Imagine this: you're driving to work on an ordinary day when—BAM—you hit a pothole. Before you can catch your breath, you realize the road ahead is flooded, and to top it all off, there's a massive traffic jam.

Frustrated, you mutter a few curses at the city authorities.

Aren’t they supposed to fix these problems? But here’s the big question: why don’t things ever seem to get better?

Is it just incompetence, or could there be something else going on? Maybe—just maybe—the municipality doesn’t have enough money to fix these issues in the first place.

What’s the most essential tech in your life? Your smartphone? Laptop? Car?

Think deeper. Inside those devices lies the real powerhouse: semiconductors. These tiny chips run our modern world.

Here’s why they’re so important—and how they’re fueling the US-China tech rivalry.🧵👇 Semiconductors are the unsung heroes of technology. They power everything from smartphones to electric cars, AI systems, and even missile defense.

But today, they’ve become more than just tech components. They’re a key battleground in global politics.

Over the past month, several major Indian companies missed their earnings expectations, hinting at larger economic challenges.

In this thread, we’ll explore what key high-frequency economic indicators are revealing about India’s current economy🧵👇 Between May and September, auto sales struggled with weak demand. But October brought a festive cheer. two-wheeler sales shot up by over 36% compared to last year, while cars and SUVs saw a solid 33% jump.

Lately, gold has been making headlines again, with prices surging to new highs in October. For an asset known for its stability, that’s no small feat.

But the real question is—what’s driving these prices up, and why has gold suddenly become more valuable? Most of you watching or listening probably know that gold is often seen as a “safe haven” investment.

When things in the world feel uncertain—whether due to political, economic, or social reasons—people tend to put their money into gold, trusting it to hold steady even when other investments don’t.

Today, let's talk about a health crisis that’s impacting millions of lives quietly but seriously—diabetes. This problem goes far beyond individual health issues.

It is reshaping economies, adding stress on families, and changing the very structure of our society. In India especially, diabetes is a huge issue affecting our economy, social lives, and productivity, which makes it critical to understand this in detail. To start, it’s important to know what diabetes really is. Think of it as a condition where the body struggles to manage sugar levels in the blood.

Usually, our body relies on a hormone called insulin to help process sugar from the food we eat. In diabetes, either the body doesn’t produce enough insulin or can’t use it properly.

This results in high blood sugar levels, which can lead to long-term health problems like heart disease, kidney damage, and even blindness.

Recently, India’s Oil Minister laid out an interesting strategy: instead of stepping back from fossil fuels, we’re planning to strengthen our reliance on them. The aim? To become a "regional refining hub" until at least 2040.

What does this really mean?🧵👇 In simple terms, India doesn’t just want to refine oil for its own needs; we want to supply our neighbors too. There are plans in the works to build more refineries for oil, gas, and petrochemicals.

India’s aviation industry is really taking off. It recently reached a major milestone, becoming the world's third-largest aviation market, meaning more people are flying in India than almost anywhere else.

This growth is driven by rising demand and more planes in the sky to meet it—a big change from the struggles during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Now, the industry is bouncing back strong.

Source: IBEF Interestingly, just three airlines—IndiGo, Air India, and Vistara—control almost 90% of all domestic flights.

These three are in tight competition, each making careful moves to lead the market. Let’s start with IndiGo.

For years, it’s been the dominant player in India’s skies, known for its simple, no-frills approach as a low-cost carrier (LCC).

Source: @Tijori1

In the past year, a new trend has emerged among some of India’s most well-known companies. As demand within India, especially in rural areas, begins to slow, many brands are shifting their focus overseas.

They’re finding success by exporting to international markets, where demand remains steady, if not growing. This trend is particularly noticeable in the automotive and fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) sectors, where companies are seeing more sales abroad than they might currently expect domestically.

Why is this happening?

October was a tough month for Indian markets. The Nifty and Sensex, India’s main indices, fell about 6%. That might feel big because, since 2020, we’ve gotten used to a steady climb so even a small dip feels like a major shift.

To put it in perspective, the Nifty 50’s 6.2% drop in October was the largest since March 2020. The Mid and Smallcap indices saw a similar trend, although Smallcaps were down by only around 3.6%. Despite October’s dip, the markets have still shown strong overall growth.

When we talk about the basics in life, three things often come to mind for most Indians: roti, kapda, and makaan—food, clothing, and shelter.

While access to food and clothing has improved over the years, owning a home remains a distant dream for millions of people. This is especially true for lower-income groups who face huge challenges in affording or even qualifying for a home loan. In a country with over a billion people, the dream of owning a home is widespread, but it’s not equally achievable for everyone.

India currently faces a massive housing shortage, with a gap of nearly 100 million homes. According to a study by the RBI, around 95% of this demand comes from the economically weaker sections (EWS) and lower-income groups (LIG).

HDB Financial Services (HDB), a key player in India’s lending sector, is preparing for a major IPO.

The company plans to raise ₹12,500 crore in its public offering, making it one of the largest IPOs ever by a non-banking financial company (NBFC) in India. For some background, HDB is the lending arm of HDFC Bank and manages over ₹90,000 crore in assets.

This IPO has the potential to reshape the lending market by introducing a strong competitor equipped with fresh capital to expand its reach.

HDB operates as an NBFC, which means it can lend money like a bank but doesn’t offer services like savings accounts. Its customers range from individuals to businesses, covering both urban and rural areas across India.

India's residential real estate market is seeing a revival. Inventory levels, which measure how long it would take to sell unsold homes, have significantly dropped from ~30 months before the pandemic to ~18 months now.

Here's what's happening🧵👇 Just a few years ago, this sector was facing big challenges: there were too many unsold homes, people were hesitant to buy, and lenders weren’t keen on giving out loans. The industry seemed to be in a rough spot.

Since the U.S. elections are on everyone’s mind (they are, right?), we thought we'd do a quick check on what the polls are showing.

The TL;DR? It’s close—pretty much a coin toss.

Here’s Nate Silver’s poll aggregate. @TheEconomist's poll also gives a slight lead to Harris, but it's still very close.

There's a notable shift happening in India’s spending patterns. Urban spending—traditionally a big driver—has started to slow, while rural spending is actually on the rise. This shift has economists and corporate leaders talking, especially about what people are buying.🧵👇 More and more people in India are opting for higher-quality, often more luxurious versions of everyday products—things like soap, snacks, and even cars.

Silver hit ₹100,000/kg this year, and is up 30%, outperforming both gold and Nifty.

October has been rough for stocks, highlighting the importance of diversified portfolios.

More Indians are moving from gold & real estate to stocks and mutual funds.

A deep dive into these and more such trends through charts in this 🧵👇 Silver has been on a tear! Earlier this month, it crossed the ₹1,00,000 per kg mark, climbing over 30% this year and outshining both gold and the Nifty by a large margin.

Urban demand for daily essentials and premium goods is slowing, while rural areas are becoming unexpectedly strong in consumer spending! Here’s what’s changing in India’s consumer landscape.🧵👇 Cities like Delhi, Mumbai, and Bengaluru have traditionally driven consumer spending. Companies like Tata Consumer Products, HUL, and Nestlé focused on these markets. But now, demand in urban areas is softening.

📉Nifty closes lower at 24,350 despite strong broader market buying. Banking, Pharma, and IT stocks weigh down the index, but robust buying elsewhere shows positive sentiment.

Here's a quick market wrap-up and key news from India and around the world🧵👇 Nifty tested the 24,480-24,500 range for the third straight day before closing at 24,350.30. While headline indices dipped, the advance-decline ratio was a strong 3.05, indicating robust buying outside of the Pharma, Banking, and IT sectors.

Microfinance in India started with a simple goal: to get loans to people who really needed them but couldn't access traditional banking.

Now, however, it's in a tricky spot, facing serious challenges like rapid growth, changing regulations, and high interest rates.

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is taking a close look at how the sector is run, especially with more loans turning bad and the overall quality of loans dropping. In 2022, the RBI made a decision that changed things significantly—they removed the cap on how much interest microfinance institutions (MFIs) could charge.

The old system was pretty straightforward: MFIs could take their cost of borrowing money and add up to 12%. So, if it costs them 10% to get funds, they could charge borrowers up to 22%.

This system worked well, allowing MFIs to cover their costs and make a fair profit without overwhelming borrowers with high rates.

India’s spirits market is unique. While alcohol consumption worldwide is often spread across beer, wine, and spirits, Indian consumers overwhelmingly prefer spirits—especially whisky, rum, and brandy.

Spirits account for nearly 90% of all alcohol consumed in India, with beer a distant second and wine barely making a mark. This creates a huge market for companies like United Spirits Limited (USL), part of the global beverage giant Diageo, and Radico Khaitan, one of India’s top homegrown brands.

When these companies release their quarterly results, they provide more than just company updates; they offer a close-up view of the trends in India’s spirits industry.

ITC, one of India’s biggest business groups, recently announced its quarterly results.

ITC’s size means its results give us a sense of what’s happening across India’s economy.

To give some context, ITC operates in a variety of sectors, including cigarettes, FMCG, agriculture, hotels, and paper products. So, by examining ITC’s performance, we can get a better picture of trends in these important parts of the economy. For this quarter, ITC reported total revenue of ₹20,360 crore, a 16% increase compared to the same period last year and a 12.6% rise from the previous quarter.

On the profit side, ITC recorded a Profit After Tax of ₹5,078 crore, slightly up from last year’s ₹4,927 crore and the previous quarter’s ₹4,917 crore.

Source: ITC

The electronics industry has become essential to our daily lives. Without smartphones, laptops, TVs, etc. it would be tough to get through our day.

While we rely heavily on these gadgets, India produces only about 2% of the world’s electronics but consumes 5%. 🧵👇 This reliance on imports means that whenever there’s a global supply chain disruption as we saw during the pandemic, India is significantly impacted. However, the good news is that India is taking steps to change this.