5 days Ago
Happy Monday! The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has narrowed its probe’s focus on ecommerce firms. This and more in today’s ETtech Morning Dispatch. Also in the letter: ■ AI domain trade ■ Ethics code for AI firms ■ X monetisation challenges ED shifts focus to Amazon and Flipkart ties with sellers The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has shifted the focus of its ecommerce probe to whether arrangements between Amazon and Flipkart and their vendors violated foreign direct investment (FDI) norms, sources told us.
What’s happening: The investigation had earlier focused on the sellers as the aim was to find out if ecommerce companies were exercising control over vendors. Under the FDI rules, these companies can only act as marketplaces. The issue dates back to 2019.
Catch up quick: Earlier this month, the ED had conducted nationwide searches at 19 sites related to large sellers on Amazon and Flipkart in Delhi, Bengaluru, and Hyderabad after it found certain actionable material. While the sellers were covered in the first leg, the next one will be concentrated on the ecommerce giants. Yes, but: Company executives denied any wrongdoing and told us that they had explained their stand to the authorities on earlier occasions as well.
“The FDI norms are very stringent, and now, with most of the transactions having a digital footprint, it is impossible to violate the FDI norms,” said one of them. Also Read: Piyush Goyal flays Amazon, unchecked ecommerce Stock market set to plateau after euphoria of last four years: Zerodha’s Nithin Kamath The Indian stock market is headed towards a growth plateau , and the euphoria of the last four years might go missing for the next one to two years, said Nithin Kamath, chief executive officer, Zerodha, during an interaction with ET. On market performance: Zerodha’s growth typically reflects the movement of the stock markets.
In the next one to two years, the euphoria in the market will be missing. Hence, the growth projections for the firm are also muted. Kamath is expecting a 30-50% hit on the revenues because of Sebi’s stricter rules on futures and options (F&O) trading.
On the flood of IPOs: It is a great move to see new generation companies hitting the public markets. What is important is that consumers get to see companies they interact with on a day-to-day basis go public, which will get them to participate in the markets too. However, he wondered how long markets will continue to appreciate the focus on ‘growth over the bottomline’ model of startups.
Competition in the space: Facing severe competition from fellow discount brokers, Zerodha has removed all account opening charges , which has helped boost the new account opening numbers by 20%. Overall, Kamath said that competition will bring in new products and features, which will eventually help expand the market, and which is good for the larger ecosystem. Also Read: Groww extends lead over Zerodha, adds a million active traders in December quarter AI website domain trade rakes in big bucks When OpenAI CEO Sam Altman tweeted 'chat.
com' last week, Dharmesh Shah, cofounder & CTO of HubSpot, hinted in a post that he had sold the domain to OpenAI for over $15 million in exchange for shares in the company. Driving the news: With artificial intelligence (AI) applications on the rise – domain investing is turning lucrative again – .ai domains are now the third-largest category, with sales of $9.
2 million year-to-date, as per Namebio data. This is just behind .org at $9.
4 million but far behind .com, which sold $120.2 million in 2024.
Domain surge: Registrars like GoDaddy allow investors to buy, sell, or auction domains that have a high probability of being acquired for a substantial value. “Starting in late 2022, GoDaddy saw a notable increase in the number of .ai domain name registrations as a company - a trend that spiked in May of 2023 and continues to drive strong interest,” the company said.
Legal matter: The practice of cybersquatting, widely prevalent during the early days of the internet, doesn’t necessarily work as well now. A Delhi-based developer who owned the 'jiohotstar' domain had sought Rs 1 crore from Reliance Industries to fund his higher studies. Given that Jio and Hotstar are already trademarks of two unique entities, Reliance declined the offer.
Other Top Stories By Our Reporters MeitY readying voluntary ethics code for AI firms: The government is working on a set of voluntary codes of conduct and ethics for companies to follow for the work they do with AI or generative AI, sources told ET. X faces challenges in influencer-led monetisation push in Indian market: Following Elon Musk’s $44-billion acquisition of microblogging platform Twitter in 2022 and its subsequent rebrand to X in 2023, the social media site has taken multiple steps to promote influencers to drive content-led engagement. However, in India, digital marketing executives say there’s still a lot to be desired.
Building India's 'iPhone city': Lessons from Zhengzhou's transformation: The rapid transformation of Zhengzhou, the capital of China’s Henan province, into ‘iPhone City’ underlines the challenges and opportunities that India faces in its pursuit of becoming a global electronics manufacturing base. Global Picks We Are Reading ■ Tech investor Xavier Niel urges Europe’s AI start-ups not to cash out ( FT ) ■ The great American microchip mobilisation ( Wired ) ■ How this grassroots effort could make AI voice more diverse ( MIT Technology Review ).
