Beauty and Personal Care (BPC) e-retailer Honasa Consumer's initial public offering (IPO) has failed to find backing from analysts due to the company's weak financial track record and expensive valuation. T Manish, research analyst at Samco Securities suggests avoiding the IPO as the company's financial performance does not inspire confidence. "The profit has been inconsistent and advertising and marketing expenses are incredibly high at around 40 per cent of the revenues.
After unseasonal rains, supply disruptions and pandemic-induced woes pushed retail inflation well over the Reserve Bank's comfort zone in 2020, the scenario is likely to stay that way at least in the short term as economic recovery slowly gains foothold. For most part of this year, pricier food items pushed the retail inflation, based on Consumer Price Index (CPI), higher in the range of 6.58-7.61 per cent, except for March when the reading was 5.91 per cent. Experts believe retail inflation is likely to average around 6.3 per cent this fiscal and mostly will remain sticky going forward owing to pick-up in demand across sectors.
The impact of currency depreciation can also be mitigated by holding a portion of your investment portfolio in dollar-denominated assets.
This is the Mukesh Ambani-led company's second entry into the dairy segment and it will directly compete with Amul and Mother Dairy.
While the fiscal year has just begun, any windfall surplus will be welcomed by the government as it bids to meet the fiscal deficit target of 5.9 per cent of GDP, amidst lack of clarity on exactly to what extent will recession in the West impact India's trade and tax collections.
With the Big Four information technology services players having disappointed the Street, the focus is on mid-cap IT players who seem to have met expectations, according to analyst reports and management commentary on the demand environment.
As temperatures soar across the country, amid searing heat wave, analysts see power demand hitting fresh record highs this year. The time, therefore, may be opportune to add related stocks on dips as higher demand boosts earnings visibility, they said. On April 18, India's electricity demand touched a new high of 216 gigawatts.
Shares of telecom services providers - Reliance Industries (parent of Reliance Jio), Bharti Airtel, and Vodafone Idea - have shed up to 23 per cent so far in the current calendar year as growth in the wireless subscriber segment begins to plateau amid higher tariffs and rising costs of smartphones. By comparison, the benchmark S&P BSE Sensex, and sectoral index BSE Telecom have dipped 1.8 per cent, and 12.6 per cent, respectively, ACE Equity data shows. However, analysts expect the trend to reverse soon as telecom services providers focus on the next leg of growth -- fixed broadband (FBB) segment.
The new offer is part of its strategy to turn India to an exclusively 4G market.
Analysts expect RIL to report consolidated revenue of Rs 1.40 trillion and 10 analysts expect RIL's net income to be Rs 9,629 crore
Kerala floods take a toll on small businesses, NBFCs brace for losses
After a very weak December quarter and a poor year-to-date fiscal year volumes-when sales plunged to the lowest in nine years, the signs in the first 15 days of January haven't been encouraging either. "Though the severity of the current wave is not as high as the previous one, it has hit the sentiments hard impacting conversion of enquiries into sales," said Vinkesh Gulati, president, Federation of Automobile Dealers Association (FADA).
Maruti was the top gainer in the Sensex pack, rallying nearly 4 per cent, followed by PowerGrid, ITC, NTPC, SBI, M&M, Kotak Bank and HDFC Bank. On the other hand, TCS was the top loser on the Sensex, shedding over 6 per cent.
Mumbai Metropolitan Region recorded housing sales of nearly 9,200 units in Q3 of calender 2020, against 3,620 units in the preceding quarter, registering a 1.5 times growth which is the highest growth seen any city except Chennai.
The entry of SoftBank-backed Ola into the electric scooter (e-scooter) segment is set to power up the overall market and perhaps fast-track the adoption of battery-operated vehicles. But for manufacturers of internal combustion engine (ICE)-powered two-wheelers, such as Bajaj Auto, Hero MotoCorp, and TVS Motor, it will be a double whammy. Not only will they have to contend with the aggressive pricing of Ola's scooter and incur a loss at each unit of the e-scooter sold, the volumes of their regular (ICE) models, too, could feel the squeeze, observed analysts. Ola is expected to price its e-scooter in the range of Rs 85,000-1.1 lakh.
Analysts remain confident RIL's refining and petrochemical segment will continue to support growth.
Tech Mahindra was the top loser in the Sensex pack, shedding over 3 per cent, followed by NTPC, IndusInd Bank, Kotak Bank and Reliance Industries. NSE Nifty fell 185.60 points to 17,671.65.
Benchmark indices bounced back on Wednesday after falling for five straight sessions, with investors snapping up the recently-mauled IT, finance and consumption stocks amid a supportive trend overseas. A rebounding rupee further bolstered sentiment, traders said. Halting its five-session slide, the BSE Sensex jumped 574.35 points or 1.02 per cent to finish at 57,037.50. Similarly, the NSE Nifty surged 177.90 points or 1.05 per cent to 17,136.55.
Gold prices are struggling and are down 18 per cent from their March highs. But stock prices have fallen even more. As a result, the precious metal has begun to outperform equities - both in the domestic market and international markets. Gold prices are up 2.6 per cent in the domestic market in the current calendar year (CY22) so far, according to the World Gold Council (WGC), compared to a 1.7 per cent decline in the Sensex year-to-date (YTD).
'Younger investors start their journey with very little capital so they are risking less while they have a lot of time to experiment and learn early on.'
ICICI Bank was the top gainer in the Sensex pack, rising over 3 per cent, followed by ITC, SBI, HCL Tech, Axis Bank, Bajaj Finserv and Tech Mahindra. NSE Nifty advanced 32 points to 15,856.05.
While growth metrics for Infosys was skewed to a single vertical and it is struggling to get a handle on costs, TCS has been able to manage growth and keep cost inflation under control.
A weak margin outlook in the near term and lack of fresh triggers may keep the Godrej Consumer Products (GCPL) stock under pressure. The stock, after tepid September quarter (Q2) results and marginal downward revision in earnings estimates, declined 3.5 per cent in trade on Friday. Though consolidated sales of the company, which owns the Goodknight and Cinthol brands, grew 8.5 per cent year-on-year (YoY), its operating profit declined because of the sharp contraction in margins.
Other gainers included Nestle India, Asian Paints, Bajaj Finance, NTPC, L&T, Axis Bank and Bajaj Auto. On the other hand, TCS, ONGC, Infosys, HDFC and SBI were among the laggards. NSE Nifty surged 121.65 points or 1.03 per cent to 11,889.40.
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has announced a dollar-rupee two-year sell-buy swap auction for $5 billion on March 8, which will suck out rupee liquidity from the system. The swap will be in the nature of a simple sell/buy foreign exchange from the RBI side, in which a bank will buy US dollars from the central bank and simultaneously agree to sell the same amount of US dollars at the end of the swap period. "With a view to elongating the maturity profile of its forward book and smoothen the receivables relating to forward assets, it has been decided to undertake sell/buy swap auction of $5 billion on March 8, 2022," the RBI said in a statement. The auction cut-off will be based on the premium amount in paisa terms up to two decimal points.
Dhananjay Sinha, co-head, institutional research, Emkay Global Financial Services tells Business Standard in an interview that even as global commodity prices have softened in response to expectations of weaker global demand, the stronger performance of equities is seemingly pre-empting stronger growth.
Consensus continues to be cautious with analysts pointing towards tougher days ahead
Many investors, who have made money in the rising market of the recent past, are pulling out of equity funds, believing that they can earn more by investing directly.
The sudden movement of the rupee - post the monetary policy - is not a reason to panic, said currency dealers. According to them, a correction was overdue for the rupee that remained the best performing currency in the region for well over a month. The rupee closed at 74.72 a dollar on Friday from its previous close of 74.60. It had dropped 1.52 per cent against the dollar on April 7 after the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) announced its monetary policy, committing to buy Rs 1 trillion of bonds in the June quarter. A weak rupee goes well with the export narrative of the government, and is consistent with the RBI's intervention strategy that prevented an appreciation.
Equity investors grew richer by Rs 32.49 lakh crore in 2020 on the back of smart returns in the stock market which had a roller-coaster ride during the year hit by the coronavirus pandemic. The COVID-19 outbreak ravaged lives and livelihoods on a global scale, shuttering businesses and jolting world equities. But amid all the gloom, Indian stock indices gave hope of returning to winning ways towards the latter part of the year.
The country's narrowing power deficit and increased coal production may not be indicators of the end of stress in the industry. Amritha Pillay reports.
Inflation print for food articles, as a basket, remained nearly flat at 7.47 per cent during the month.
The broader NSE Nifty fell 78.75 points, or 0.70 per cent, to close at 11,234.55.
From the 30-share basket, 28 scrips suffered losses. Over 200 stocks were at their 52-week low in Tuesday's trade.
The bank lost out on fairly meaningful quantum of fees from point of sale terminals and ATM usage during the demonetisation exercise.
Declining vegetable prices brought down the retail inflation to a 15-month low of 4.59 per cent in December and within the comfort zone of the Reserve Bank, government data showed on Tuesday. It is for the first time during the current fiscal that the Consumer Price Index (CPI) based inflation print is below 6 per cent or in the RBI's target range of 2 to 6 per cent. The central bank factors in the CPI-based inflation while arriving at its monetary policy. The inflation in December 2020 came down from 6.93 per cent in November, mainly on account of 10.41 per cent decline in vegetable prices over the year-ago period.
Top losers in the Sensex pack included Yes Bank, Vedanta, IndusInd Bank, Tata Steel, L&T, SBI, NTPC, Kotak Bank, HDFC, HDFC Bank, PowerGrid, Infosys and ITC, falling up to 4.18 per cent.
Kotak Bank was the top gainer in the Sensex pack, ending 4.31 per cent higher. PowerGrid, TCS, ICICI Bank, SBI, HCL Tech, NTPC, Infosys, Bajaj Finance, HDFC duo, ONGC, Vedanta and IndusInd Bank too rose up to 2.84 per cent.
Infosys was the top gainer in the Sensex pack, rallying around 7 per cent, followed by TCS, IndusInd Bank, ONGC, HDFC Bank and HCL Tech. On the other hand, ITC, Bajaj Finance, Kotak Bank and Sun Pharma finished in the red.
India's industrial production grew by 1 per cent in December, official data showed on Friday. According to the Index of Industrial Production (IIP) data, the manufacturing sector output grew by 1.6 per cent in December 2020.