Uday Kotak wonders if 'MAAMA' knows best for retail investors

Not too while back, when Facebook changed its name to Meta, the acronym FAANG for the five biggest American tech companies didn’t quite fit anymore. However, soon after, American television personality Jim Cramer, who coined the term FAANG in 2013, unveiled a new acronym that fits Meta well within it—MAAMA  -- Meta, Apple, Microsoft, Amazon and Alphabet, Google’s parent company.

Following the trend, Kotak Mahindra Bank executive vice-chairman and managing director Uday Kotak came up with his own desi take, playing on the word Maama, which in Hindi colloquial is a word for a person's maternal uncle.

Taking to Twitter, the Indian billionaire and world's richest banker, posted, "The Economist gives new name to big 5 tech giants, MAAMA: Microsoft, Apple, Alphabet, Meta, Amazon. Anyone who understands colloquial Hindi knows there are 2 meanings of word “maama”. Wonder which meaning if any, is relevant here.वोह हमारे मामा है।या हम मामा बनेंगे!"

Kotak, with a net worth of $16 billion, ranks as the world’s richest banker according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index as of December, 2021.

While coining “MAMAA”, Cramer dropped Netflix from the list and replaced it with Microsoft, and Facebook with Meta.

Meanwhile, Wall Street's main indexes ended sharply lower last Friday as Netflix shares plunged after a weak earnings report, capping a brutal week for stocks that saw the S&P 500 and Nasdaq log their biggest weekly percentage drops since the onset of the pandemic in March 2020.

The benchmark S&P 500 posted its third straight week of declines, ending 8.3 per cent down from its early January record high.

Losses also deepened for the Nasdaq after the tech-heavy index earlier in the week confirmed it was in a correction, closing down over 10 per cent from its November peak. The Nasdaq has now fallen 14.3 per cent from its November peak and on Friday closed at its lowest level since June.

Stocks are off to a rough start in 2022, as a fast rise in Treasury yields amid concerns the Federal Reserve will become aggressive in controlling inflation has particularly hit tech and growth shares.

Investors are keenly focused on next week's Fed meeting for more clarity on the central bank's plans to tighten monetary policy in the coming months, after data last week showed U.S. consumer prices in December had the largest annual rise in nearly four decades.