 

 

I would have loved to see a multi cultural, diverse post-1947 combined India. Not wasting resources on confrontation with a militarized Pakistan. 
 

A Hindu-dominated India, and Muslim-dominated Pakistan, where does that leave the Sikh and others ? 

[ICUMD]

Indeed.  Racial segregation is a waste of energy and resources.  Countries that encourage diversity prosper most, like USA and Canada where many a Fortune 500 is run by a visible minority.  China is lacking in this regard.  

 

India, well racism there is a whole different story. 

[tnp20]

This is equivalent to Texas putting 10 commandments in schools. On a totalitarian scale its much lower than Xi or Erdogan. Yes, the tweak is wrong from historical perspective but the author makes too much out of it. XI is wiping out Tibetan and Uigar culture...this is not even close. Whats with the book covered in blood ....and not mentioning Modi was cleared of any wrong doing for the Gujarat riots by India's supreme court ( its probably lot less corrupt then ours given the recent events)....take author's bias with buckets of salt. I guess the Economist must be running out of good stories, after all they have a paper to sell. I have always hated shallow stories that are easy to write (even if they are true), it means the author is too lazy to dig  a more interesting but difficult story  ..with well researched data that took months to write.

 

Lets focus on the investment case (signal) and not be distracted every political act (noise) in the country. Imagine if foreigners made investment decisions in the USA based on Texas situation or national abortion ruling. As always ...pluses and minuses with each country and whats the objective and the time frames.

 

No one who is looking long term at India going to pull their investment dollars out by reading this article.

Edited April 30, 2023 by tnp20

[cheapguy]

Orthodox Muslim religious scholars are still living in medieval times in India.

For example in India - Muslim man can marry up to 4 wives. The law allows only for Muslim man. It is illegal for everyone else like Christians, Buddhists, Sikhs, and Hindus. Polygamy (polyandry to be more specific) is legally allowed for Muslims only, as Islamic scholars claim everything done by Muslim Prophet Mohammed should be allowed.  

 

Some Islamic Religious groups do not want any reform, as they are afraid of losing their power.

Modi is trying to reform this outdated behavior. 

Muslim women see Modi as their savior.

All male self-selected Muslim religious leaders are waging a vicious campaign to keep their power. 

 

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-61351784

In India, the issue is a political hot potato. Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has promised to enact a Uniform Civil Code (UCC) - a contentious piece of legislation that will mean marriages, divorces and inheritance will no longer be governed by their religious law but will come under a common law applicable to all citizens.

And at a time when the country is highly polarised along religious lines, any reform suggested by the government is bound to be considered an onslaught on Islam by a majority of Muslims.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-61351784

 

 

Edited May 6, 2023 by cheapguy

[Ulti]

https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/herecomesindia

[tnathan]

This is another great read laying out the broader India investment case. I also happen to be in India at the moment (here for a month traveling) and you can feel the energy in the people. As much as the government has problems, it’s clearly making positive investments and spending money in areas that will boost the economy, and people here want to succeed. In many ways I think the positive energy represents what the US has lost in recent decades.

 

https://www.dispatchesfromindia.com

[Spekulatius]

Great news for the US and Russia. It’s much better to work with India and reduce dependency on China. India is far more likely to become a real superpower than China, due to demographics alone.

[Dinar]

40 minutes ago, Spekulatius said:

Great news for the US and Russia. It’s much better to work with India and reduce dependency on China. India is far more likely to become a real superpower than China, due to demographics alone.

Time will tell whether that will be good for the US and Europe.   India seems to me no less nationalistic and protectionist than China.  

[Dinar]

5 minutes ago, Haryana said:

 

what is your opinion on Japan, is Japan less nationalistic than China/India?

 

Japan is a declining power that depends on the US, so their nationalism is not a threat to the US.

[Haryana]

2 minutes ago, Dinar said:

Japan is a declining power that depends on the US, so their nationalism is not a threat to the US.

 

Currently, the nationalism of China is appearing to become a threat so the USA appears to be diversifying supply from India.

 

By the time, nationalism of India appears to become a threat, China could be declining and USA could diversify to Indonesia.

 

[Spekulatius]

5 hours ago, Haryana said:

 

Currently, the nationalism of China is appearing to become a threat so the USA appears to be diversifying supply from India.

 

By the time, nationalism of India appears to become a threat, China could be declining and USA could diversify to Indonesia.

 

India is a democracy, China is an autocracy. That’s the big difference. I also think that India is much more likely to become a superpower than China, mostly because of demographics, but also because a democratic system over the longer term beats autocracies.

[Luke]

11 hours ago, Spekulatius said:

India is a democracy, China is an autocracy. That’s the big difference. I also think that India is much more likely to become a superpower than China, mostly because of demographics, but also because a democratic system over the longer term beats autocracies.

@Spekulatius Do you think the US is a democracy too? I feel like we are getting blinded by this word. 

 

I remember this study by Princeton>

 

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/perspectives-on-politics/article/testing-theories-of-american-politics-elites-interest-groups-and-average-citizens/62327F513959D0A304D4893B382B992B#

 

 

 

 

Clearly, when one holds constant net interest-group alignments and the preferences of affluent Americans, it makes very little difference what the general public thinks. The probability of policy change is nearly the same (around 0.3) whether a tiny minority or a large majority of average citizens favor a proposed policy change (refer to the top panel of figure 1).

 

Furthermore, the preferences of economic elites (as measured by our proxy, the preferences of “affluent” citizens) have far more independent impact upon policy change than the preferences of average citizens do. To be sure, this does not mean that ordinary citizens always lose out; they fairly often get the policies they favor, but only because those policies happen also to be preferred by the economically-elite citizens who wield the actual influence.

 

What do our findings say about democracy in America? They certainly constitute troubling news for advocates of “populistic” democracy, who want governments to respond primarily or exclusively to the policy preferences of their citizens. In the United States, our findings indicate, the majority does not rule—at least not in the causal sense of actually determining policy outcomes. When a majority of citizens disagrees with economic elites or with organized interests, they generally lose. Moreover, because of the strong status quo bias built into the U.S. political system, even when fairly large majorities of Americans favor policy change, they generally do not get it.

Edited June 27, 2023 by Luca

[Luke]

China, Russia etc know very well that if they would implement a democracy, US capital and intelligence would just come into the country and try to install leadership that does what the US wants. Thats why the US hates China, not because they are hurting people in concentration camps but because they can not be controlled. So whenever i hear the hate on authoritarian leadership, i often cringe because we have exactly that as well in western nations, just hidden. Its already bought and paid for.