One up and one down, the qualifying competition between India and Hong Kong** lasted for a long time.
The Hang Seng Index continued**, and the overall market value of Hong Kong-listed companies shrank severely. In early December, the market capitalization of companies listed on the India** exchange reached $4 trillion for the first time. India's major indices have hit record highs for nine of the past decade.
If you stretch out the long timeline, you will find that there are so many stories in India, where frenzy and danger coexist, expectations and despair are intertwined, and the extreme attitude and way of pursuing wealth are not limited to this moment.
* With oligarchs. 
On May 20, 1985, the Cooperage Stadium in Mumbai was crowded. People came from far and wide to attend Reliance's annual shareholder meeting. Simple under the awning, 120,000 people sat on the grass and listened to Dhirubhai Ambani's sermon from afar. He was India's most famous self-made entrepreneur of the 20th century, starting with a Shell petrol station in Yemen and building an almost ubiquitous manufacturing empire. "This is the largest annual general meeting of companies in the world," and "my investors are my biggest bankers," said Ambani Sr.
The Evil Character of the First Pot of Gold in Old Ambani: In the port of Aden, Yemen, a young petrol station worker discovers that the face value of local coins is lower than the value of its material, silverHe bought all the coins he could, melted them, and pocketed the difference.
I don't believe in not taking chances. ”
Ambani Sr. returned to India with the money and started a yarn company in 1959. By the end of the 90s, he had built an integrated empire that went from textiles to petrochemicals and oil, and then diversified into telecommunications, power, finance, and biotechnology.
The extraordinary excitement of the 1985 shareholders' meeting stemmed from the history of Fidelity. Ambani Sr. portrayed himself as an East populist who, when the company went public in 1977, used cheap to attract poorer investors. Reliance gathered so many minority shareholders to hold an AGM in Mumbai and was also the first demonstration of superpower in the history of India's capital markets.
In the stadium in 1985, the elder Ambani wore a suit and reported a 58% increase in the company's net profit for the previous year6% and lists the next various new project expenditures. Ambani Sr.'s success has been accompanied by various controversies, such as being accused of using fake companies to buy companies below market price in the 80s**;In the 90s, accused of issuing and trading false, duplicate **;Three executives are accused of possessing sensitive ** documents on privatizations.
But none of this has stopped India** from treating the old Ambani as a hero.
In 1991, after the liberalization of India's economy, Reliance grew stronger with its industrial network, established globally competitive production bases, and almost single-handedly popularized the joint-stock system in India: two holding companies, Reliance Industries and Reliance Petroleum, together have 3.5 million shareholders.
By the year of Ambani's death in 2002, Reliance's revenue reached $12.2 billion and its net profit was 9$500 million. He left a group with a market capitalization of more than $55 billion, equivalent to 1 10 of India's ** value, to his two sons, Mukesh and Anil. The former went on to become India's richest man for many years, the wealthy father who owned a 27-storey mansion in Mumbai and spent $100 million to celebrate his daughter's wedding.
The tradition of a super-boisterous shareholder meeting has also been carried on by the Ambani family, with more than 2,000 shareholders coming to Mumbai every year to applaud and cheer Mukesh as he reads out his achievements. The portrait of the elder Ambani in the wreath watches all the noise.
India** tasted the sweetness here in old Ambani, but unfortunately the rise of India** did not continue in a linear way, and the excited ** felt the cruelty of ** soon after.
Huge deception and corruption.
One of the culprits is the broker Harshadmehta.
After India opened up in 1991, there was a wave of reform. Correspondingly, India boomed, with the number of investors on the Bombay Stock Exchange soaring from 9 million in 1989 to 16 million at the beginning of 1992, and the stock index hitting 4,500 points in March 1992. Excited investors are keen to make quick money, unbeknownst to it, that part of the reason for the boom is that the Mehta have achieved it by manipulating the stock price.
At that time, Indian banks were under pressure to maintain profitability, and as a matter of policy, banks were prohibited from participating in the market and could not enjoy the benefits of take-off. Mehta and some of his peers obtained hundreds of millions of dollars in loans from banks in the form of unsecured loans through forged documents and bribes, and misappropriated the funds for trading on the Mumbai** Exchange. Meta and the brothers embezzled millions of shares in 90 companies**, up 12$800 million in fraud.
The whistleblower was journalist Sucheta Daral, who was amazed by Mehta's extravagant lifestyle, when Mehta owned a fleet of vehicles, including Lexus, which was too rare in India in the early 90s. After the investigation, Dalal published an article in April 1992 exposing Mitian**. Later official reports said that several banks had about $1.2 billion off their books. An Indian bank was forced to liquidate, the chairman of a bank committed suicide, and some executives of banks and investment companies** were fired.
The net value of the *involved** was even higher than the combined budget for health and education in India at that time. The scandal wiped out 1 4 of the total market capitalization of companies listed on the Mumbai** Exchange, and the market was closed for a month;A large number of ** investors lost their money in the crash;A cabinet minister resigned. An aide to the Prime Minister** was accused of accepting a $100,000 bribe from Meta. Mehta also claimed to have bribed the then Prime Minister of India.
Mehta was saddled with hundreds of criminal proceedings, sentenced to five years in prison, and found not guilty by some judges. On December 31, 1999, Mehta died suddenly in prison due to cardiac arrest while in custody at the age of 48.
A few years later, there is another theory: the reason why Meta has to take responsibility for Mi Tian** is that there are more powerful players who want to withdraw;Meta only exploited the system's loopholes, and another faction profited from the stock price crash, and the female reporter's revelations were suspected to be part of it.
There was more than one absurd thing in those days. In the 90s, India** caused countless investors to lose a lot due to lax regulation. After the opening of the financial market, thousands of companies raised funds in **, and some of them simply disappeared after raising funds.
Until 2009, India** filed a lawsuit against a number of companies that disappeared into thin air, all of which went public in the 90s and then disappeared because they could not meet the regulatory disclosure rules, with as many as 121 companies. India's Securities and Exchange Board of India banned 100 companies and 378 directors from investing in capital markets for five years.
Take off and fall.
After 2000, a gradually regulated and ambitious Indian capital market emerged.
Mumbai's geographical location and time zone are complementary to the United States, Europe, and Hong Kong, and there is the possibility of upgrading its financial status. Mumbai is also one of the best performing emerging markets, benefiting both from global liquidity and from the market's optimism about India's economic growth prospects.
2005 was a year of emerging market rise, with Russia accounting for 80% and Brazil and Mexico for 466% and 442%, South Korea and Turkey both rose close to 52%, and India *** 36%. Mumbai's capital markets are maturing, with a regulatory and operational framework in place and momentum to become a regional financial centre.
The world's top financial institutions, banks, and capital poured into Mumbai like a tidal wave. In 2005, a record 108$900 million, pushing India's main stock index, the Bombay 30 Index (Sensex 30), up 42%. In February 2006, the index crossed the 10,000-point mark for the first time, and investors believed that India's revival was just around the corner. In his March 2006 speech, Singh hinted at the need for the rupee to be fully convertible, much to the excitement of the financial industry.
In 2006, India** had a market capitalization of about $660 billion and an average daily turnover of $12 billionIt is hoped that in three to five years, the market capitalization will exceed the $1 trillion mark, with an average daily turnover of $50 billion.
Foreign investors are buying into India**, and reform-minded Finance Minister Chidambaram has encouraged people to "invest wisely". India's ** has entered again, further driving ** to soar. In December 2007, the Bombay 30 index closed above 20,000 points. In the same year, Reliance Industries' share price doubled, and the elder Ambani's eldest son, Mukesh Ambani, became India's richest man and became one of the 10 richest people in the world.
In February 2006, the Bombay 30 index reached 10,000 points;In December 2007, 20,000 points were realized. The U.S. interest rate cut and foreign investors' ** made the market happy.
There are also economists who warn investors not to be careless, because India's dependence on hot money is too obvious. India** has been exposed to the cycle of global capital markets since 1995, relying on global venture capital rather than domestic funding;Relative to the volatility of corporate earnings, India** is much more volatile.
The crisis has finally come. When the Federal Reserve began to exit low interest rates after the 2008 financial crisis, investors who had flocked to India** and witnessed double-digit growth over the past few years left the market for fear of rising inflation and a weaker exchange rate. The rupee has reached a new low against the US dollar**, pushing India to the brink of a financial crisis.
In February 2008, the main index of the Bombay Exchange fell by 12% in five days**, and the Indian authorities were considered to be unresponsive in the global financial crisis. In just over half a year to August 2008, foreign investors withdrew a net $1 billion from India***.
During the five-year bull market from 2002 to 2007, there were many analysts who believed that emerging markets had matured, learning from the Latin American debt crisis of the 80s and the Asian financial crisis of 1997, but the abrupt end of the bull market undermined this view. In July-August 2007, when mature markets first encountered difficulties, emerging markets were still making great strides;But in October, Hong Kong** peaked, India peaked in January 2008, and Brazil and Russia** peaked in May 2008.
From the Reserve Bank of India's interest rate cut in 2004 to boost the economy, to January 2008, when India** plummeted from its peak, the aura of India's bull market faded. For the average investor, a large sum of paper wealth was blown away in a storm**.
It's hard to ride a tiger. 
The Indian version of Enron also emerged in the storm of **.
In January 2009, B. Ramaringa Raja, founder of Satyam, India's fourth-largest software companyRamalingaraju) wrote a letter to the board of directors admitting to manipulating the company's accounts and defrauding more than $1 billion. The company was the first Indian sponsor and IT service provider for the 2010 and 2014 FIFA World Cups.
In the letter, Raja wrote:"It's like riding on a tiger and not knowing when to come down and not be eaten. ”
He said the fraud began as an inflated profit to cover up poor quarterly results. When the value collapsed with India, the lenders began liquidating the family shares, liquidating the collateral, forcing the Raja to admit fraud. After that, he lost control of the company and "handed himself over to the laws of the state."
This is the worst case of financial fraud that has occurred in India since the 90s. The scandal caused the main stock index of India's Bombay Stock Exchange to fall by 7%, and Satyam's share price fell by nearly 80%. Two weeks after the scandal was exposed, India **cumulatively** 15%.
Investors' fears are heightened by the Satyam fraud case, which is already family-owned by 17 of the 30 constituents of India's major stock indexes that are already vulnerable to questionable performance.
A 108-page report by the Indian Exchange Commission revealed that over a period of about five years, starting in 2003, Satyam issued 7,561 fake invoices to inflate revenuesEven the number of employees is fake, which is exaggerated by 130,000 people;Accounting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers failed to detect fraud of up to $1.7 billion and was fined a two-year ban on auditing India-listed companies.
The battered Satyam was given to his peers, and later the company's brand was abandoned. Raja, the initiator, was sentenced to seven years in prison in 2015 and was one of four executives convicted of fraud, but just a month later, Raja was released on bail by the special court.
In 2020, Netflix released the documentary series "Bad Boy Billionaires", starring four notorious rich people in India about their greed, fraud, and corruption, with Raja being one of them. The protagonists have repeatedly filed lawsuits to prevent the release of the documentary, but three of the episodes have already aired, except for the one belonging to Raja, which has not yet been released.
Fanatical young man.
From 2009 to 2012, India's economy, currency and ** experienced some struggles, with few IPOs and conservative international funds concentrated on a few blue chips. The investors who have poured into India remain in a strange state – everyone is betting that the economy here will recover and take off, but no one has provided a lot of money to help make it happen.
Until Modi's election ignited the expectations of capital. India was the world's 10th largest economy when Modi began his first premiership in 2014 and grew by 40 percent in the seven years since, second only to China among large economiesIt has about 100 unicorns, second only to the United States and China.
In the spring of 2020, India opened a historic and a new investment revolution arrived.
The popularity of the Internet and smartphones has contributed to this. In 2017, 300 million people in India owned smartphones, which doubled to more than 700 million in 2022 and is expected to reach 900 million active internet users by 2025.
Zerodha is India's largest brokerage, where novice investors bet on technology, financial, and industrial companies. At the end of 2021, data provided by Kamath, founder of Zerodha, showed that its customer base had more than tripled in just 20 months, from 2 million to nearly 8 million, with daily trading volume accounting for about 10%-15% of India**The most notable change is that 3 to 4 new customers are under the age of 30.
The young ** did not experience the trauma of the 90s and 2008. In 2021, India's NIFTY50 and Mumbai 30** both surpassed 20%. In the same year, the enthusiasm of young people was palpable in the IPO of the parent company of the digital payment platform Paytm, which raised $2.5 billionIt became the largest offering in Indian history, valuing the company at over US$20 billion.
There are two types of Indian technology companies, one is to provide various support services to international companies, such as Infosys, Tata Consultancy, etc.;One is the local version of overseas technology companies, such as the Indian version of Alipay Paytm, the Indian version of Amazon Flipkart, and the Indian version of Uber called OLA. Investors believe that if a business model makes money in other countries, it can also be done in India.
Non-technology companies will also benefit. In November 2023, Celloworld, a 61-year-old medium-sized company that produces lunch boxes, kitchenware, and household items, went public, and it's hard to say what imagination there is in these products. Even so, it was about 40 times oversubscribed, and its shares soared 29% on its first day of trading, giving it a market capitalization of more than $2 billion, almost 60 times its net profit in the previous fiscal year.
Cello World does not have 2$300 million is planned for a larger investment, and the money will go back to the family, who own 81% of the shares. Perhaps the only logic that makes sense is that investors are valuing the rise of India's middle class and the demand for kitchen and home products has exploded. Cello World's plastic, glass and porcelain products have grown by 70% in the last two years, reaching a revenue of about 2$200 million.
In addition to creating more of the new wealthy, the biggest event in India in 2023 took place at the Adani Group.
This is one of the largest conglomerates in India, with a combined market capitalization that has soared by 2,500% in five years. Modi's close friends are Gautam Adani, both born in Gujarat, where Modi's political career took off and Adani built a business empire with industries ranging from electricity to ports to food. At its peak, Adani's companies together accounted for 6% of the market capitalization of India's two major exchanges.
In early 2023, a report by Hindenburg Research, a small New York-based institution, accused the Adani Group of decades of "unbridled manipulation and accounting fraud." The market value of the group's nine publicly traded companies has evaporated by more than $150 billion. Adani defended himself wrapped up in nationalism, calling the report a "deliberate attack on India."
After nearly a year, the share price of Adani's flagship company, Adani Enterprises, is still the best, but the share price of power and port companies has recovered a lot. The Adani Group recouped some of its market value losses after repaying some of its debts. So far, the regulator's investigation has yielded nothing.
In the longer time frame, the role of this short-selling event in the trajectory of India** is unknown.