JSW Steel (3.37 per cent), Tata Steel (3.33 per cent), Maruti (3.24 per cent), Power Grid (3.07 per cent), IndusInd Bank (2.95 per cent), Bajaj Finance (2.12 per cent) and Tech Mahindra (2.22 per cent) were among major gainers. On the other hand, Ultratech Cement, Sun Pharma, Nestle and L&T were the losers.
Stock markets will be driven by domestic inflation data, ongoing quarterly earnings from corporates and global trends this week, analysts said. News flows around the general election would also be tracked by investors, market experts said.
The Reserve Bank of India on Friday raised the GDP growth projection for the current fiscal to 7 per cent from 6.5 per cent earlier on buoyant domestic demand and higher capacity utilisation in the manufacturing sector. Announcing the bi-monthly monetary policy, RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das, however, flagged protracted geopolitical turmoil and global economic fragmentation as risks to the growth outlook. The RBI kept interest rates unchanged at 6.5 per cent in Friday's monetary policy statement.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) on Tuesday cut its projection of India's economic growth in 2022 to 6.8 per cent, as it joins other global agencies that have trimmed forecasts. The IMF had in July projected a gross domestic product (GDP) growth of 7.4 per cent for India in the fiscal year that started in April 2022. Even that forecast was lower than 8.2 per cent projected in January this year. India had grown at 8.7 per cent in 2021-22 fiscal (April 2021 to March 2022).
Macroeconomic data announcements, global trends and trading activity of foreign investors would guide momentum in the equity market this week, analysts said. Markets ended a five-week losing streak and gained nearly a per cent last week, helped by a sharp rebound on Friday. Last week, the BSE benchmark jumped 500.65 points or 0.77 per cent and the Nifty gained 169.5 points or 0.87 per cent.
India and the US on Friday expressed concern over high inflation which is being driven by external factors and has become a challenge for both the nations. Speaking at the US-India Businesses and Investment Opportunities, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said in India the inflation challenges are prompted more by external factors. "So while the number today is in a manageable range, the challenges are largely due to the import of crude.
Retail investment demand for gold bars and coins as well as central bank purchases pushed the global gold demand by 28 per cent to 1,181.5 tonnes in the September quarter, according to the World Gold Council report. The total global demand stood at 921.9 tonnes during the July-September quarter of 2021, the World Gold Council's 'Gold Demand Trends Q3 2022' showed on Tuesday. Investment was down 47 per cent year-on-year as gold backed Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) investors responded to a challenging combination of higher interest rates and a strong US dollar with significant outflows of 227 tonnes.
Indian economy is projected to grow 7.1-7.6 per cent in the current financial year despite shifting geopolitical realities across the world, a report said on Wednesday. In its India's economic outlook - July 2022 report, leading consultancy Deloitte India said that as 2021 was coming to a close, there was optimism in the air but the optimism received a jolt early this year as a wave of Omicron infections swept through the country and Russia's invasion of Ukraine happened in February. "These events aggravated the pre-existing challenges such as surging inflation, supply shortages, and shifting geopolitical realities across the world with no definite end in sight.
India's economy continues to be robust, but downside risks such as rising crude oil prices, adverse weather conditions, and the global banking crisis outweigh the upside potential in gross domestic product (GDP) growth in the current financial year (FY24), the finance ministry said on Tuesday in its Monthly Economic Review for March. "We reiterate that downside risks to our official forecast of 6.5 per cent for real GDP growth in FY24 dominate upside risks," the review said. "Opec's surprise production cut has seen oil prices rise in April, off their lows of low-seventies per barrel in March.
While most economies contracted in the second quarter of 2020, the Chinese economy grew by 3.2 per cent.
Nirmala Sitharaman on Wednesday assumed charge as the Finance and Corporate Affairs Minister for the second consecutive term and is slated to soon present the final Budget for FY '25 that is going to set the tone for the Modi 3.0 government's priorities and direction for Viksit Bharat. Upon her reaching the North Block office, Sitharaman was greeted by Finance Secretary T V Somanathan and other top officials. Minister of State for Finance Pankaj Chaudhary was also present. Chaudhary assumed charge on Tuesday evening.
The Street will thus keep an eye on the operating profit margins over the next couple of quarters.
Capital markets are becoming more prominent in India's growth story, with an expanding share in capital formation and investment landscape on the back of technology, innovation and digitisation, according to the Economic Survey 2023-24 tabled in Parliament on Monday. Further, Indian markets are resilient to global geo-political and economic shocks, it added. "Despite heightened geo-political risks, rising interest rates and volatile commodity prices, Indian capital markets have been one of the best performing among emerging markets in FY24," the Economic Survey said.
Robert Blake says the United States wants to partner India on a range of global issues.
As the results season kicks in, the quarterly earnings numbers of several blue-chip firms -- such as Infosys and Reliance Industries -- along with global trends and trading activity of foreign investors, will determine equity market movement in the holiday-shortened week ahead, according to analysts. The domestic WPI inflation data for June -- scheduled to be announced on Monday -- will also influence trading sentiments, traders said. Markets will remain closed on Wednesday for Muharram.
After lagging behind benchmarks and broader indices over the past five years, real estate investment trusts (Reits) have outperformed them since the start of 2024. The four listed Reits have posted an average return of 16 per cent year-to-date, compared to 9.9 per cent for the S&P BSE Sensex and 11 per cent for the National Stock Exchange Nifty.
HDFC was the top loser in the Sensex pack, shedding over 2 per cent, followed by Axis Bank, Bharti Airtel, M&M, Reliance Industries, ICICI Bank, IndusInd Bank and Titan.
The finance ministry expects a broad-based moderation in inflationary pressures on the back of an anticipated reduction in food prices as a result of the uptick in summer sowing. The retail inflation rate remained stubbornly clung to the 5 per cent mark in seven of the past eight months. "Core inflation is trending downwards, indicating a broad-based moderation in price pressures... Driven by strong domestic growth and benign global commodity prices, core inflation is declining continuously.
Amid rising geopolitical risks, a vast majority of Indian CEOs have indicated in a survey that they are reducing or planning to reduce operating costs, even as they are more upbeat than their global peers on their country's economic prospects. However, most of the companies do not plan to cut their headcount or salaries, found the annual Global CEO Survey released by consultancy giant PwC here on the first day of the World Economic Forum meeting on Monday. The survey also found that about four in ten CEOs (40 per cent of global and 41 per cent of India respondents) do not expect their companies to be economically viable in 10 years if they continue on their current path.
Although as per the IMF-OECD estimates, an incremental growth of 1.8 per cent in global GDP is achievable
In a remarkable comeback, foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) have pumped Rs 1.7 lakh crore into the Indian equity markets in 2023, propelled by confidence in the country's robust economic fundamentals amid a challenging global landscape. The year 2023 has witnessed massive investment by FPIs, thanks to the sharp uptick in inflows of Rs 66,134 crore in December. Going forward, FPI flows are expected to be robust.
India's services sector growth recorded another month of robust expansion in July, albeit at a slightly slower pace than in June, largely supported by robust demand conditions and investment in technology, a monthly survey said on Monday. The seasonally adjusted HSBC India Services Business Activity Index was at 60.3 in July, down only fractionally from 60.5 in June. In the Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI) parlance, a print above 50 means expansion, while a score below 50 denotes contraction.
Former RBI governor Raghuram Rajan on Tuesday said it is too premature to think that India will replace China when it comes to influencing global economic growth. However, the situation may change going forward as India is already the world's fifth largest economy, it is growing and has the potential to keep expanding. At a World Economic Forum (WEF) press briefing on the recently released Chief Economists Outlook that saw majority of them expecting a global recession in 2023, Rajan said any recovery in the Chinese economy would definitely boost the global growth prospects.
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.
Standard and Poor's had in April lowered India's rating outlook to negative from stable.
The size of Reserve Bank's balance sheet increased by 11.08 per cent to Rs 70.47 lakh crore as on March 2024, leading to the highest-ever dividend payout to the government, according to the central bank's annual report. In actual terms, the increase was Rs 7,02,946.97 crore over Rs 63.45 lakh crore as on March 2023.
India needs to strengthen its economic growth, says IMF.
India's manufacturing sector growth moderated in August as output and sales rose at slowest rates since January, while competitive pressures and inflation concerns hampered business confidence, a monthly survey said on Monday. The seasonally adjusted HSBC India Manufacturing Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI) stood at 57.5 in August, below July's reading of 58.1 but above its long-run average of 54.0, signalling a substantial improvement in operating conditions.
Indian economy's growth is expected to be "below trend" even as neighbouring China and most of the developed nations are expected to see better prospects, according to Paris-based think tank OECD.
'The economy is clearly at a very soft spot, and earnings growth is disappointing every day.' 'After three great years, the Indian economy has hit a rough patch.'
Inflation has remained a major concern.
The encouraging news, however, is that India features among the top four countries out of 44 nations that projected a positive hiring trend.
The simultaneous decline of several trade-related indicators should put policy makers on guard for a sharper slowdown.
Moody's Investors Service on Wednesday raised India's economic growth estimate for 2023 to 5.5 per cent from 4.8 per cent pegged earlier, on the back of a sharp increase in capital expenditure in the Budget and a resilient economic momentum. It however revised downwards India's growth estimate for 2022 to 6.8 per cent from 7 per cent pegged in November last year. In its February update to Global Macro Outlook 2023-24, Moody's raised the baseline 2023 real growth projections "meaningfully" for several G20 economies, including the US, Canada, the Euro area, India, Russia, Mexico, and Turkiye, accounting for a stronger end to 2022.
The upward revision in growth forecast for current fiscal comes in the backdrop of GDP expanding 8.2 per cent in April-June quarter, higher than Fitch's expectation of 7.7 per cent.
The RBI on Wednesday cautioned that while the Indian economy appears capable of weathering the deterioration in geopolitical conditions amid the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war, it faces headwinds from global spillovers from geopolitical tensions, elevated commodity prices and moderating external demand. The RBI, however, did not tinker with the GDP growth projection made in April. It had slashed the GDP growth projection for the fiscal 2022-23 to 7.2 per cent from its earlier forecast of 7.8 per cent.
The Reserve Bank on Wednesday approved a Rs 2.11 lakh crore dividend payout to the central government for 2023-24, more than double the amount it paid for the previous 2022-23 financial year. The decision was taken at the 608th meeting of the Central Board of Directors of the Reserve Bank of India held under the chairmanship of Governor Shaktikanta Das.
Benchmark equity indices Sensex and Nifty declined nearly 1 per cent on Wednesday, falling for the fourth day running amid profit-taking by cautious investors ahead of the results of the Lok Sabha polls. The 30-share BSE Sensex declined 667.55 points or 0.89 per cent to settle at 74,502.90. It went below the 75,000 mark to hit the day's low of 74,454.55, plunging 715.9 points or 0.95 per cent.
Global rating agency Standard & Poor's on Wednesday upgraded India's outlook to positive from stable and affirmed the sovereign 'BB+/B' ratings to the country due to improvement in government finances.
In a dazzling resurgence, foreign investors have graced the Indian equity markets with an influx of nearly Rs 1.5 lakh crore in 2023, fuelled by optimism over the country's resilient economic fundamentals amid shadows of a gloomy global scenario. Experts believe that the positive trend may continue in 2024. This follows Indian equities witnessing the worst-ever net outflow of Rs 1.21 lakh crore by FPIs in 2022 on aggressive rate hikes by the central banks globally after net inflows for three consecutive years.
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