The business is now looking to expand into the fast-growing padel market

A Bristol company that has developed a rankings, ratings and community platform designed to modernise how racket sports are played and organised has secured a £500,000 investment.

Levels Technologies – originally launched as SquashLevels – uses data-led insights to provide more accurate player ratings, helping to match players of similar ability and improve participation and engagement.

The business, which also has an office in London, will use the funding to further develop its platform, including launching new sports verticals and investing in commercial and data teams to accelerate user growth and partnerships, it said.

The round was led by The FSE Group, which invested £250,000 through the British Business Bank’s South West Investment Fund. It also included participation from Akira Financial, the Professional Squash Association (PSA), and the Haley Family Office.

Levels Technologies’ platform is available across web and mobile, and combines player performance data, dynamic rankings and social features, giving users a way to track progress, compete and connect.

Having already built a strong user base in squash, the business is now expanding into other fast-growing racket sports markets, starting with padel.

Co-chief executive Jethro Binns, a former professional squash player, said: “We built Levels to bring a more accurate and engaging way for people to play racket sports, starting with squash and now expanding into much larger global markets. This investment allows us to accelerate that vision, develop the platform further and grow our partnerships internationally.

“The support from FSE and our co-investors brings valuable experience as well as capital, and we’re looking forward to working closely together as we scale.”

Matt Browning, investment manager at FSE, added: “Levels has developed a differentiated platform that is already demonstrating strong engagement from its user base.

“The team has built a product that solves a clear problem in how players are ranked and matched, and there is a significant opportunity to apply this across a range of growing racket sports. With proven traction and clear expansion plans, we believe the business is well positioned for further growth.”

McDonald’s sales growth came in slower than expected when the company released its second quarter earnings on Tuesday, with leaders pointing to execution lapses they say hampered its push to promote value deals aimed at lower-income consumers.

CEO Chris Kempczinski said that weak promotion of value deals and a pullback in the use of digital deals, such as its buy-one-add-one promos, led to a drop in visits from loyal customers – noting that accounted for about two-thirds of the shortfall in customer traffic for the quarter.

Comparable sales for McDonald’s largest market grew 0.8%, below analysts’ estimates of a 1.06% increase, according to data compiled by LSEG. The pace of the fast-food giant’s U.S. growth was 2.5% last year.

“We don’t have a strategy problem. We simply didn’t execute at the level we needed to in the second quarter,” Kempczinski said.

MCDONALD’S BRINGING BACK FRIED APPLE PIE TO CELEBRATE AMERICA’S 250TH BIRTHDAY

The CEO said that while McDonald’s has “restored our overall value and affordability leadership, our restaurant level results show that execution was inconsistent across the system,” noting that the best performing restaurants executed the affordable price menu plan and saying they “need the same level of execution in all our restaurants.”

He went on to say that about one-thirds of the McDonald’s system’s restaurants didn’t execute against the guidance for the every day affordable price menu, adding that the company will educate franchisees about the importance of complying with that pricing scheme which will factor into business reviews.

MCDONALD’S TESTING AI DRIVE-THRU ORDER-TAKING SYSTEM CALLED ARCHIQ AT FIVE LOCATIONS ACROSS COUNTRY

Kempczinski also said that restaurant teams were overwhelmed by the number of deployments McDonald’s put forward in the quarter, which impacted efficiency and worsened customer service times, while marketing programs didn’t deliver against expectations.

McDonald’s CFO Ian Borden said that in the near term, the company is launching more national digital flash offers starting next week to “reenergize our high-frequency customers,” while also targeting the chain’s most loyal customers with more personalized digital offerings.

MCDONALD’S UNVEILS NEW GROWTH STRATEGY TO WIN BACK CUSTOMERS

Ticker	Security	Last	Change	Change %
MCD	MCDONALD’S CORP.	268.34	+3.11	+1.17%

Borden added that the company is already taking steps to simplify restaurant operations by eliminating several non-customer-facing activities over the remainder of the year.

As part of the company’s push to reinvigorate its growth, McDonald’s named Skye Anderson to lead its U.S. business, betting on an executive with extensive experience across operations and international markets.

Anderson has worked for the company for 26 years, which includes time as the U.S. chief operating officer. In her new role she will oversee about 14,000 restaurants in the U.S. and guide McDonald’s new turnaround strategy.

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Reuters contributed to this report.

Buc-ee’s has sued a small mini-mart in Ohio, alleging its cartoon beaver logo is too similar to the popular Texas-based chain’s iconic logo, adding to the various lawsuits the company has filed against small stores with cartoon animal branding despite an HBO show daring it to challenge someone its own size.

Beaver’s Mini Mart in Beavercreek, Ohio, was sued by Buc-ee’s late last month over alleged trademark infringement, according to WLWT. Buc-ee’s claims the store used a smiling cartoon beaver logo and red coloring that closely mimics its famous branding.

Buc-ee’s said it has been using the cartoon beaver logo for more than four decades and has several federal trademark registrations, according to the outlet. The chain also argues that Beaver’s Mini Mart started using the logo after Buc-ee’s had established trademark rights.

The logo could create “confusion among consumers” about whether the store is associated with Buc-ee’s, the company argued in the complaint.

BUC’EE’S SUES SMALLER GAS STATION CHAIN FOR COPYRIGHT, ARGUING CARTOON DOG IS TOO SIMILAR TO ITS BEAVER

Buc-ee’s opened its first location in Ohio earlier this year, but Beaver Mini Mart has no gas pumps, is miles from the nearest interstate and was operated before Buc-ee’s expanded into the state.

The mini-mart has been owned by Vik Boparai for more than a decade, years before Buc-ee’s first expanded out of Texas in 2018 and long before it opened its first Ohio store near Dayton in April. Beavers are also popular characters across Beavercreek, as numerous businesses and the local high school feature the rodent as their mascots, according to The Cincinnati Enquirer.

“I don’t know why they would sue a small business like mine,” Boparai told the outlet. “I have two kids and this store is how I feed them.”

Beavercreek Councilman Zach Upton also told the outlet that the lawsuit appears to be overreach and customers are unlikely to confuse the two logos.

“Common sense is not prevailing,” Upton said. “I can’t imagine anyone would be confused by the mini mart and Buc-ee’s. It’s not even in the same ballpark.”

The lawsuit comes after comedian John Oliver noted how Buc-ee’s has sued several small stores with cartoon logos, even when they bear very little or no resemblance to Buc-ee’s grinning beaver logo, and dared the chain to take on someone its own size.

On the July 26 episode of “Last Week Tonight,” Oliver urged Buc-ee’s to sue his show rather than small local stores with fewer resources to defend themselves.

“Buc-ee’s loves to sue other companies, particularly those with animal mascots,” Oliver said, pointing out that the chain has filed more than a dozen lawsuits and threatened more.

Oliver said Buc-ee’s has won nearly all the cases because the other companies typically settle and redesign their logos or because “most just don’t have the resources to fight a company this big.”

The comedian cites a legal expert who said Buc-ee’s should be careful with its decision to file so many lawsuits because it may eventually run into one with the resources to fight back.

“And that is where we come in,” Oliver said. “Because, it turns out, we very much have the will to get into a fight with Buc-ee’s.”

BUC-EE’S EXPANDS NATIONAL FOOTPRINT WITH 15 MORE LOCATIONS IN THE PIPELINE

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Oliver then reintroduced Mr. Nutterbutter, a 7-foot-tall squirrel mascot originally created for a 2017 segment targeting former coal executive Bob Murray, which sparked an unsuccessful defamation lawsuit against the show and HBO.

The show created a cartoon logo of Mr. Nutterbutter and put the logo on various products, including tumblers, hats, shirts, onesies, mugs and pajamas that are available for purchase for a limited time at Buc-Off.com.

“So, if any prominent gas station chain out there has an issue with our new logo and products and wants to get lawyers involved, then you know what? Bring it the f— on. Although remember, in doing so, you’d be directly taking food out of hungry people’s mouths,” Oliver said, noting that all profits would go to Hunger Free America, a nonprofit group working to end domestic hunger.

Fox Business has reached out to Buc-ee’s for comment.

Mumbai: The divergence between Sensex and Nifty levels persisted for the second day on Tuesday as market participants continued to grapple with confusion around the rollout of the closing auction system launched the previous day. The expiry of Nifty weekly futures and options contracts on Tuesday added to the complexity, with several traders taking to social media complaining of unexpected moves in derivatives prices and losses on their positions.

The Sensex ended at 78,428.95, down 210.08 points or 0.27%, while the Nifty closed at 24,614.90, down 159.40 points or 0.64%, coming off early lows. At the day’s lowest levels, the Sensex was down 0.5% and the Nifty was down 1.4%. The partial recovery happened in the last five minutes of trading.

Read more: Nifty’s value doesn’t change suddenly at 3:30 pm, NSE clarifies amid CAS confusion

The differences in the intraday and closing levels over the past two days follow the introduction of the closing auction system, which changes the way the official closing prices of stocks traded in the futures and options (F&O) segment are determined. The closing prices are used to calculate index closing levels, value mutual fund portfolios and settle derivatives contracts.

Trading Volumes
“The main cause of the last-minute spike in the Nifty appears to be participation in the CAS (closing auction system) session, or possibly the lack of it because of the confusion,” said Kamlesh Shroff, president, Association of NSE Members of India. “While NSE’s CAS volumes were higher compared to yesterday, the number of UCCs (unique client code) traded during the CAS fell on Tuesday, suggesting fewer participants had a larger influence on the Nifty’s close. This makes it easier for large orders to move the market.”

The fall on Tuesday is a reversal of the previous day’s upmove when a late surge of 0.8% at around 3.28 pm led to the Nifty surging 1.6% at close, while the Sensex ended 0.7% higher, creating an unprecedented variance.
The new closing auction process, limited to the 200-odd stocks in the F&O segment, lasts about 20 minutes, from 3.15 pm to around 3.35 pm. During this period, the exchange first collects buy and sell orders and then matches them to determine a single official closing price for the stockUnder the old system, the closing price was based on the volume-weighted average price (VWAP) of trades during the last 30 minutes of trading. Unlike the earlier system, the new mechanism concentrates buy and sell orders into a single closing auction, making the closing price more sensitive to large orders.

The shift to the closing auction system has resulted in a drop in trading volumes in the last part of the trading session, said brokers. “The cash market saw volumes of only about Rs 1,500 crore in the last 30 minutes, against the usual Rs 6,000-7,000 crore, while open interest also declined,” said Samir Doshi, CEO, Marwadi Shares and Finance. “This makes market moves difficult to track and raises concerns around mutual fund NAV tracking and index rebalancing for MSCI or FTSE.”

F&O EXPIRY
Brokers said many traders and investors were still adjusting to the new closing auction mechanism, with several caught off guard during the first equity derivatives expiry under the new system on Tuesday. “This Tuesday’s expiry looked very different from the moves we usually see on expiry days, particularly as the index again shot up in the last few minutes of trading,” said Doshi. “We saw unusual moves in option prices, with virtually no decay in ATM (At the money) options, which is typically seen through the day by the close.”

Doshi said the uncertainty over how long the abrupt price moves would last is unnerving. “The Nifty climbed nearly 150 points late on Tuesday, and is likely to open lower again on Wednesday. This is making us question when this cycle will end.” Traders will now watch the expiry of the Sensex weekly derivative on Thursday to gauge the impact of the closing auction system on activity. “We are more worried about BSE, where volumes are so low that any sort of index manipulation would become much easier in the CAS session,” said Doshi. Shroff expects “normalcy” to return to the markets by Nifty’s monthly expiry later this month, saying participants are likely to have adjusted to the new system by then.

The government’s offer for sale (OFS) in insurance behemoth Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) opens for retail investors today, with analysts listing reasons why investors should consider participating.

LIC announced on Monday that the government plans to sell a 2.5% equity stake in the company as part of the base offer, with an additional 4% available as a green shoe option. The floor price was fixed at Rs 382 apiece, taking the total OFS size to nearly Rs 31,410 crore. The floor price implies a discount of 3% from the stock’s previous closing price of Rs 391.3 apiece on NSE.

The OFS opened for non-retail investors on August 4, and saw strong participation. The offer was oversubscribed more than 3 times its offer size. It now opens for retail investors today.

Investors can participate between 9.15 am and 3.30 pm using the separate OFS window on NSE and BSE. A minimum of 10% of the offer size has been reserved for retail investors. A discount of Rs 10 per share on the cut-off price has been set for retail and employees.

Should you participate in LIC OFS?

At the effective retail price of Rs 372 apiece (after the retail discount of Rs 10 per share), the stock is available at around 0.3x FY26 embedded value, a significant discount to listed private life insurers that trade at materially higher P/EV multiples, said Ajit Mishra, SVP of Research at Religare Broking. He noted that LIC has also strengthened its fundamentals, with the FY26 VNB margin improving to 21.2% and the solvency ratio rising to 2.35x, reflecting a robust capital position.

“While persistence remains an area to watch, the combination of compelling valuation, improving profitability and market leadership makes the OFS an attractive long-term investment opportunity,” according to the analyst.
Also read | Government unveils offer for sale to dilute LIC stake

LIC shareholding pattern

The government owned a 96.5% stake in LIC as of June 30, 2026, according to the latest data on the company’s shareholding pattern. This makes LIC one of the largest government-owned listed companies, and the public float must gradually increase to comply with minimum public shareholding requirements. More than 20.92 lakh retail shareholders meanwhile held a 1.55% stake in the insurance behemoth.

“The Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) is a cornerstone of the nation’s financial sector, serving as India’s largest life insurer and the country’s second-largest public sector enterprise by market capitalisation. Its institutional eminence is recognised both domestically and globally, with LIC ranked as the fourth most valuable brand in India and the world’s third-strongest insurance brand. Furthermore, LIC’s exceptional operational scale and market penetration are exemplified by its Guinness World Record for the most life insurance policies sold within a 24-hour period, reflecting unwavering public trust and unmatched execution capabilities,” DIPAM secretary Arunish Chawla said.

Notably, the OFS marks the latest step in the government’s divestment efforts, following recent stake sales in PSUs like Coal India, NHPC, NLC India and more.

LIC share price

LIC shares plunged 9% on Tuesday after the OFS opened for non-retail investors. This marked the biggest single-day plunge recorded by the stock in more than two years. The stock has fallen over 8% in a week and 9% in a month, falling over 8% in 2026 so far.

In the longer term, LIC shares have delivered a negative return of 13% over one year, but gained around 19% in three years. The company has a market capitalisation of nearly Rs 4.94 lakh crore.

Also read | LIC shares sink 9% as OFS opens at 11% discount. Here’s all you need to know

(Disclaimer: Recommendations, suggestions, views and opinions given by the experts are their own. These do not represent the views of The Economic Times)