The tiny Central American nation of El Salvador has embarked on an interesting experiment by recognising bitcoin as legal tender. This is proving painful for many of its citizens but it's a useful "pilot" project for larger economies that are contemplating the peculiarities of this new asset class. El Salvador has a population of 6.5 million and GDP of about $27 billion.
The hospitality sector has been hit very hard by the pandemic. In the past 18 months, it has lost business, first because of the harsh lockdowns and after that because of lack of demand due to the ensuing economic slowdown. Most hospitality businesses have sustained low revenues and losses since April 2020. Is this the classic case of a beaten-down cyclical sector that may be close to bottoming out?
The OF saga has led to sex-workers looking at cryptocurrency as an alternative, notes Devangshu Datta.
Starting with the third quarter of financial year 2020-21 (Q3FY21), we have seen "unlock" trades at various times. Whenever lockdowns have been eased, traders have taken long positions in consumer-facing businesses. Let's look at the logic. Since March 2020, sectors like retail, personal vehicles, hospitality, aviation, fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG), multiplexes, etc., have been under severe pressure. As a result, there's been a low base effect. Every company in these spaces has suffered top line contraction. Many suffered losses, especially in the first half of FY21.
The pandemic has changed the way people see the government. It has eroded trust in the administration's ability to tackle a crisis, any crisis, observes Devangshu Datta.
The laggards include FMCG (16 per cent), Energy (37 per cent) and Media (34 per cent).
Given the costs, you would need to be a high-value target for a government agency to spend this sort of money, points out Devangshu Datta.
Twitter can probably afford to wait it out. But would it have the moral courage to do so? asks Devangshu Datta.
Only the government has the capacity to collate all death data across all facilities and count corpses dumped in rivers. And the government is patently not interested in finding out, observes Devangshu Datta.
'It is no accident that politicians strive to control sports bodies, and get their names associated with popular sports, sometimes by renaming stadiums after themselves,' observes Devangshu Datta.
Projections suggest online food delivery market should grow to $22 billion by 2025.
Developers grappling with labour shortage and getting construction material to sites could be among a list of problems.
Here are seven jargons you may often come across when discussing the Covid-19 pandemic that Devangshu Datta makes sense of.
'In India, there's currently evidence the Centre has not managed a smooth vaccine rollout.' 'It is now falling back on blaming states, which are facing vaccine shortages,' points out Devangshu Datta.
The costs of providing free vaccines are way lower than the costs of a freewheeling epidemic.
Welcome to Non-Fungible Tokens (NFT) - digital constructs authenticated using an abstract mathematical application. An NFT is a unique token added to some digital construct and registered on a blockchain with details of ownership. The construct itself might be free (it often is) but the NFT along with the construct is worth "more". The NFT market didn't exist until 2017 when "cryptokitties", or virtual cats, became available with NFTs. The market is now worth around $350 million. Speculators believe it is likely to be worth much more in future.
Given the dimensions, it is bound to have at least ripple effects across markets. Could ripple turn into cascade? asks Devangshu Datta.
Indians supposedly have the right to freedom, and the right to equality, which cuts across gender, religion, sexual orientation, etc, observes Devangshu Datta.
Use a "virtual credit card" for every online transaction when you can't pay cash on delivery.
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