Happy morning, Munchers! 🙏

As always, here is your daily dose of the news that matters, from Wall Street to Dalal Street - in 4 minutes and 53 seconds.

Yesterday, Adani baba fastened his seatbelt, Goldman Sachs admitted to job cuts coming late, and Ineos got a petrochem plant running. 🔥

Let’s dive in.

What’s hot, what’s not?

Market Commentary

• Traders are betting that Putin has lost the energy war and bets on higher gas prices seem to be vanishing. Europe has weaned itself of Russian gas after receiving the short end of the stick, and they are unlikely to go back. Once bitten, twice shy.

• American markets also saw their worst week in about a month, so stocks rose slightly to pare back some of those losses.

• European investors didn't enjoy the day, and markets remained muted as people remained confused over monetary policy outlook.

Story Roundup

1 - Adani slashes their growth targets in half. 🔪

India's crown jewel is showing a few cracks.

Adani baba has halved revenue targets and is getting ready to scale down their capital expenditure.

They're gonna shoot for 20% top-line growth next year instead of the 40% expected previously - this means that profits are gonna be smaller too.

Adani's bank account is also gonna get boarded up, and they won't be able to splash cash as freely as before.

Their biggest priority is their financial health and not their stock price.

And that's a much-needed pivot, because their credit card is on life support.

Adani and co are levered to the tips of their noses, so cash is always welcome.

Fingers crossed... 🤞

2 - Goldman Sachs admits to doing too little, too late. ⌛

Turns out that running the world's largest investment bank and DJing on weekends is a little tough on the mind.

Goldman's CEO David Solomon told partners that he made a mistake by not cutting jobs sooner.

At a GS partner meet in Miami, he told folks that he took responsibility for being slow in job cuts and roll-backs in spend.

It's now pretty apparent that things are tough, and Goldman is now gonna pare back even more investment in new projects.

Recent job cuts have been their most aggressive cost-cutting exercises in history, and it looks like that action would have been less drastic if done earlier.

Back to the turntable, I guess. 💿

3 - Ineos bucks the energy crisis to open a pricey petrochem plant. 🏭

Britain's richest man runs a company called Ineos - and Ineos generates tons of energy.

Their business has been thrown into jeopardy for a while now, because of how many unforeseeable things hit global economies.

Europe particularly was knee-deep in hot water - but that doesn't faze the big boys.

Ineos will be spending €3.5bn on a fresh petrochemical plant.

This is not just your normal investment - it's a €3.5bn sized vote of confidence in the renewal of the European energy industry.

The plant's gonna turn ethane (a byproduct of making nat-gas) into ethylene (a super-useful tool in making everything from food wrappers to insulation).

Oh, and it'll be "green".

Way to go for corporations to wash their sins away... 😂

4 - China's EV future seems brilliantly bright. ⚡

VC funding is slowing all across the world, and even more so in China.

But one young cowboy is bucking this trend and making waves in the electric vehicle space.

2-year old luxury EV startup Zeekr just picked up $750mn in funding at a mammoth $13bn valuation.

They were a baby of the post-COVID wave of EV companies, but they're one of the handful that survived.

Zeekr will be splashing this cash into a larger global footprint - since diversification and distribution are king in the EV game.

They want to take it to the big boys, and do it in style.

Electrifying. 🔋

5 - British bars go up in smoke. 🍻

If you want a newer, spicier recession indicator, here you go!

Pub and bar closures in the UK just hit their highest level in over a decade.

And it's probably gonna get worse.

The UK govt's £18bn support package to businesses is gonna taper away in March, so local pubs are gonna have one less crutch to lean on.

Your local tavern has likely been suffering from sky-high energy, labour, and food costs - all of which weigh on their bottom line.

As they say... breathe air, drink water, and find God. 😴

Hope you enjoyed this issue of the Market Munch. If you've got any feedback - good or bad (😏) you can hit reply to this email. Thanks a ton for reading!

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Cheers, and have a lovely day. 🙏

Aryaansh