Winter has come(technically), we just passed the solstice, which means it’s officially time to eat, drink and be merry…and then hibernate for a bit. You can also use that ugly Christmas sweater outside of work parties. So grab that cup of hot chocolate(or mulled wine) and catch up on everything happening around you
![Funny Birthday Card - "Booster Shot" from CardFool.com](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!K_C8!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa654b405-c880-480d-89d2-b23d1e922219_378x522.jpeg "Funny Birthday Card - "Booster Shot" from CardFool.com")
Omicron: As Omicron continues to spread across the world, POTUS Joe Biden issued a warning to the 1 in 4 American adults still not vaccinated. Also, THE Donald Trump has received a booster shot(and promptly got booed upon revealing that). That’s pretty much a ‘There’s only one way to survive this apocalypse’ statement right there. European nations have started imposing some restrictions, though thankfully no lockdowns. Yet. Thailand has stopped quarantine-free inbound travel and NZ has pushed back the opening of its borders.
In concerning news for Indians, Lancet has published a study that says that the AZ protection weakens after three months. It's important to mention here that the Indian Government has still not authorized a booster shot. This is after majority of at-risk groups completed the 2 doses around June-July, i.e., 6 months ago. If we could, our request to the Indian Govt. would be to authorize a booster shot asap and help protect every Indian. Meanwhile, Israel is preparing to offer a fourth shot to at risk groups, becoming the country of Pfizer’s dreams. All in all, looks like we will be in the grip of some anxiety this holiday season (like the last one then).
No laughing matter : Turns out Juhi Chawla(yes, that one) isn’t alone in fighting 5G deployment. The two largest commercial jet makers, Boeing and Airbus, are worried about the possible affects of next month’s planned 5G rollout. The companies have expressed concern that 5G, which operates on a frequency close to that used by aircraft systems such as radio altimeters, could cause interference. So, the joke is on everyone who had a chuckle when the Delhi High Court had dismissed Ms. Chawla’s original petition and fined her INR 20 Lakh for “wasting the court’s time”. To compound her misery, the hearing had repeatedly been disrupted by unknown persons, who passed comments and sang songs from the actor’s movies.
Marry Older: India is presenting a new legislation in Parliament which seeks to raise the legal age at which women can marry from 18 to 21, bringing it on par with men. PM Modi says it will allow women time to study more. The head of the task force behind the bill, Ms. Jaya Jaitley points out their mandate was to study matters pertaining to age of motherhood, imperatives of lowering MMR (maternal mortality rate), improvement of nutritional levels and the bill is addressing these issues. It also sets aside the notion that the wife needs to be younger than the husband.
Critics argue if 18-year-olds can vote, sign contracts, work, then why should they not decide when to marry? They point out that the reason for high MMR is not the age but excessive blood loss during or immediately after childbirth, a condition also more likely to occur in women who are anemic and suffer from malnutrition. Raising the marriageable age to 18 has not deterred child marriages and there are underlying issues behind marriages at a young age which the bill does not address. We leave the last word to one of our more outspoken MP’s.
Warring Musk: Tesla jumped 7% on Wednesday and back above $1,000 after falling to $900 as Musk said he had disposed of 10% of his Tesla’s holding. His war of words with Sen Elizabeth Warren and trolling of the Crypto crowd continued. Read the story behind the possibly biggest in US history tax payment of $11 Billion tax here.
Can’t Super Size Me: In tragic news for customers of probably the unhealthiest food on the planet, McDonalds will be forced to serve only small servings of their French Fries in Japan. A flooding at the Vancouver port and Covid related snags are to be blamed for this travesty. A large serving of the famous fries packs in a cool 498 calories, maybe loyal patrons can top off their meal with a nice large vanilla milk shake to make up the deficit.
Economy and the Markets
Markets continued to bleed on Monday as the negative sentiment from the Bank of England rate hike and the threat of Omicron variant continued to weigh heavy. Nifty and Sensex had one of the worst days of the year and breached critical technical levels. Short covering helped the markets in the last hour of trade on Monday and it carried forward into Tuesday. The global markets turned green with some buying on dips kicking in. The positive sentiment continued on Wednesday with traders wishing the ‘transitory’ impact of Omicron and the Government resisting lockdowns despite the new wave positively. The broader indices outperformed their larger peers with S&P BSE MidCap rising 1.5% and S&P BSE SmallCap gaining 1.7%.
Sports
No alarms and no surprises : England lost another test in Australia. Their 11th loss in the last 12 matches, and not many are betting against it being 14 in 15 matches. What makes this even worse is the fact that Australia was without their 2 best bowlers, Pat Cummins and Josh Hazelwood. The fanciest named sporting contest in the world, “The Ashes” is not much of a contest right now. England have been out-batted, out-bowled, and out-fielded. If this were a boxing match, the referee would have called it off, but, much to England’s misfortune, it’s not. To know more, or maybe for some schadenfreude, here’s a great piece by Andrew Miller.
Hockey : India beat Pakistan 4-3 to secure Bronze in the Asian Champions Trophy. India had also beaten Pakistan 3-1 in the round robin stages. India had surprisingly lost to Japan in the semis but we reckon a win over Pakistan will be enough to make up.
That’ all we have for this hump day edition. Have a great week everyone !