Where’s the V-shaped recovery? https://www.financialexpress.com/opinion/wheres-the-v-shaped-recovery/3368633/ Santosh Mehrotra January 19, 2024
Data on real wages, jobs, savings, consumption, etc, point at a K-shaped rebound
the share of India’s Biggest 5 firms in total assets of the non-financial sectors rose from 10% in 1991 to nearly 18% in 2021, whereas the share of the next Big 5 business groups fell from 18% in 1992 to less than 9% in 2021. This growth has been the biggest in the last decade. “In other words, Big 5 grew not just at the expense of the smallest firms, but also of the next largest firms,” Acharya said.
The Biggest 5 industrial groups referred to in the paper are Mukesh Ambani-helmed Reliance Group, Tata Group, Aditya Birla Group, Adani Group, and Bharti Telecom. He said the growth of such conglomerates raises several concerns, like the risk of crony capitalism, related-party transactions within their byzantine corporate organisation charts and overleveraging due to an implicit too-big-to-fail perception among others. This is what drives government spokesmen to claim the importance of ‘national champions’.