House economists at the nation's largest lender State Bank of India (SBI) have urged the government to budget for nursing the pandemic-ravaged economy and not to focus too much on fiscal consolidation as there is a need for more stabilisation measures to sustain the fledgling recovery. And one of the best way to begin the new fiscal is to complete the share sale of LIC this fiscal. This can go a long way in repairing the overstretched balance sheet which in turn will bring down fiscal deficit to a much lower 6.3 per cent in FY23 as the public coffers will be left with a cash surplus of at least Rs 3 lakh crore to begin the new fiscal, SBI chief economist Soumya Kanti Ghosh said in a pre-Budget note on Wednesday.
Among the lot, Rallis India, Escorts, Jubilant Life Sciences, and Crisil added half of the total gains made in the ace stock-picker's portfolio.
The company, which in the previous quarter announced former Capgemini top executive Thierry Delaporte as its new chief executive officer and managing director, is looking at improving its performance in coming quarters.
While commercial vehicles are expected to benefit from strong replacement demand, the two-wheeler and tractor segments are expected to gain from a recovery in the rural economy.
India's primary deficit (Centre and states) for FY21 is assumed to be 6.8 per cent of GDP, according to the Economic Survey tabled in Parliament on Friday. It said the Covid-19 pandemic has created a significant negative shock to demand. Active fiscal policy -- one that recognises that fiscal multipliers are disproportionately higher during economic crises than during economic booms -- can ensure that the full benefit of seminal economic reforms is reaped by limiting potential damage to productive capacity.
2.75 million of the 3 million Covid-related health claims were settled.
An immediate RBI rate cut will lower lending rates for banks' MSME/retail/mortgage loans before the 'busy' industrial season ends in March.
Revenue from divestment has fetched Rs 40,000-50,000 crore against target of Rs 2.10 trillion.
Piramal Enterprises (PEL) on Wednesday said it has completed the acquisition of Dewan Housing Finance (DHFL) by paying Rs 34,250 crore to creditors of the housing finance company. The company said the creditors of DHFL, including fixed deposit (FD) holders, would recover an aggregate amount of Rs 38,000 crore from the resolution process of DHFL. The amount comprises approximately Rs 34,250 crore to be paid by Piramal Capital and Housing Finance Ltd (PCHFL) as a combination of cash and NCDs, and an amount of approximately Rs 3,800 crore which is the entitlement of creditors as per the resolution plan from the cash balance available with DHFL, the company said.
Small-cap stocks raked in big gains in fiscal 2021-22 by giving up to 36.64 per cent returns, outshining the bigger benchmark gauge and experts believe that they may continue to outperform in FY23. Markets faced many headwinds in the latter part of the last fiscal with the emergence of geopolitical tension, inflation concerns and FII selling. Analysts said that the first half of the last fiscal was very good, while the market entered into consolidation in the second half, combined with high volatility.
IndusInd Bank was the top gainer in the Sensex pack, rallying over 7 per cent, followed by SBI, ICICI Bank, HDFC twins, Axis Bank, Bajaj Finserv and UltraTech Cement. NSE Nifty soared 245.35 points to 14,923.15.
No expecting mother ever needs to travel for more than 30 minutes to reach one of their hospitals, believes the Cloudnine group.
IndusInd Bank, L&T, ITC, HUL, Reliance Industries and Sun Pharma were among the gainers. On the other hand, HCL Tech, Axis Bank, Asian Paints, UltraTech Cement and Infosys were among the laggards.
Without exception, the top four majors beat Street estimates across all parameters - revenues, profitability, or net profit growth. However, what stood out were the large deal wins reported by the big two, TCS and Infosys.
The country's gross domestic product (GDP) is likely to grow more than 9.5 per cent in fiscal 2021-22, an SBI research report-Ecowrap said. The economy grew at 8.4 per cent in the second quarter of the current fiscal, according to data released by the National Statistical Office (NSO) on Tuesday. The growth in the April-June quarter of this fiscal stood at 20.1 per cent. In October's monetary policy review, the Reserve Bank of India had retained its projection for real GDP growth at 9.5 per cent in 2021-22, consisting of 7.9 per cent in Q2; 6.8 per cent in Q3; and 6.1 per cent in Q4 of 2021-22.
'Our focus on fresher induction is high, given that they come in with certain advantages.' 'They do not have an unlearning process as seen in senior employees.'
Days after cutting the salaries and other allowances of MPs and ministers, the government has passed instructions to all departments to reduce their expenditure by as much as 60 per cent from their first-quarter spending plans.
Private hospitals, especially smaller standalone ones, are staring at a crisis that they were not prepared for. Analysts say larger corporate chains have to brace up for at least six months for business to return to normal.
Pegging the cost of the covid-19 lockdown at USD 120 billion (approximately Rs 9 lakh crores) or 4 per cent of the GDP, analysts on Wednesday sharply cut their growth estimates and stressed on the need to announce an economic package. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI), which is scheduled to announce its first bi-monthly policy review on April 3, is set to deliver a deep rate cuts and it should also be assumed that the fiscal deficit targets will be breached, analysts said.
'While most companies were bullish before the second wave of double-digit sales growth in FY22, that may not be the case now.'
Experts expect a net loss of Rs 26.7 billion for IndiGo and Rs 10.1 billion for SpiceJet in Q1FY21 driven by low traffic volume, low fleet utilisation and poor coverage of fixed costs.
Developers are cautious about the timing of launches in the near term, given the relative uncertainty in demand pick-up and logistical challenges during the lockdown. However, affordable housing projects slated for the first quarter (Q1) of 2020-21 (FY21) may get launched this quarter itself.
'We tightened our risk frameworks once the Covid crisis started.' 'We are slowly lightening this as we see economic activity pick up, salaries getting restored, and people getting back into jobs.'
With the arrival of the second Covid wave in April, the numbers fell by almost 50 per cent.
The FPI holding in India's top 100 companies, which are part of the Nifty 100 index, declined to 24.23 per cent on average at the end of March this year, from a high of 27.5 per cent at the end of March 2021. This is the lowest FPI holdings in India's top listed companies in at least three years. A general sell-off by FPIs has weighed on stock prices and the benchmark S&P BSE Sensex is down 8.5 per cent, from its 52-week high made in October 2021. Most analysts expect FPI flows to remain weak in FY23 as well, given rising bond yields in the US and an expected earnings slowdown in India due to high inflation and commodity prices.
Analysts attribute the surge to a host of factors, particularly the interest shown by the retail investors in these two market segments.
To counter the pandemic, air transport was suspended from March 25 till May 24 which rendered zero traffic at AAI airports. Even after resumption of flights, traffic is yet to pick up at airports due to quarantine measures implemented by states and an overall fear of flying.
Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Shaktikanta Das on Thursday said the country's economy has recovered stronger than expected from the initial impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, but there is a need to be watchful of demand sustainability after the end of festivities. Speaking at the annual day event of Foreign Exchange Dealers' Association of India (FEDAI), Das said there are downside risks to growth across the world and also in India. It can be noted that the Indian economy contracted by 23.9 per cent in the first quarter of the fiscal year, and the RBI expects the economy to shrink by 9.5 per cent in FY21.
Crisil Ratings on Wednesday said a broad-based recovery is on for India Inc currently, and upgraded its credit quality outlook to 'positive' from the earlier 'cautiously optimistic'. The rating agency said the credit ratio, which illustrates the number of upgrades to downgrades, rose to over 2.5 times in the first four months of the fiscal, as compared to 1.33 times in the second half of FY21, it said in a statement. The rating agency said it has also done a study of 43 sectors, excluding the financial sector, accounting for 75 per cent of the overall Rs 36 lakh crore in outstanding debt, which shows that the current recovery is broad-based.
The economy is likely to register a 9.5 per cent growth this fiscal over 7.3 per cent contraction last year, as the ongoing recovery is faster and more credible than earlier foreseen, according to a foreign brokerage report. It will gather more momentum in the second half of the current fiscal, but will slow down to 7.7 per cent next financial year, it added. The government has budgeted for a 10.5 per cent growth this fiscal, but the Reserve Bank has scaled it down to 9.5 per cent.
The early bird results for the January-March 2022 quarter (Q4FY22) hint at a slowdown in corporate sector growth in the upcoming quarters. The combined net sales of the 81 early bird companies in the Business Standard sample were up 15.1 per cent year-on-year in Q4FY22; this was less than the 15.9 per cent YoY jump reported in Q3FY22. The slowdown could be much stronger for the domestic market-focused companies, including those in the banking, finance, and insurance (BFSI) space.
With Covid-19 cases across the country rising rapidly once again, demand for health insurance products has spiked. Insurers are seeing an uptick in inquiries for such products and underwriting more premiums in the segment. Already, health insurance was growing at a rapid pace since the onset of the pandemic as awareness around risk had heightened among consumers. But the country recorded more than 600,000 Covid-19 cases in the past week, which is almost a six-fold rise than the previous week. Owing to this, the spike in demand for health insurance products is inevitable, experts said.
The group companies now lead the market capitalisation league table in sectors such as ports, power generation, gas distribution and transmission, and power transmission and distribution, ahead of incumbents in both public and private sector. This has Gautam Adani family the second wealthiest in business in India.
Citing the impact of the second wave of the pandemic over the economy and consumer sentiment, Swiss brokerage Credit Suisse has lowered its nominal GDP growth forecast by 150-300 bps to 13-14 per cent, but expects a stronger recovery in the second half as it sees the lockdowns having limited impact on tax collections. Last month, Neelkanth Mishra, the co-head of equity strategy for Credit Suisse Asia Pacific, and India equity strategist, had told PTI that he expected the real GDP to fall to 8.5-9 per cent in FY22 due to the more severe pandemic attack. The virus case load has crossed the 25-million mark, death toll from the same is nearing 2.9 lakh mark, which is one of the highest in the world as the test positivity rate has been around 15 per cent for long.
For FY21, CSB is looking at growth of around 25 per cent and is confident of doubling it in two years. And it is also exploring options to acquire a mid-size bank with a good client base and branches in the north to acquire an all-India presence.
India Inc's cash pile was up 13.8 per cent last fiscal year, thanks to a combination of higher profits in sectors such as IT and fund raising by top companies such a Reliance Industries, Bharti Airtel and Tata Motors, among others.
The Economic Survey released before next year's Budget could become a single volume, reverting to the practice followed till FY14. "There is so much to write about the Indian economy's performance in the past year. "Most of the exciting themes will be covered in what used to be considered Part II," said a senior government official who is part of the preparations for the Survey.
Under fire for technical glitches plaguing the new income tax return filing portal, Infosys CEO Salil Parekh on Wednesday said the new portal developed by his company is seeing "steady progress" and already 1.9 crore returns have been filed. He further said that taxpayers' concerns are being "progressively addressed". "We are seeing a steady progress on the income tax system. As of yesterday we had over 1.9 crore returns that have been filed using the new system.
'Investors should reduce cash gradually and look for value investing.'
India's harsh lockdown has left companies grappling with temporary closure, chaotic supply chains and depressed demand. Consequently, business plans have been modified.
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