India Rice Export Ban to Strain Global Food Supplies

MARKET MOVERS

• India’s rice export ban to further strain global food supplies. India banned exports of broken rice and levied a tax on other key varieties. Late Thursday, India’s Directorate of Foreign Trade issued the ban, which came into effect Friday. New Delhi also imposed a 20% export duty on overseas shipments of white and brown rice, which make up about 60% of India’s total global sales. Read more here.

• Burger King unveils $400 million plan to revive U.S. sales. Burger King will spend $400 million over the next two years on advertising and renovating its restaurants as part of a strategy to revive lagging U.S. sales. The chain’s U.S. menu will also get a facelift. The strategy has received support from U.S. franchisees, who will have to chip in as part of the strategy.

• Roblox jumps on the plan to introduce immersive ads in games. Roblox has had lucrative partnerships with the likes of Ralph Lauren, Chipotle, and other top companies to offer users branded games, virtual concerts, and items. But the plan is to go even further, for players to be able to interact with advertisements inside of games, including ones that function as portals, taking gamers to branded zones.

• Robinhood unveils index to track customers’ favored stocks. The brokerage firm’s new “Robinhood Investor Index,” unveiled Friday, is designed to track the performance of the 100 investments most popular among its user base. Such an index could be of interest to financial professionals who monitor the activities of small investors as one of the underlying factors behind stock-market moves. Read more here.

• Intel breaks ground on its $20 billion chip plant. Intel officially broke ground on its new $20 billion semiconductor chipmaking plant in Ohio. Biden attended Intel’s groundbreaking ceremony to make sure midterm voters know the plant is being fueled in large part by the bipartisan CHIPS and Science Act. Intel is expected to employ 7,000 Ohioans to build its facility and 3,000 more to work in the completed factories.
  

WHAT TO WATCH

• Bank of America pushes out its recession call to the first half of 2023. The firm thinks the contraction now looks likely to start later than expected and is still expected to be shallow by historical norms. With the labor market still showing sizeable gains, consumer spending remaining robust and a sharp slide in the trade deficit, Bank of America now sees growth stronger than expected this year and no contraction until the first half of 2023. Read more here.

• Inflation expectations and breakevens are coming down. A cooling labor market should manifest itself as lower vacancies and wage growth are not necessarily higher unemployment. For every recession, unemployment was never below 5.5%. Based on the current data, it's going to get really difficult to get to that 5.5% because there are a lot of job openings, more non-job seekers, and the underemployed. Source(39:22)

• Amazon plans job cuts in health-care business after shuttering telehealth service. Amazon is preparing to cut jobs from its Amazon Care organization after announcing it will shutter the telehealth service at the end of this year. About 159 Amazon Care employees will be laid off, while a standalone company that provided services for Amazon Care will cut 236 roles.

• All advertising and marketing will get replaced by content creation, says David Friedberg. Content creation direct to consumers through social media platforms becomes the mechanism by which people are aware of and buy goods and services. Influential business owners like Kim Kardashian and Rihanna are killing legacy brands like Revlon. One tweet or post from an influential business owner is more powerful than any paid promotion. Source(56:06)

• G-7 looks to recruit more countries on the Russian oil cap before negotiating details. The countries aim to restrict the amount of revenue the Kremlin receives, but keep Russian oil on the market to avoid supply disruptions. A senior White House official said the Biden administration expects the price cap to go into effect by the end of the year. Source.