Of the nearly 4.6 crore people living as slaves globally, two-thirds, or 3.04 crore, are in the Asia-Pacific region, with the highest number in India.
Industrial production and inflation data, quarterly earnings from IT majors and global trends would drive the equity markets in a holiday-shortened week, analysts said. Moreover, foreign fund trading activity, movement of the rupee and global crude oil prices would also dictate terms in the market, they added. Equity markets would remain closed on Friday for 'Dr Baba Saheb Ambedkar Jayanti'.
The general elections in April/May 2024 are expected to add volatility to the Indian markets, keeping investors on their toes.
Ulhas Joshi, Head -- Sales, Rank MF, a mutual fund investment platform, answers your queries.
Benchmark indices Sensex and Nifty settled with gains for the third straight session on Monday, helped by buying in auto, banking and capital goods shares despite a spike in crude oil prices. The 30-share BSE Sensex rose 114.92 points or 0.19 per cent to close at 59,106.44 points with 22 of its components ending in the green and eight closing lower. It moved in a range of 58,793.08 points to 59,204.82 points during intra-day trade.
Wayanad will continue to support Rahul but not to the same extent as in 2019, when his margin of victory had been enormous. Articulate, to the point and speaking in fluent Malayalam, CPI's Annie Raja, had the people who gathered to see her, listening in rapt attention, notes Shyam G Menon.
Hailstorms were reported at various parts of the national capital including Palam, Chilpighat and Ayanagar, the IMD said.
The headline HSBC Services Business Activity Index was at a 17-month peak of 54.4 in June rising from a modest 50.2 in May, HSBC said adding that 'the Modi wave has struck the service sector'.
The Union government's revenue from securities transaction tax (STT) is on track to exceed its Budget projection for the current fiscal year, with the mop-up already surpassing 50 per cent of the annual estimate. Provisional figures reveal that the Centre has collected approximately Rs 14,000 crore in the first half of this fiscal year up to September, according to a government official. This amount exceeds half of the full-year target of Rs 27,625 crore set for FY24.
The seasonally adjusted Nikkei India Services Business Activity Index fell to 50.2 in May, from 51.0 in April, pointing to the slowest growth rate in the current 12-month stretch of expansion.
Fitch Ratings on Thursday retained India's growth forecast for the current fiscal at 6.3 per cent citing economic resilience despite tighter monetary policy and exports weakness, but upped year-end inflation projection on El Nino threat. The Indian economy grew 7.8 per cent in the April-June quarter of current fiscal on strong services sector activity and robust demand. "The Indian economy continues to show resilience despite tighter monetary policy and weakness in exports, with growth outpacing other countries in the region," Fitch said, while projecting 6.3 per cent growth for current fiscal (April-March), and 6.5 per cent for next fiscal.
The BSE Healthcare Index is up 19 per cent as compared to BSE Sensex returns of 11 per cent during this period. Nitin Agarwal of DAM Capital highlighted this trend in a report last month. "After a sustained period of underperformance over FY21-23, the BSE Healthcare Index has once again captured the spotlight. "The recent uptick in performance has been driven by hospitals and emerging green shoots in pharmaceutical exports, particularly to the US, along with sustaining momentum in domestic branded formulations," he said.
Indian equity markets have a limited upside potential in the near-term as they negotiate the ensuing cyclical slowdown, wrote analysts at Nomura in a recent coauthored report led by Saion Mukherjee, their managing director and head of equity research for India. He, however, believes that the foundations are in place for sustainable growth over the medium-to-long term, and hence suggests a 'buy on dips' strategy to equity investors. As an investment strategy, Nomura prefers domestic-oriented sectors and companies over exporters, and prefers stocks that provide valuation comfort. Industrials and banks are their overweight sectors, while IT services and consumer discretionary are their underweight sectors.
Omkeshwar Singh, Head, Rank MF, a mutual fund investment platform, answers your queries.
'Revision of the base year for both CPI and GDP are long overdue.' 'The basic data that went into the 2011-2012 series were mainly from surveys done in 2011 or earlier.' 'We have since seen the emergence of new sectors like platform-based work and online marketing.' 'The employment surveys and the consumption surveys need to reflect these adequately.'
The HSBC India Services Business Activity Index, that tracks changes in activity at Indian services companies on a month-by-month basis, fell from 51.6 to exactly 50.0 in October.
Since infrastructure projects have long gestation periods, investors need to enter them with a long horizon of at least 10 years.
From the Sensex pack, NTPC, Bajaj Finance, IndusInd Bank, UltraTech Cement, Bajaj Finserv, State Bank of India, Tata Motors, ITC, Power Grid and Larsen & Toubro were the biggest gainers. IndusInd Bank climbed 2 per cent after the company on Tuesday reported a 30 per cent jump in consolidated net profit in April-June quarter at Rs 2,124.50 crore, helped by core income growth and lower bad loan provisions.
India's consumer price index (CPI)-based inflation could ease in the coming months thanks to the arrival of kharif crops, lower international commodity prices, and a pass through of lower input costs to consumers, the finance ministry said in its Monthly Economic Review (MER) for October, which was released on Thursday. The MER, however, warned that the global macroeconomic situation remained precarious and a recession in many advanced economies would impact India's exports. "Easing international commodity prices and new Kharif arrival are set to dampen inflationary pressures in the coming months.
Investors' wealth eroded by Rs 3.46 lakh crore on Wednesday as equity markets took a sharp tumble amid weak global trends and foreign fund outflows. The 30-share BSE Sensex fell by 676.53 points or 1.02 per cent to settle at 65,782.78. During the day, it plunged 1,027.63 points or 1.54 per cent to 65,431.68. In line with the weak trend in equities, the market capitalisation of BSE-listed firms eroded by Rs 3,46,947.54 crore to Rs 3,03,33,258.69 crore.
From the Sensex firms, Tech Mahindra, NTPC, Tata Steel, Maruti, Infosys, Power Grid, Larsen & Toubro, Axis Bank, Titan, Reliance Industries, Wipro and Mahindra & Mahindra were the biggest gainers. Sun Pharma, UltraTech Cement, Tata Motors, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Bajaj Finance, State Bank of India and Nestle were among the laggards.
The automobile sector is considered a good indicator of economic health. It has a very long value chain, from primary materials, like metals, glass and plastic, to value-added high-end electronic components, specialised alloys, and software.
Gross inflows into active equity mutual fund (MF) schemes dipped 34 per cent month-on-month (MoM) -- to Rs 25,400 crore -- in April as investors applied brakes on lump sum investments amid a sharp upwards movement in the market. Gross inflows for March stood at Rs 38,641 crore. The sharp decline pulled the net inflows to a five-month low of Rs 6,480 crore, shows data released by the Association of Mutual Funds in India (Amfi).
The US Federal Reserve's interest rate decision, quarterly earnings of corporates and domestic macroeconomic data will influence trading in the equity market in a holiday-shortened week ahead, analysts said. Foreign funds' trading activity, monthly automobile sales data and global trends would also guide market movement this week, they added. Markets would remain closed on Monday on account of 'Maharashtra Day'.
'We are in a sweet spot.' 'Equity, on a standalone basis, will continue to remain the asset class to stay invested in.'
The Reserve Bank of India's interest rate decision, domestic macroeconomic data and global trends will dictate terms in the equity markets this week, analysts said. Trading activity of Foreign Portfolio Investors (FPIs) will also influence markets, they added. "The Indian market will be closely monitoring the Reserve Bank of India's Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) meeting scheduled for June 6-8, 2023. Aside from that, market participants will be keeping an eye on the progress of monsoon," said Pravesh Gour, Senior Technical Analyst, Swastika Investmart Ltd.
The improvement in business conditions promoted job creation, while confidence towards the year-ahead outlook for activity was at a four-month high during March.
The joint venture of Jio Financial Services and BlackRock to foray into India's asset management space could be disruptive but not disastrous for incumbent industry players, analysts said on Thursday. As an investment strategy, analysts suggest investors stay put in shares of those AMCs that consistently improve business metrics, and where market capitalisation-to-asset under management (AUM) valuation is not stretched. However, growth expectations of incumbent players may get trimmed in the medium-to-long term, analysts said, once the Jio-BlackRock JV unveils its plans, discounting the looming challenge as significant enough to dent their profitability.
'Till such time climatic activities resume up north in the plains and the hills, Mumbai's air quality may not improve.'
With factory production, activities across the private sector saw the biggest drop in over three years
RPTs are globally recognised as an important component of the ease of business index.
Notwithstanding sharp volatility in March, mutual fund (MF) investors didn't fight shy of investing in riskier small-cap-oriented schemes. Inflows into small-cap funds were not just the highest in absolute terms, they were also the maximum as a proportion of assets under management (AUM) among all market capitalisation (m-cap)-oriented categories. Investors funnelled Rs 2,430 crore down small-cap funds - 1.8 per cent of their AUM of Rs 1.33 trillion.
Citing a weak manufacturing sector coupled with the steep margin compression, SBI Research has pencilled in the country's GDP growth for the second quarter at 5.8 per cent, down 30 basis points from average estimates. The government will release the official numbers on November 30. In a report on Monday, SBI Research headed by Soumya Kanti Ghosh said corporate results, operating profit of companies, excluding banking and financial sector, degrew by 14 per cent in Q2FY23 as against 35 per cent growth in Q2FY22, though the top line continued to grow at a healthier pace.
Many investors want to exit equities now and re-enter when they begin to rise. Such timing is difficult to pull off.
'Laws have been used in a way to serve the needs of the current regime and its authoritarian ideology.'
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The government is confident of meeting the fiscal deficit target of 5.9 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) and the nominal GDP target of 10.5 per cent despite pressure in the initial months of FY24, Economic Affairs secretary Ajay Seth told Business Standard. Normally the initial months of any financial year see proportionally a higher fiscal deficit because the expenditure is evenly paced while revenue picks up in the later months, he said. "This year the proportional fiscal deficit so far is much closer to the target than in most other years.
Over 85 per cent of SIP AUM, or Rs 5.8 trillion, is in equity schemes, compared to just Rs 6,100 crore in debt.
'Historically, equities have consistently outperformed debt, gold, property, and other assets over a reasonable period.'
'India has always been a bottom-up stock-picking market, and as growth recovers with higher liquidity, mid and small-caps always tend to outperform.'
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