Arvind's Newsletter

The newsletter returns after a break

1.JSW Paints to acquire Akzo Nobel India in ₹9,000 crore deal: Mint

JSW Paints said it will acquire a 74.76% stake in Akzo Nobel India Ltd. from its Dutch parent Akzo Nobel N.V. and its affiliate, in a deal valued at nearly ₹9,000 crore. The acquisition, subject to regulatory approvals and a mandatory open offer to minority shareholders, will bring established brands like Dulux and Sikkens under the JSW umbrella.

The transaction marks a significant consolidation in India’s paints market, historically dominated by a handful of players. With this deal, JSW Paints is positioning itself as a serious contender behind Asian Paints and the recently aggressive Birla Opus, which has quickly scaled up to become the second-largest by capacity.

2.HDB Financial among most subscribed billion dollar Indian IPOs in 4 years: Economic Times

HDB Financial’s $1.5 billion IPO attracted bids for over 2 billion shares—15 times the offer size—making it one of India’s most in-demand listings in years. Global investors, domestic mutual funds and financial institutions made up the bulk of the demand/

The parent firm HDFC Bank, which holds a 94.6 per cent in HDB Financial Services Ltd, will sell shares worth ₹10,000-crore via an offer-for-sale (OFS) as part of the IPO. This is the HDFC Bank group's first public float in six years.

3.Navi Mumbai airport to start charging user development fee from passengers: Business Standard

As Navi Mumbai International Airport (NMIA) gears up for its commercial debut, passengers will have to shell out more than just the ticket fare. The aviation regulator has approved an ad-hoc user development fee (UDF) that will be levied on all flyers, making NMIA one of the costlier gateways in the country even before its first flight takes off.

Departing domestic flyers will pay Rs 620 and international passengers Rs 1,225. For arriving passengers, the fee is Rs 270 (domestic) and Rs 525 (international). Other major airports like Delhi, Bengaluru, and Mumbai also levy UDFs—Rs 207 and Rs 726 at Mumbai’s Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport (CSMIA).

Full-scale operations are said to begin in August 2025 with 20 million passenger capacity, ramping up to 90 million annually by 2040 in five phases.

4.Novo Nordisk’s GLP-1 drug Wegovy launched in India earlier this week, intensifying competition in the burgeoning weight loss market: Reuters

Wegovy challenges Eli Lilly’s Mounjaro, which was rolled out in India earlier this year and saw a 60% rise in sales between April and May. Obesity and diabetes rates are steadily climbing in the world’s most populous nation, showing the clear market potential for the Western pharma giants. But they could face heightened domestic competition elsewhere in Asia.

Some 30 experimental weight loss drugs are reportedly in China’s late-stage development pipeline. A Hangzhou-based firm this week heralded a new obesity drug that it said may be more effective than Wegovy.

5.Torrent Pharma closes in on JB Chem likely for $2.4 bn buyout, eyes $1.6 billion financing

Torrent Pharma is in advanced talks with KKR to acquire JB Chemicals and Pharmaceuticals, reviving discussions from last year. The deal involves Torrent acquiring KKR's 47.84% stake and launching an open offer, potentially leading to a Rs 20,734.61 crore buyout. This acquisition would bolster Torrent's branded generics portfolio and provide entry into the CDMO business.

6.NATO Spending Hike: CNBC and others

NATO leaders are expected to agree to ramp up defense spending when the two-day summit concludes. Countries may commit to spending 5% of their gross domestic product on defense by 2035—up from the current 2% target, which 22 of the 32 member countries have met. 

The commitment responds to a call from President Donald Trump, who has conveyed skepticism about the military alliance’s value to the United States. The US is one of NATO's biggest contributors, responsible for roughly 16% of the alliance's collective $3.5B budget last year. It is also the only country to have triggered Article 5, which assures collective defense for all member countries. Spain struck a deal with NATO to be exempted in the final communique, instead committing 2.1% of its GDP to defense.

Separately, the ceasefire between Israel and Iran appeared to hold yesterday despite violations. An early US intelligence assessment meanwhile reportedly found US strikes set Iran's nuclear program back by months but left its uranium stockpile and centrifuges largely intact. The White House has denied the report. 

6.Here’s Why BP Is Seen as a Potential Takeover Target: Bloomberg

It’s been almost 25 years since BP Plc attempted to rebrand itself as “Beyond Petroleum” and adopt a more environmentally friendly image. But with a recent swing away from green energy toward its fossil fuel roots, “Back to Petroleum” might be a more appropriate tag line.

The shift comes as BP lags significantly behind its fellow oil and gas majors, due to a combination of corporate disasters, war, lacklustre returns from its greener efforts and some bad luck. It could even be a takeover target, although rival Shell Plc has ruled itself out of the running for now.

Activist shareholder Elliott Investment Management has been turning up the heat, and BP management has laid out plans for a grand reset. The effort risks being blown off course if crude oil prices remain below $70 a barrel, with US President Donald Trump’s tariff war weighing on the outlook for oil demand and the OPEC+ cartel ramping up supply. This price level is the foundation of BP’s targets for improved cash flow and returns. By the company’s own reckoning, each $1 drop in oil prices wipes an estimated $340 million from its pretax profit.

7.Zohran Mamdani, the socialist New Yorker shaking up the Democrats: Financial Times

In the small hours of Wednesday morning, a 33-year-old man of South Asian descent walked out into a crowded bar in Long Island City to announce that he had achieved the unimaginable.

Zohran Mamdani had just been elected Democratic nominee for the mayor of New York — a jaw-dropping achievement for a politician who most voters in America’s most populous city had barely heard of a few months ago.

“In the words of Nelson Mandela, it always seems impossible until it is done,” he told ecstatic supporters. “My friends, we have done it.”

A self-declared democratic socialist whom President Trump has branded a “100% Communist Lunatic”, Mamdani had beaten the man who polls suggested would sail to the nomination — Andrew Cuomo, scion of a political dynasty and governor of New York state from 2011-21. 

“This is the biggest upset in American political history since Barack Obama beat Hillary Clinton in the 2008 Democratic presidential primary,” says Trip Yang, a New York-based political strategist. “No one saw this coming.”

Others, such as Ross Barkan, a columnist at New York magazine, were less surprised. He’s known Mamdani since 2017, when he hired him to run his campaign for a seat in the New York State senate: from the start, Barkan says, he was impressed by his “charisma and verve”. “I’m not shocked because I knew Zohran was incredibly talented . . . and I saw that the moment I met him,” he adds.

 “Did I know he’d be on the trajectory to be mayor of New York City by the time he was 34 years old? No! No one could have foreseen that. But I knew he had great potential.”

Read on (Gift Article)

8.The résumé is dying, and AI is holding the smoking gun - The New York Times.

Employers are drowning in AI-generated job applications, with LinkedIn now processing 11,000 submissions per minute—a 45 percent surge from last year, according to new data reported by The New York Times.

Due to AI, the traditional hiring process has become overwhelmed with automated noise. It's the résumé equivalent of AI slop—call it "hiring slop," perhaps—that currently haunts social media and the web with sensational pictures and misleading information. The flood of ChatGPT-crafted résumés and bot-submitted applications has created an arms race between job seekers and employers, with both sides deploying increasingly sophisticated AI tools in a bot-versus-bot standoff that is quickly spiraling out of control.

The Times illustrates the scale of the problem with the story of an HR consultant named Katie Tanner, who was so inundated with over 1,200 applications for a single remote role that she had to remove the post entirely and was still sorting through the applications three months later.

9.Who is most at risk from the billions of leaked Facebook and Google passwords? Rest of the World

A recent data breach of about 16 billion login credentials is said to have put users of Facebook, Instagram, Google, and Apple at risk of fraud and identity theft.

The stolen records, scattered across 30 databases, are a “blueprint for mass exploitation” that threatens users in developing nations, according to a June 18 report by CyberNews, whose researchers found the breach. Unlike traditional database hacks, this leak originated from malware that infiltrates devices only when users download corrupted files, then targets people with poor password habits.

Developing countries face the greatest risk from this breach due to rapid digital adoption coupled with inadequate cybersecurity infrastructure, experts said. The vulnerability is particularly acute in Asia and Latin America, which represent the largest user bases for many affected platforms.

10.A big mistake by Bangladesh: The Economist

IT IS ALMOST a year since the start of the uprising that toppled Sheikh Hasina, Bangladesh’s despotic former ruler. More than a thousand people died in those few weeks of turmoil; many more were hurt. Shortly after the deposed prime minister fled to India on August 5th 2024, a caretaker government led by Muhammad Yunus, a Nobel peace-prize winner, took office. It promised to restore order and rejuvenate democratic institutions that years of misgovernment had ruined.

Eleven months on, the going is tough indeed. Political demonstrations continue (a march in late May is pictured). Many politicians seem keener to lash out at enemies than build bridges: Sheikh Hasina’s party, the Awami League, has been banned. America’s aid cuts and tariffs threaten development; relations with India, Bangladesh’s biggest neighbour, are in crisis. Is this country of 174m going to squander its fresh start?

Mr Yunus insists his project is on track. In a recent interview with The Economist, the 84-year-old said that achieving the deep reforms Bangladeshis are seeking will take time. On the economy, at least, his government has good news. Bangladesh’s growth will slow from 4.2% to 3.9% in the year ending in June, reckons the Asian Development Bank (ADB): not stellar, but miles better than expected last year. Remittances are arriving, foreign-exchange reserves have surged, and the annual inflation rate has dipped from nearly 12% in July last year to 9% in May. The government has sought to clear bad loans from the banks and started hunting for billions of dollars that the previous government is believed to have siphoned abroad.

Encouraged by this, in recent weeks both the International Monetary Fund and ADB have approved multi-billion-dollar loans. The catch is that so far the government’s reforms have focused only on “low-hanging fruit”, points out Chandan Sapkota of the ADB. Bangladesh still depends heavily on exports of textiles, has woeful infrastructure and is not creating enough jobs for its youngsters. These issues have grown urgent now that America is waging tariff wars.

If action on the economy has won nods abroad, the government’s foreign policy raises eyebrows. Mr Yunus says that Bangladesh is “reaching out to everybody”. But in March he was in China for his first big bilateral trip, where he signed a handful of agreements. Reports suggest Bangladesh may buy Chinese J10C and JF17 fighter jets—the same aircraft used by Pakistan in its conflict with India in May. On June 19th China, Pakistan and Bangladesh held their first-ever trilateral summit.

All this dents ties with India, which used to be Bangladesh’s strongest ally and is providing sanctuary to Sheikh Hasina. Bangladeshis do not care: a survey last year found 75% of them view China positively, while only 11% say they like India. But alienating a big neighbour is risky. In April India cancelled a trans-shipment facility that allowed Bangladeshi goods to be sent abroad from Indian airports; that will increase costs for firms.

Aligning with China could also hurt relations with America. Before that country cut foreign aid, Bangladesh was one of its biggest beneficiaries; much of the money helped Bangladesh host the 1.1m Rohingya refugees who live near the border with Myanmar. America is also the biggest market for Bangladeshi exports. Last month Bangladesh opened negotiations on trade, as it seeks to avoid being subject to reciprocal tariffs of 37% that are due to take effect on July 9th.

Yet the biggest question facing Bangladesh is how quickly it can restore democracy—and how long that achievement will endure. Mr Yunus has suggested that elections may be held in February 2026, or at least no later than April. In advance he wants politicians to sign off a document, called the “July Charter”, that will set ground rules for the poll and list reforms to be completed by its winner. Exactly what politicians will agree to insert in this contract remains fuzzy.

Nearly 150 parties have signed up to compete in the polls, more than twice as many as were registered before. Newcomers include the National Citizen Party (NCP), a student-led group that emerged from the protests. The caretaker administration is keen to nurture a new generation of politicians. So this is hopeful news. The problem is that these minnows seem unlikely to do very well. Among voters who have already made up their mind, only 5% will plump for the NCP, according to one opinion poll. The old guard is doing much better: the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) gets backing from 42% of decided voters. Jamaat-e-Islami, an Islamist group, is polling at 32%. Liberals fear the Islamists would indulge religious extremists. As for the BNP, many Bangladeshis think it as venal and complacent as the party they have just removed from power.

That outfit—the Awami League—will not be taking part. After months of pressure from other parties, the interim government banned it from political activity in May, citing “national security” concerns. In theory the ruling is temporary, pending court cases, but legal proceedings might take years. The risk is that a large chunk of Bangladesh’s voters decide that this decision has denied them a proper choice at the ballot box. The Awami League remains surprisingly popular: it is first choice for 14% of decided voters, and that is almost certainly an undercount (many Bangladeshis prefer not to admit that they still back it). Mohammad Arafat, an Awami leader, insists half the country still sympathises with his party.

Awami claims that 24 members or supporters have been killed in custody since last year’s revolution. Human Rights Watch, an NGO, has accused the interim government of “arbitrarily” targeting Awami supporters in a way that “mirrors the previous government’s abusive clampdown on political opponents”. Lasting change will require bringing all Bangladeshis together, not dishing out punishments, argues Arafat Khan, a legal scholar at the London School of Economics. Bangladesh sorely needs a “Nelson Mandela moment”, he says.