TMS Ep534: Car buying spree, China's economy, stockbroker, malaria vaccine

With SUVs leading the charge, car sales in India smashed yet another monthly record in September. Quarterly numbers too have surpassed the previous best. Over 10 lakhs 76 thousand personal vehicles were sold in the second quarter of the ongoing financial year. Clearly, it looks like Indians are on a car buying spree? But why? 

This record car sales also points towards India’s impressive economic growth. But, it seems, the economic juggernaut of neighbouring China is slowing down. Several key markers attest to it. And amid the sluggish recovery of its economy from stringent pandemic lockdowns, China is also involved in some sort of trade war with the West. And China recently barred a Nomura banker from leaving the country. This move raised a lot of questions about the business environment there. So is authoritarianism the cause of China’s economic woes? 

Back home, the retail frenzy in the Indian stock market is at its peak, thanks to the mushrooming discount broking industry. These brokers, who provide only trading services to clients, are cheaper when compared to the traditional brick-and-mortar brokers. As the discount brokers chip away traditional brokers’ client base, how are the old guards planning to fight back? And what are the challenges they may face? 

After the financial markets, let us turn our gaze to a disease which still claims over six lakhs lives on an average every year across the world. WHO recently recommended a cheap malaria vaccine that can be produced on a massive scale and save a lot of lives. The R21/Matrix-M malaria vaccine has been developed by the University of Oxford and the Serum Institute of India. Listen to this episode of the podcast to know more.