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- Bit by Bit 26th Jan || Republic Day facts you might not know! || New Disclaimer guidelines by Advertising Standards Council of India & More
Bit by Bit 26th Jan || Republic Day facts you might not know! || New Disclaimer guidelines by Advertising Standards Council of India & More
Good Evening Readers!
Here are:
"5 amazing stories in 5 minutes to make you future ready"
Happy reading!
MARKET UPDATE
NIFTY 50 : ₹17,891.95 (-1.25%)
BSE SENSEX : ₹60,205.06 (-1.27%)
NIFTY BANK : ₹41,647.65 (-2.54%)
USD/INR : ₹81.491 (-0.13%)
BRENTOIL : $86.18 (+0.06%)
MCXGOLD : ₹56,929 (+0.08%)
FII Net Cashflow : - ₹2394 crores
DII Net Cashflow : + ₹1378 crores
(Market Data as of 11:00 PM on 25/01/2022)
ECONOMY
The Story:
The Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI), a self-regulatory group for the advertising sector, has strengthened its criteria for disclaimers used to substantiate, limit, or clarify statements made in commercials. Key enhancements to current criteria include limiting the use of disclaimers in commercials, requiring all disclaimers to be clearly visible by consumers, remaining on screen for more than four seconds, and simplifying headlines where necessary. According to ASCI, strengthening criteria was necessary because 80 percent of customers do not see disclaimers in advertisements. "Overuse of disclaimers makes it difficult for consumers to absorb all of the information in the advertising," said Manisha Kapoor, ASCI's chief executive officer and secretary-general. As a result, she stressed the need of crafting assertions in a way that minimizes the need for qualificatory disclaimers. "Where disclaimers are required, they should be provided in such a way that anyone interested in reading them may do so," Kapoor added.
According to the revised guidelines, the duration and readability of disclaimers in television commercials or other video ads should be clearly readable to consumers, there should not be more than one disclaimer in a single frame in an advertisement, the disclaimer should be limited to two full length lines, and it should remain on screen for more than four seconds for each line. According to the revised criteria, all types of text appearing on screen at any one moment should be counted, including disclaimer messages and any text material in the adverts, regardless of where it appears on screen or if it is repeated in audio.
FMCG
The Story:
HUL last week reported a 16 per cent rise in sales to 149.86 billion rupees ($1.84 billion) in the quarter ended Dec. 31, powered by demand from wealthier urban shoppers. The increase was supported by underlying price growth of 11 per cent. All thanks to its dominant market position and pent-up demand among middle-class shoppers. But industry experts said the British multinational should take care not to alienate poorer rural consumers – which some analysts estimate account for nearly half its revenues in India – after some signs they reined in spending last year as higher inflation took its toll. The nation of 1.4 billion is one of Unilever’s three priority markets, alongside the United States and China. Globally, Unilever has raised its prices faster than its biggest rivals P&G and Nestle since the middle of 2021, partly due to its exposure to emerging market countries and food products – where cost inflation has been high. Unilever said high energy costs and rising input prices hit the industry particularly hard in India.
Industry experts said Unilever’s strategy was to raise prices in categories such as laundry soaps where it is dominant, which helped minimize any negative impact on its market share. In categories like health, food, drinks, they have not taken similar pricing, because that’s a very competitive market. Even when HUL kept prices steady for some products, it has shrunk pack sizes, AICPDF data showed – a tactic used by many consumer goods companies around the world.
AUTOMOTIVE
The Story:
The largest automaker in the nation, Maruti Suzuki India Ltd, exceeded Street expectations to more than double its net profit in the quarter that ended on December 31 to 2,351 crore, compared to 1,011 crores a year earlier. Following the news, shares of the automaker increased by almost 3.3% to close at 8,698.6 on the Bombay Stock Exchange. Analysts polled by Bloomberg had projected Maruti Suzuki's third-quarter net profit at 1,850 crores.
Improved semiconductor supplies, along with sustained demand for passenger vehicles, especially SUV sales, drove up revenue by 25% to ₹27,849.2 crore. Maruti Suzuki sold 465,911 vehicles during the quarter, with domestic sales at 403,929 units and exports at 61,982. But in Q3, a dearth of electrical parts reduced manufacturing by 46,000 vehicles. Despite improvements in chip availability, according to Maruti Suzuki, the supply situation is uncertain and a bottleneck persists.
At the conclusion of the quarter, Maruti Suzuki had around 363,000 pending customer orders, including 119,000 for its new models. It claimed that the majority of its unfulfilled orders are for expensive ones like the Grand Vitara, Ertiga, and Brezza. The company, which commands nearly 41% share of the passenger vehicles market, is down from its peak 52% levels, and is betting on its line-up of bigger cars to fetch it the pole position in the SUV market by FY24.
TECH
The Story
Nearly 50,000 jobs have been lost in the technology sector in the last month alone. Due to the spike in demand for their goods, services, and technology over the past few years as a result of millions of individuals working remotely, both big and small IT companies embarked on a hiring frenzy. The majority of tech companies are still far bigger than they were three years ago, despite all of the layoffs that have been disclosed in recent weeks. Here are a few of the businesses that have thus far disclosed layoffs.
Snap: The parent firm of the social media site Snapchat announced that 20% of its workforce would be laid off. More than 5,600 individuals now work for Snap, and the firm has stated that even after firing more than 1,000 workers, its staff would still be larger than it was a year before.
Twitter: After being acquired by Tesla CEO and billionaire Elon Musk, the social networking platform's 7,500 employees were reduced by about half.
Lyft: The ride-hailing company announced it would lay off over 700 workers, or 13% of its workforce.
Meta: 11,000 individuals were let go by Facebook's parent business, or around 13% of its staff.
Amazon: The e-commerce company announced that it will have to eliminate 18,000 jobs. Just a small portion of the company's 1.5-million-person global workforce.
Microsoft: The software company announced it would eliminate 10,000 positions or nearly 5% of its staff.
Google: The industry's largest search engine company announced that 12,000 employees, or approximately 6% of its staff, would be let go as part of an adjustment.
Anything Interesting
The Story:
It wasn't always Rajpath - Rajpath wasn't the organising venue for the parade from 1950 to 1955. In those five years, it was held at Irwin Stadium (now National Stadium), Kingsway, Red Fort, and Ramleela Maid,an respectively.
Rajpath was Kingsway - It was on 26th January 1955 that Rajpath became the permanent venue for the parade. At that time, Rajpath was known as 'Kingsway'.
The first chief guest was the then President of Indonesia - The tradition of inviting the President or Prime Minister of any country or a foreign leader as chief guest for the parade has continued since 1950. The chief guest for the first-ever parade was Dr Sukarno, the then President of Indonesia was invited.
25 Ponders - The 21 Guns Salute is not done by firing 21 canons. It is actually done by 7 cannons of the Indian Army. They are known as '25 Ponders'
Preparations begin six months before the parade - Yes, the preparations for the grand parade begin in July of the previous year. That's when all the participants are informed formally.
The tableaux move at a speed of around 5 km/hr - Tableaux representing each state cannot move fast. A speed of about 5 km/hr is maintained so everyone present can watch it properly.
Ready by 2 AM - Participants of the parade need to get ready by 2 AM and arrive at Rajpath by 3 AM.
600 hours of practice - All or most of the participants clock over 600 hours of practice before performing on the 26th of January.
'Abide with me' - This is the title of the song that is played at every Republic Day parade event. It was Mahatma Gandhi's favorite song. However, the song was replaced in 2022 with the Hindi song ‘Ae Mere Watan Ke Logon’
