Rise With Profit: US Inflation Data, Amazon's New Foray, Paytm's Divestment Plans | Podcast

This is the daily morning update from NDTV Profit. Over the next few minutes, we’ll bring you up to speed with everything you need to know to start your day ahead of the curve.

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There’s quite a bit of chop and churn in global markets ahead of the release of crucial inflation data in the US later today. The print could have a bearing on the course of policy action by the US Federal Reserve, starting with the meeting next week. The consumer price-based inflation in the US is expected to rise marginally, both sequentially and compared with a year ago. Core inflation, which removes the impact of food and fuel, is expected to remain flat.

The base case assumption for next week’s Federal Open Market Committee decision is for a 25 basis points cut in the policy rate.

Overnight, US stocks dropped marginally, with the Dow and S&P 500 down about a third and the Nasdaq losing about a quarter of a percent. Bond yields rose marginally across the curve, with the 10-year Treasury closing at 4.23%. That’s still about 20 basis points lower than it was earlier in the month.

The other big trigger to watch for is going to be any clarity from the China Annual Economic Work Meeting that begins today. The meeting is aimed at distilling the stimulus measures that are in the offing to boost the flagging economy. Already, there’s been an announcement of a change in monetary policy stance from “prudent” to “moderately loose”, which last happened during the global financial crisis.

Asian markets are also trading cautious this morning, with two of the three early risers trading with small cuts.

In international news, the Biden administration has urged the rebel group that led the ouster of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to not assume automatic leadership of the country. Two US officials and a congressional aide told Reuters that the US is pushing for the rebel group to run an inclusive process to form a transitional government.

Communication with Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, a group formerly allied with al Qaeda and designated a terrorist organisation by the United States, is being conducted in coordination with Washington's allies in West Asia, including Turkey.

In news back home, Amazon has joined the quick commerce race with Tez, the company's rapid delivery arm, according to Samir Kumar, country manager at Amazon India. The arm will be competing against Zomato's Blinkit, Swiggy Instamart, Zepto, and BigBasket.

As of now, this is going to be a pilot, but the fast-growing quick commerce space is set to see increased competition.

An NDTV Profit exclusive to tell you about—Paytm will continue to divest non-core businesses, said Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder Vijay Shekhar Sharma. The company will focus on its core business. The payments business is the company’s moat, according to Sharma, and that’s where he thinks the growth will be. He wants to continue to cross-sell financial services to the users of his payments service.

In other news, Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone Ltd. has said that it will finance the Colombo West International Terminal project in Sri Lanka through internal accruals and opted out of US funding. The Colombo project is progressing well and is on track for commissioning by early next year.

In the insurance space, general insurance saw a 4.41% year-on-year increase in premiums in November. That’s a slowdown from the growth seen in October, when premiums rose 28%.

And finally, the government on Tuesday assigned Economic Affairs Secretary Ajay Seth to take additional charge of the new revenue secretary, after Sanjay Malhotra was moved to take over as the Reserve Bank of India Governor. Seth will handle the additional responsibility till the government finds a regular replacement for the office.

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