☕️ IGP: Children rescued believed to be children of GISB members

1. MARKET SUMMARY 📈

The European Central Bank (ECB) cut interest rates for the second time this year by 25 bps to 3.5% as inflation in the Eurozone moderates and shows signs of economic weakness.

2. NUMBERS AT A GLANCE 🔢

As of July, there are 159,781 unresolved bankruptcy cases in Malaysia, according to the Malaysian Department of Insolvency (MDI). MDI Director-General M. Bakri Abd Majid stated that delays are largely due to individuals not submitting required documents, such as lists of liabilities and statutory forms. When assessing discharge applications, MDI considers factors like the applicant's cooperation, the percentage of dividends payable, and their attitude during the case. Proper documentation and compliance are crucial for resolving these cases efficiently. A person can be declared bankrupt if they can't pay debts of RM100,000 or more, and creditors start bankruptcy proceedings in the High Court.

For the first time, a bar of gold is valued at over USD1 mil, following a surge in gold’s spot price, surpassing USD2,500 per troy ounce. Standard gold bars typically weigh about 400 troy ounces, putting their worth above the million-dollar mark. However, variations exist, as bars can weigh between 350 and 430 ounces, according to the London Bullion Market Association.

Cruise holidays are making a strong comeback, with 35.7 mil passengers expected in 2024, up 6% from 2019. Cruise operators are luring new customers through themed trips. Themes range from TV shows like Star Trek and Golden Girls to music-centric voyages with bands such as the Beach Boys and KISS. There's also a diverse range of options for specific interests, including wrestling, motorcycling, and religious groups. Additionally, cruises catering to adults seeking more risqué experiences are also available.

3. IN MALAYSIA 🇲🇾

Mass child sexual abuse case update
Following the rescue of the 402 children (201 boys, 201 girls) from the 18 care homes linked to Global Ikhwan Services and Business Holdings (GISB), IGP Razarudin Husain said the children are now placed at the Police Training Centre where they will be interviewed with special care over the next 2 weeks. The children, aged between 1 and 17, allegedly were sodomised and forced to do the same to others and the IGP said this was only the tip of the iceberg - this alone is horrifying enough, and gets worse - and added that from their investigations, the children rescued are all believed to be the children of GISB members.

GISB strongly denied these allegations, saying that they are “an Islamic organisation, of course, there will not be any such (sexual) actions”, according to its deputy director Mokhtar Tajudin. If history is anything to go by, the more agama ditunggang, the higher the likelihood of such incidents regardless of which religion. 

Some background, especially its financials, on GISB: in a piece published by The Malaysian Reserve less than a month ago, the Muslim conglomerate was founded in 2010, has assets totalling RM325 mil and annual revenue of RM187 mil, rivalling that of many public-listed companies. Its businesses can be considered global as it has a network of 45 business outlets across 20 countries in Asia, Europe, Africa and Australasia — read more here. 

This news is making headlines globally. 

Sabah, Sarawak given an additional RM300 mil reason each annually to smile
Whilst the Malaysia Agreement 1963 (MA63) negotiation is still ongoing, PM Anwar has agreed to double the RM300 mil interim payment pending the 40% revenue entitlement resolution to Sabah and Sarawak with each getting RM600 mil starting 2025. PM Anwar, together with DPM Fadillah Yusof, attended the MA63 implementation action council meeting which was held for the first time in Kota Kinabalu. In the case of Sabah, the first grant introduced in 1970 amounted to RM26.7 mil annually under the Sabah Special Grant (First Review) Order 1970, which was increased to RM125.6 mil in 2022, and subsequently to RM300 mil in 2023. 

DPM Fadillah said so far, 11 demands under the MA63 has been resolved (view resolved matter here). Some unresolved matters, which require further high-level discussion including the return of continental shelf, royalties and stamp duty.
Learn: What is MA63 and why is it important to Sabah and Sarawak?

Whilst we are in East Malaysia, Peninsular is exporting its politics to Sabah — UMNO has decided to join forces and collaborate with Pakatan Harapan in the upcoming Sabah state election, which must be held by 9 Dec 2025. 

Malaysia’s RM1 tril fund management industry
According to the Securities Commission, the fund management industry has surpassed the trillion-ringgit benchmark since February given a robust equity market, according to Salmah Bee Mohd Mydin, the executive director of SC’s market development, during her keynote speech at the Federation of Investment Managers Malaysia (FIMM) Conference 2024. Since 2013, assets under management (AUM) have grown steadily by more than 65% from RM588.4 bil to RM975.5 bil in 2023. The same period saw the industry’s investment being more diversified across various asset classes and geographically. In 2023, about one-third (RM351 bil) of industry AUM were invested abroad. Now it makes us wonder, how much of this investment outflow contributed to our shrinkgit. 

The driving force behind the industry’s growth is the unit trust (UT) industry, accounting for slightly more than half of its AUM. As of 2024, UT AUM amounts to RM545 bil with a total of 26 mil accounts. For UT in 2023, about 27% of its AUM was invested abroad, representing a 2.5x increase compared to 2017. Apart from UT, other fund management activities include wholesale funds, exchange-traded funds (ETF), private pension funds, private retirement schemes and others - more stats here on investor type and here on asset classes. Interestingly, charitable organisations had RM1.02 bil invested in 2023. 

Shorts

1. PAS Youth grand idea to win non-Malay votes - marriage

   At its 65th muktamar (aka conference), Selangor PAS Youth Secretary Aubidullah Fahim proposed that its leaders in its youth wing “commit cross-ethnic or cross-cultural marriage” to win more votes on a mass scale. UMNO Sec-Gen Asyraf Wajdi Dusuki slammed the suggestion, saying that marriage in Islam is a sacred union and should not be used as a tool for political gain. 

2. Albaba’s Taobao now available in English
   Shopping on Taobao is now no longer limited to Type-M (Mandarin, that is), shoppers. Long a haven for cheap shopping, Taobao was only available in Chinese. The site’s translation is powered by AI, with customer support also available in English. To celebrate this launch, Taobao is offering several vouchers including a platform-wide shopping voucher of RMB20 (RM12.17) and free returns within 15 days. Check out the site here.

3. MAS flight disruption ain’t our fault - SIAEC
   SIA Engineering Co Ltd, the maintenance,repair and overhaul arm of Singapore Airlines pushed back against blame thrown at it by opposition politicians that Malaysia Airlines’ recent surge in flight disruption is due to them poaching engineers from MAS’ engineering arm MAB Engineering Services, which saw 63 of 411 engineers departing. SIAEC said technical staff hired from MAB was through an open recruitment process (i.e. job fairs, portals, Linkedin). SIAEC currently employs 150 technical staff, where more than 20% are trainees from training programmes tied to Malaysian higher learning institutions.

4. AROUND THE WORLD 🌎

Israel bombs a UN school in Central Gaza, killing 6 UN workers and more civilians
Israel has made a fifth strike on the Al-Jaouni school in Nuseirat, home to 12,000 displaced Palestinians taking refuge from the bombardment. The attack killed at least 18 people, including 6 staff members of the United Nations Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA). It was the deadliest for the UNRWA staff since the beginning of the attacks, bringing the total number of deaths of UNRWA staff to 220 to date. After more than 11 months of war, the death toll in Gaza is more than 41,000, mostly civilians, including women, children and older people.

The Al-Jaouni school is run by the UNRWA and has been a target of Israel as a Hamas command and control centre, although there’s no evidence or proof of it whatsoever.

A UN survey in July has found that more than 4 in 5 schools in Gaza have been directly hit and damaged by Israel, causing 650,000 children in Gaza unable to study for nearly a year. Palestinians have resorted to shelters in school because they have no other choice and have nowhere to go.

Separately, Hamas said on Wednesday that it was ready to implement an “immediate” ceasefire with Israel in Gaza, based on a US proposal put forward in June, without new conditions from any party.

What do we know about the humanitarian catastrophe in Mali?
Gaza, Sudan and now Mali. Amid the war, famine and displacement in many countries around the world, Mali, a landlocked country in Africa is also suffering immensely as a result of climate change, rising temperatures, long-term political instability, protracted armed conflict and seemingly endless economic struggles. View Mali on map here.

This creates a perfect storm of vulnerability in the country with a population of more than 22 mil, where people’s livelihoods are challenged with internal displacement, famine, deteriorating security and inaccessibility to healthcare.

In April, an unprecedented heat wave caused temperatures to climb to more than 45 degrees Celsius across the country. During the hot spell, the Gabriel Toure University Hospital in the Malian capital, Bamako, recorded more than 100 deaths. In March, 130 deaths were recorded, even before temperatures soared.

Today, some 7.1 mil people (⅓ of Mali’s population) need urgent humanitarian assistance. According to the WHO, the national rate of severe acute malnutrition, which is the deadliest form of hunger, rose from 4.2% last year to 11% today, the highest level in a decade.

Immersive sports viewing provider Cosm raises USD250 mil to open more locations worldwide
You might not be able to attend your favourite sports event in person due to various reasons, but how about viewing it in an immersive experience akin to being there yourself?

That’s what Cosm is all about, a company going viral for its offerings of the new immersive sports viewing experience in shared reality venues. Currently, Cosm venues are only in LA and Dallas, where it makes attendees feel like they are at the real-life stadium of a sporting event. It uses a 180-degree LED display that can go from 8K to 12K-plus and offers 5 to 10 camera angles per event, which enable fans to have several different vantage points, broadcasted on an 87 x 55 foot diameter dome with surrounding visuals and graphics that make you feel like you’re at the game’s location. Sounds pretty mind-blowing - check it out here.

Cosm recently announced an astounding USD 250 mil fundraising round that values the company more than USD 1 bil. Investors for this round include sports team owners David Blitzer, Marc Lasry, Dan Gilbert, billionaire Steve Winn, and UK investment management firm Baillie Gifford. These moolah will help them reach their goal of opening 50 locations worldwide, by the end of this decade. Ain’t cheap buildsing one - costs about USD80-90 mil to build a venue,

Shorts

1. Singer Bon Jovi helped coax a distressed woman off a bridge

   The Metropolitan Nashville Police Department sent a thank you shoutout to Jon Bon Jovi, who had successfully talked a woman off a bridge ledge in Nashville, Tennessee. A video released (watch here) by the said police department showed that rock superstar Bon Jovi calmly approached the distressed woman, who was standing precariously over the Cumberland River. A few minutes later, the woman stepped safely back onto the pedestrian walkway, where Bon Jovi gave her a warm embrace to help calm her down further. Bon Jovi and his team happened to be in the vicinity for the shooting of a music video with his team.

2. Thai cave boys’s coach Ekkapol Chantawong trapped around water again

   In 2018, coach Chantawong and his football team were trapped for weeks in a Thai cave before being rescued in a successful international rescue operation. On Tuesday, Chantawong again found himself in a watery predicament, where he was stuck on the roof of his home after a flooding brought by days of torrential rain of Typhoon Yagi in the northern Thai district of Mae Sai. Drawing experience from his cave predicament, Chantawong said he learned a lot from the cave trapping and kept calm and focused on solving the problem instead of panicking. He did the same thing when he was trapped in the cave with his team, which gave them the mental strength to endure the crisis.

5. FOR YOUR EYES 📺

1. It’s that time of the year again when Khairul Aming closes his factory and treats his staff (100+ people) to a vacation. I love watching it. He truly deserves all the success that he has now.

khairulaming

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2. Did former deputy minister of MITI Ong Kian Ming consider quitting DAP?

3. Ending the week with some nonsense entertainment - DC x Marvel x Monkey God crossover plus the most unexpected character appearance at the end. Btw, buy us our weekend coffee here. Sekian, terima kasih. Full video here.

inspired.author

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