☕️ Grand theft jewellery: RM9.7 mil gold heist in broad daylight in 5 minutes

1. MARKET SUMMARY 📈

2. NUMBERS AT A GLANCE 🔢

USD950 mil (RM3.76 bil) in tourist revenue – The Songkran festival, which is the Thai New Year holiday famous for public water fights, brought in that much in tourism revenue as tourists flocked to Thailand and spent widely across the country, with the government expecting to exceed last year’s revenue. More than 558,000 visitors were recorded at six venues in Bangkok and other central areas alone, and just the capital saw more than 90 events held.

KES1 mil and 12 months’ jail – The stiff sentence was handed down by a Kenyan magistrate against a Chinese man who tried to smuggle live ants out of the country. Ant-trafficking has been on the rise in Kenya, as enthusiasts are willing to pay large sums to maintain ant colonies in large transparent vessels to study them. The Chinese man was arrested last month with more than 2,200 live garden ants in his luggage. This follows four men being fined KES1 mil each last year for the same crime. Btw, KES is Kenyan shilling.

Nine survivors and around 250 missing – A Rohingya survivor shared his story of being packed on a boat with nearly 300 people, which departed from Teknaf, Bangladesh, for Malaysia. Unfortunately, the boat capsized and sank in the Andaman Sea. Rafiqul Islam was one of a handful of survivors who were rescued by a passing Bangladeshi oil vessel. By his estimate, about 30 people suffocated during the journey due to a lack of oxygen, and when the boat capsized, he believed there were still over 200 people on board. Rohingya refugees continue to make such dangerous sea journeys in search of safety and livelihood abroad after fleeing violence in Myanmar. It costs between RM15k to RM30k each for undocumented migrants from Myanmar to be smuggled into Malaysia by human trafficking syndicates.

3. IN MALAYSIA 🇲🇾

RM10 mil gold heist in broad daylight
A jewellery store in Brickfields, Kuala Lumpur, was hit by a brazen daylight robbery, in which armed suspects escaped with gold worth nearly RM9.7 mil. The incident happened around 11am along Jalan Tun Sambanthan, when four men entered the premises and allegedly brandished two pistols, triggering panic inside the store. Within 5 minutes, the group managed to seize 21 trays of gold weighing around 15kg before fleeing the scene. Police also confirmed that a shotgun and a single cartridge belonging to the security guard were reported missing during the incident. The guard was reportedly assaulted during the robbery, which was carried out in a swift, coordinated manner.

A three-minute CCTV recording of the incident later went viral on social media, showing suspects wearing helmets and moving quickly as they committed the theft. The footage has since been used to assist police investigations as authorities work to identify and track down those involved. Kuala Lumpur police chief Fadil Marsus said the case is being investigated under Sections 395 and 397 of the Penal Code, which cover gang robbery and robbery involving deadly weapons, carrying penalties of up to 20 years’ imprisonment and whipping.

Selangor rolls out RM130 mil relief plan
Selangor has unveiled a RM130.42 mil stimulus package aimed at helping households and businesses cope with the impact of the global energy crisis. The Selangor Resilience Enhancement Package will roll out its first phase in June and is designed to address rising living costs, strengthen food supply chains, and support vulnerable groups across the state. Menteri Besar Amirudin Shari said the measures come as the ongoing conflict in West Asia continues to disrupt global supplies of oil, gas, and key materials, with recovery expected to take at least a year even if tensions ease.

Under the plan, RM5 mil will go towards the Jelajah Ehsan Rahmah programme, which will run monthly in each state constituency and is expected to benefit up to 168,000 households. Another RM50 mil has been allocated for the Gudang Makanan Selangor initiative, which will stockpile essentials such as rice and protein to help stabilise prices if import shortages occur. The state is also introducing a RM100 monthly Kita Selangor voucher for six months, targeting 50,000 residents to ease inflation pressure and support low-income groups, with a total allocation of RM30 mil. RM5.4 mil will go towards public transport incentives, including subsidies for Demand Responsive Transit services, buses, and trains. The government said the package aims to provide both immediate relief and longer-term resilience as economic uncertainty continues to build.

Push for victim compensation reform
Malaysia’s Criminal Law Reform Committee is set to study whether crime victims, including those affected by road accidents, should receive formal compensation under a strengthened legal framework. The move is part of wider reforms to the Criminal Procedure Code, with Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Azalina Othman Said confirming that the committee will assess how compensation provisions can be better integrated into the system. She said the review aims to strengthen existing legal structures while ensuring victims have clearer access to financial redress through the courts.

The discussion follows a directive from Attorney-General Mohd Dusuki Mokhtar, who instructed deputy public prosecutors to actively pursue compensation applications for victims, especially in cases involving fatal drink-driving incidents. Under Section 426 of the Criminal Procedure Code, courts are already empowered to order compensation alongside penalties such as fines or imprisonment, with prosecutors required to present relevant factors during proceedings to determine suitable amounts. Azalina noted that while road traffic matters fall under the Transport Ministry, compensation rules are embedded within criminal law provisions.

Golden Destinations IPO hit by war timing
Golden Destinations Group Bhd’s ACE Market debut in Kuala Lumpur on Apr 16 took place against a challenging backdrop, with ongoing Middle East tensions continuing to disrupt global tourism flows. The stock opened at 49 sen, about 8.9% above its IPO price of 45 sen, but quickly lost steam and closed at 40 sen, down 11.11%, with more than 93 mil shares traded. The stock also swung between 40 sen and 49.5 sen during the session, reflecting mixed investor sentiment as geopolitical uncertainty weighed on travel-related counters. The company raised RM135 mil from its IPO, with RM90 mil earmarked for expansion including a new headquarters, technology upgrades, branding, and regional growth, while RM45 mil went to managing director Mita Lim.

Despite the fundraising and expansion plans, the listing was overshadowed by timing concerns as the travel sector continues to feel pressure from route disruptions and shifting travel demand linked to the conflict. The impact is already visible, with around RM9.35 mil in bookings affected and RM2.48 mil in refund requests due to cancellations, rescheduling, and flight delays, particularly on routes to Europe and the Middle East. Management expects the disruption to be temporary as travellers redirect to alternative destinations, but short-term volatility has still weighed on sentiment.

4. AROUND THE WORLD 🌎

Energy mishap, bad timing
Vedanta power plant explosion kills at least 17 in India
A suspected boiler explosion has occurred at a 600-megawatt coal plant operated by India’s Vedanta Ltd in the central Indian state of Chhattisgarh, leaving 17 dead and 36 injured. Authorities said that it was likely caused by overheating in the boiler tube, and the plant’s operations had to be suspended after the blast. The ‌shutdown of the plant comes as India ⁠is poised for a harsher ⁠summer, and as the Indian government delayed the maintenance of nearly ⁠10 gigawatts ⁠of coal plant capacity in the absence of gas supplies due to the Middle East conflict.

Explosions and massive fire erupt at key Australian refinery
In Australia, flames as tall as 60 metres have been seen engulfing the Viva fuel plant in Victoria after a gas leak triggered a chain of explosions at the plant. Viva is a crucial Australian oil refinery and is one of the only two working oil refineries in Australia. Located an hour’s drive southwest of the state capital, Melbourne, Viva pumps out about 10% of Australia’s fuel and is capable of producing up to 120,000 barrels of oil each day. Geographically isolated and with only two oil refineries, Australia is heavily exposed to disruptions in global fuel supply and imports most of its petrol. It holds roughly 38 days’ worth of petrol in reserve, far below the 90-day minimum dictated by the International Energy Agency. Australia is also heavily reliant on oil shipped through the Strait of Hormuz.

Getting paid to train robots, is the 100,000-year robot problem solved?
Apparently, while chatbots and large language models (LLMs) were trained on free data from the internet, there’s no equivalent for robots. Enter Instawork - a platform best known for supplying hourly workers to hotels, warehouses and stadiums - who is now turning gig workers into real-world data generators to cater to the demand for real-world robot training data. The tasks range from the mundane to the downright strange. On some shifts, workers known as “Instawork Pros” have to move a few robots here and there, while others operate robots from remote locations, and even record themselves while working on tasks such as washing dishes or cleaning a room. Instawork recently launched the Instawork Robotics Lab alongside a robotics certification programme that has already reached more than 20,000 Pros in its first few weeks. In May, the company plans to release Instacore, a wearable camera system designed in-house to help gig workers record and label their activities in more detail.

Interestingly, the lack of robot training data is known as the 100,000-year problem, an idea popularised by Ken Goldberg, a UC Berkeley professor and cofounder of Ambi Robotics.

Last year, he estimated that at current data-collection rates, a general-purpose robot, based on a ChatGPT-sized set of robotics data, will be available in 100,000 years. But with Instawork in the picture, it might not be the case anymore. Goldman Sachs forecasts the humanoid robot market could reach USD38 bil (RM150.25 bil) by 2035, and the global data-collection and labelling market is projected to hit USD17 bil by 2030.

Maybe finally we can get a robot that can do our laundry?

Shorts:

1. Malaysian man jailed in Singapore for raping vulnerable woman

   Harvin Velanggany, 24, a Malaysian odd-job worker in Singapore, has been sentenced to 8 years’ jail and 6 strokes of the cane after pleading guilty to one count of rape. The victim, a 32-year-old Filipino, was sexually assaulted by Harvin on May 26, 2024, after she was allegedly sexually assaulted by another accused man from India, Anbazhagan Sivamurugan, a few minutes earlier. Harvin, who was looking for a place to sleep, took advantage of the victim’s vulnerable situation, raped her, then went through the victim’s bag and stole USD93 (RM367.72) in cash before hiding it in his underwear. Utterly disgusting crime.

2. Allbirds goes AI

   A new meme stock is on the block - Allbirds, the once-buzzy maker of wool sneakers that was valued at more than USD4 bil (RM15.82 bil) in its heyday, has announced a new business plan just days before it was set to close down for good: AI computing infrastructure. Its shares rapidly climbed 582% by the time the trading day ended on April 15. The response underscored the intensity of the speculative mania around AI, which has fuelled stampedes into would-be winners and panicked pullbacks from any industry that seems at risk of being undone by the competitive threat.

3. Was grandpa a Nazi?

   A new online tool set up by German newspaper Die Zeit, in cooperation with archives in Germany and the US, is now helping people to discover if their ancestors were members of the Nazi Party. The tool allows people to search through several million Nazi Party membership cards, the “NSDAP-Mitgliederkartei”, and has been “accessed millions of times and shared thousands of times” since it was launched at the beginning of April, according to Die Zeit. One user said that he found two close relatives, which has destroyed the myth that no one in his family was involved. For the record, around 10.2 mil Germans became members of the Nazi Party between 1925 and 1945.

5. FOR YOUR EYES 📺

1. The colours of prison uniforms.

2. The career path of an Ah Long.

3. Monster trucks are coming to Malaysia. Get your tickets here. Now, curious to see if Myvi will survive this.