Namaste, Sat Sri Akaal, and Salaam. 🫡

Happy morning, folks. 🙏

Today we’re diving into -
- Indian regulators’ thoughts on finfluencers,
- Tata’s talks to buy Haldirams for $10bn,
- And Ola Electric’s $140mn funding round, led by Temasek.

Our read time today is 4 minutes and 52 seconds - faster than you can ask your Dad to make you a bhujia-ketchup sandwich. 🔥

Let's dive in. 👇

Market Vibe Check

SEBI fires one point-blank at finfluencers. 💸

TLDR -
- Regulated entities CANNOT promo their products with unregulated influencers.
- Influencers have to ‘register’ with SEBI to do this stuff.
- The entire finfluencer business model = gone overnight.

Of late, finfluencers have been everywhere.

They’re telling you the best stocks to buy on Twitter, the best credit cards to get on Insta, and the best mutual funds to invest in on LinkedIn.

A little bit of profile engineering is all it takes to sound smart, and smart-sounding people build audiences fast.

They then pass on literal financial advice to their followers.

This “advice” can be very dangerous.

A lot of these finfluencers promise bewildering returns and promote small-cap stocks in pump and dump schemes.

To combat this, SEBI’s said that -

Regulated entities CANNOT promote investment products, shares, or securities with UNREGULATED entities.

In short, they’ve nuked the entire finfluencer business model overnight.

Crazy… 🚀

Tata eyes a $10 billion valuation for Haldirams. 😋

TLDR -
- Tata wants to buy a 51% controlling stake in Haldirams.
- Since it’s a controlling stake, the owners want a premium - a $10bn valuation.
- But last year revenue was only $1.5bn, which begs the question - is it worth it?

Haldirams has built a $10 billion business by being the pride of every Indian chai break.

And Tata’s Consumer arm wants to take a multibillion dollar bite.

They’re looking to buy up 51% of the company.

The only problem?

Since it’s a controlling stake, the Haldirams owners are charging a hefty premium.

They’re valuing the business at $10 billion - which is a pretty crazy price tag, considering that Tata Consumer themselves is only worth around that much.

Plus, Haldirams did $1.5bn of revenue last year, making it a pretty steep multiple to pay.

Tata Consumer will probably tap into the profits of their parent company, but it’s still a LOT to shell out.

Masaledar… 🙈

Ola Electric picks up $140 million to supercharge their biz. ⚡

TLDR -
- Ola Electric picked up $140mn at a $5.5bn price tag.
- Lead investor was Temasek, committing $90mn.
- Last year loss was $136mn with $350mn of revenue.

The EV market is going bijlee-bijlee - Ola just picked up $140 million to go HAM on expansion.

Of this, 90 million is coming from Singaporean state investor Temasek.

Another comforting thing - it’s a valuation jump, not a down round, from $5bn to $5.5bn.

They’re showing us all a masterclass in operational excellence - electric bike is coming later this year, and their car is coming in 12-14 months.

A 115-acre manufacturing plant is also being built in Chennai.

Electric… 🔋

In other news… ☕

Arm targets a $52 billion valuation (FT)

Baidu rallies $23 billion after AI chatbot launch (BBG)

Oil passes $90 for the first time this year (FT)

E-com financing startup Wayflyer inks a $1 billion deal with NB (TC)

Hinduja tries diversifying into Africa (Mint)

And that’s the tea the chai for today.

Thanks for reading, and we hope you enjoyed it. Have a mauj-masti filled weekend.

Lots of ❤️,

Team Cutting Chai