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  • Vodafone & Airtel’s ₹AGR Nightmare Continues 📉 (Feb 15)

Vodafone & Airtel’s ₹AGR Nightmare Continues 📉 (Feb 15)

Happy Saturday, you legends! 🥳 You survived another week of stock market tantrums, AI lawsuits, and Jio gobbling up yet another platform.

Saturday Morning Weekend GIF by Pudgy Penguins

Now, let’s settle in with a steaming cup of Masala Chai, because we’ve got everything from Bollywood fighting robots to Japan panic-buying rice like it’s an Amazon flash sale.

🥤 Chai Shots

  • 📉 SC Rejects Vodafone & Airtel AGR Pleas – Supreme Court refuses to reconsider Vodafone Idea and Bharti Airtel’s claims of miscalculated AGR dues. With no legal options left, telcos are stuck with massive dues, and their stocks took a hit. Vodafone Idea fell 4.16% to ₹8.29, while Bharti Airtel slipped 0.51% to ₹1,705.

  • 📺 JioHotstar Goes Live with 500M Users! – The mega streaming platform, created by merging Disney+ Hotstar & JioCinema, boasts 50M paid subscribers and a hybrid model of free and premium content. Just in time for the ICC Champions Trophy!

  • 🎵 Bollywood vs AIT-Series, Saregama & Sony are joining the legal fight against OpenAI, accusing it of training AI models on copyrighted songs. With India being OpenAI’s second-largest market, the court’s ruling could have global implications.

  • 💰 Paytm Money Pays ₹45.50 Lakh to Settle SEBI Case – The stockbroking arm of Paytm settled a case related to technical glitch framework violations, system monitoring, and disaster recovery compliance. Paytm Money paid the fine without admitting or denying the violations.

📊 Market Masala

  • 📉 Sensex & Nifty Extend Losing Streak – The Sensex (-200 pts, 75,939) and Nifty (-102 pts, 22,929) fell for the eighth straight session, marking the longest losing streak in two years. The broader market suffered more, with Nifty Midcap (-1,227 pts) and Nifty Bank (-260 pts) tumbling. BSE-listed companies lost ₹26 lakh crore in market cap this week alone.

  • 📊 Markets Eye Modi-Trump Talks – The delay in reciprocal tariffs is a positive sign, giving room for negotiations. India’s willingness to buy more US oil & gas could help narrow the trade deficit, but a full-fledged deal is still uncertain. Investors are cautiously optimistic.

  • 📉 Telecom Stocks Dip – After SC’s ruling against AGR dues recalculation, Vodafone Idea drops 4.16% to ₹8.29, Bharti Airtel slips 0.51% to ₹1,705.

  • 🚀 India’s Economy on a Speedy Rebound – Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman says India will remain the fastest-growing economy, despite global uncertainties. She defended higher capital expenditure (capex) allocations, saying Budget outlays will boost the economy.

🌎 Global Masala

  • 📉 US Markets Hit Pause After Tariff Turmoil – After a rollercoaster week of Trump tariffs, inflation fears, and geopolitical moves, Dow (-0.2%), S&P 500 (flat), and Nasdaq (unchanged) futures took a breather. Markets cheered the delay in reciprocal tariffs, keeping the S&P 500 near record highs, but upcoming retail sales data and inflation reports will decide the next move.

  • 📈 Asian Markets Ride US Rally – Hang Seng (+3.14%), Shanghai (+0.43%), and KOSPI (+0.31%) climb as US stocks near all-time highs. Nikkei (-0.79%) lags due to a stronger yen.

  • 💼 Sony’s Big Jump – Sony shares surged over 10% after better-than-expected profit forecasts, fueled by PlayStation 5’s strong performance.

  • 📱 TikTok is Back in US App Stores – After nearly a month-long ban, Apple & Google restored TikTok, CapCut & Lemon8 following Trump’s executive order delaying the app’s divestment deadline.

  • 🍚 Japan Releases Emergency Rice StockFacing an 82% price surge, Japan will sell 210,000 tons from its reserves to curb inflation.

  • ☕ Starbucks Expands in the Middle EastPlans to open 500 new stores over the next five years to recover from last year’s consumer boycotts.

  • 👜 Hermes Beats Luxury Slowdown – The Birkin bag maker posted 17.6% revenue growth in Q4, outpacing luxury rivals struggling with slower sales.

🔥 The Big Brew – The Whole Truth Just Got a Whole Lot Richer! 💰🍫

Clean-label snack brand The Whole Truth just raised ₹133.3 Cr in a Series C round, led by Sofina Ventures, Peak XV, Matrix Partners & Sauce.vc, pushing its valuation to ₹2,135 Cr ($254M)—3.6X its previous! That’s some serious protein-powered growth. 💪🏽

🥜 Crunching the Numbers

  • Revenue doubled to ₹70.6 Cr in FY24, while losses shrank by 33%.

  • 80-85% of sales come from its own website—because owning distribution = bigger profits.

  • Now the market leader (41% share), leaving Max Protein & Wellbeing Nutrition playing catch-up.

📌 What Does This Mean?

  • D2C brands are thriving—big valuations are chasing big health trends.

  • The Whole Truth is flexing hard, proving that clean-label snacking = serious business. 🚀

🚀 Startup Scoop

  • 🍫 The Whole Truth’s 3.6X Valuation Surge – Clean-label D2C brand raises ₹133.3 Cr ($15.8M) in Series C, now valued at ₹2,135 Cr ($254M).

  • 💳 GrayQuest Secures ₹80 Cr ($9.3M) – Fintech startup digitizing India’s ₹120B education payments space raises fresh capital to scale.

  • 🍸 Cherrapunji Gin Goes Global – Meghalaya-based Cherrapunji Craft Gin secured $1.2M from Japanese investors. Known for using rainwater from the wettest place on Earth, the brand is expanding globally.

  • 🍹 Lahori’s ₹450 Cr Fundraise – Desi beverage brand Lahori Zeera & Shikanji is raising ₹450 Cr from Motilal Oswal & others, tripling its valuation to ₹2,500 Cr. The brand is scaling fast, now on track to hit ₹550-600 Cr in annual revenue.

🚧 What’s Brewing Next?

  • 🛣️ Delhi-Mumbai Expressway Delayed Again – Gujarat construction slowdowns push completion to 2027 (two years later than expected).

  • 🏆 ICC Champions Trophy 2025 – JioHotstar’s launch is perfectly timed ahead of the cricket tournament starting Feb 19.

  • ⚖️ OpenAI Faces Indian Court Battle – Bollywood music giants vs AI models—hearing set for Feb 21.

🧠 Chai Break Trivia

Fun Fact: The world’s most expensive Birkin bag sold for a jaw-dropping $500,000! Made from Himalayan crocodile leather and encrusted with diamonds, it’s basically the Rolls-Royce of handbags. 💎👜

(Feeling broke yet? Same. 😂)

Donald Duck Disney GIF

That’s it for today’s Masala Chai—the only place where we mix Jio takeovers, AI lawsuits, and Birkin bags like a perfect weekend cocktail. 🍹

Go forth and binge-watch, eat biryani, and pretend Monday doesn’t exist. 😎

And don’t forget—share Masala Chai with your fellow chai lovers ☕📩. See you next time for another piping hot business brew! 🚀

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