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 57 seconds.

Let’s dive in.

What’s hot, what’s not?

Market Commentary

• Most indices remained undecided - no news guiding markets strongly either way. ⚡

• Stocks closed flat/slightly in the green. 💵

• Government bonds sold off ahead of higher interest rate expectations. 🔥

Story Roundup

1 - Adani snaps up a 30% stake in NDTV. 📺

India's richest man's going for a hostile takeover. 

And his target is India's oldest media company. 

NDTV - or New Delhi Television - took a loan in 2009 to help out in the financial crisis. 

They took this loan from one of Mukesh Ambani's companies. 

Adani acquired this company - and in doing so, acquired NDTV's debt. 

When they failed to pay up, Adani took the collateral - which in this case, was 29.2% of equity in NDTV.

Crazy times. 💸

2 - Russia offers steep oil discounts to it's bros. 🤝

Russia's approached Asian countries over long-term oil contracts.

They want to sell oil to their friendlies - at a 30% discount to the market price.

This lets Russia lock in buyers since a lot of their European revenue is gone or sanctioned.

Indonesia's tourism minister said on Instagram that he was approached too - but disagreed.

The reason?

Possible US embargoes. 🔥

3 - Qatari fund to splash $3 billion on Pakistan. 🇵🇰

Qatar wants to run the bill up on Pakistani investments. 

About $3bn is planned to be allocated into renewable energy, hospitality, and power, but I reckon they'll spend it wherever they feel they can.

Qatari support is key as Pakistan edges on a funding crunch, and increased default risk.

Shares in Pakistan Int'l Airlines jumped almost 10% yesterday on news of the hospitality investments.

The PKR has also staged a comeback - gaining 9% this month since dropping to a record low last month.

Comeback season? 🎯

4 - Biden to forgive $10,000 of debt for each student loan. 🎒

Joe Biden's doing something noble - forgiving $10k of debt for each student loan.

Every American earning under $125k is eligible for it.

However, economists are worried - no other number's gonna be more watched than inflation.

Wells Fargo has estimated that this will add another 0.1-0.3% to inflation.

In the grand scheme of things, it isn't a lot.

But when you have a red-hot economy, you don't pour fuel on the fire. 🔥

5 - British businesses feel the heat of an economic slowdown. ⚙️

Life can be hard if you're a small business owner. 

British ministers are warning that it'll get harder.

Commercial energy bills are set to rise fourfold this autumn - as "winter could spell the end of many businesses as we know".

Energy regulators have come up with a plan to reduce the stress on SMEs - including things like tax cuts and some monetary support.

But as with most things in life, the magic is in execution. 🙏

Hope you enjoyed this issue of the Market Munch. If you have any feedback, positive or negative, hit my line at [email protected] or +971 50 708 8469. 

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Cheers. 

- A