Global rating agency Moody's said India's economic growth remains weak and there is little chance of recovery next year.
If customers did not see value in what we provide them at the price point at which we provide these, they would not have been there with us in such a competitive market, says HDFC deputy managing director Paresh Sukthankar.
The Reserve Bank of India on Thursday raised its inflation projection to 5.1-4.7 per cent for the second half of the current fiscal on the back of spike in prices of vegetables such as onion and tomatoes.
Liquidity continues to be a worry for both, customers and dealers, with the latter facing working capital issues.
Metals, auto and banking shares were in the limelight in this session; the FMCG pack, however, ended lower.
Ban on high-value currency sends advertising industry into a tailspin.
The previous bout of Fed withdrawal fears had threatened to spark a crisis of confidence in India -- sending the rupee to a record low of 68.85 in late August and leading to steep falls in bonds and stocks.
Policymakers have been grappling with high prices for food staples such as onions and potatoes even after the central bank raised interest rates by a quarter percentage point in each of its previous two reviews.
While the farmers are not getting remunerative prices for their produce, at the same time they are forced to pay high prices for items they consume.
Sensex ended up 41 points at 29,136 and Nifty gained 4 pts to 8,809.
RBI recently cut repo by 0.25 percentage point, taking the rate to 7.25 per cent in three reductions since January.
With the stock markets scaling new heights, Finance Minister P Chidambaram on Friday sounded a note of caution and asked investors to guard against excessive exuberance.
Despite admitting to price pressures both from food items and input prices, RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das on Wednesday hoped that a normal Southwest monsoon will have a "soothing impact" on inflation pressures and ruled out any wide variations in medium-term inflation forecast from what was given in April. In an unscheduled address earlier in the day amidst the raging pandemic, Das said the overall outlook for the economy is highly uncertain and is clouded with downside risks. He offered a slew of relief and liquidity measures to individuals and small businesses apart from a Rs 50,000 crore special liquidity window to the healthcare sector.
Rate sensitive sectors were among the top gainers with Tata Motors and ICICI Bank leading the gains on the Sensex.
In a surprise move, the Reserve Bank on Wednesday left the repo rate unchanged at 7.75 per cent, while the cash reserve ratio too is retained at 4 per cent.
While commercial vehicle (CV) sales were the worst hit, down by 21 per cent to 67,793 units from 85,833 units, two-wheeler sales dropped by 16 per cent to 12,64,169 units from 15,00,545 units. Passenger car sales dropped nine per cent to 215,716 units from 236,586 units.
RBI is closely monitoring monsoon.
The repo rate has been unchanged since January, when the RBI increased it by a quarter percentage point.
Raghuram Rajan, who was Chief Economic Advisor in the Finance Ministry before taking over as RBI Governor on September 4, is scheduled to announce the next mid-quarter policy review on December 18.
The economic survey for 2020-21 has suggested revision in the weightage of food items to gauge the true picture of inflation in the country, and said new sources of price data also need to be incorporated in the wake of increasing retail e-commerce transactions. As per the survey, the current spike in consumer price-based retail inflation of food prices is mainly a supply-side phenomenon. The survey noted that the weights of all items in retail inflation are based on the NSO household consumption expenditure survey of 2011-12, adding the weight of food items in the index might have significantly decreased over the decade since then.
Some say the MPC will raise the rate, while others are of the view that there is already de facto interest rate tightening through rising bond yields, which might prompt the central bank to go for a pause.
Sensex may remain under pressure this week due to weak global factors.
RBI's status quo on rates disappoints economists.
The broader markets ended in line with the benchmark indices- BSE Midcap and Smallcap indices ended higher by 1.3% and 0.9% each.
The global financial services major had earlier said that the central bank would keep its policy rates on hold.
Initial share sales are set to dazzle the Dalal Street in 2022 too as companies are expected to garner up to Rs 1.5 lakh crore in the New Year, continuing with the bullish momentum after 2021 turned out to be the best IPO year in two decades for the Indian market. Excessive liquidity and increased retail investor participation ensured a persistent euphoria in the Initial Public Offer (IPO) space wherein companies mopped up more than Rs 1.2 lakh crore this year even as pandemic gloom shadowed the broader economy. In 2022, the higher amount of funds through the primary market will be largely driven by the mega IPO of state-owned Life Insurance Corp (LIC).
According to the global financial services major, the Consumer Price Index based inflation is peaking off and is expected to be around 7.5-8 per cent in September.
Costlier fruits and vegetables such as onions and tomatoes pushed retail inflation to a nine-month high of 11.24 per cent in November, making it harder for the Reserve Bank to lower interest rates.
Scores of employees took to social media to express disappointment and said they were asked to resign over WhatsApp calls. On Twitter, some said they had been asked to resign by May 31 and that there was no severance package and salary would be paid only for May.
The country saw two straight years of deficient monsoons.
CPI inflation is on the decline since July.
New Reserve Bank of India chief makes his first monetary policy statement on Friday with expectations he may scale back some of the emergency measures that have helped the rupee bounce from a record low.
In October, CPI inflation was 5 per cent.
According to the global financial services major, inflation may remain sticky, with a possible El Nino effect on the monsoon likely to push up food prices and geopolitical uncertainties seen pumping up global commodity rates.
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As on Monday, the prices of many vegetables had fallen as much as 50% compared with those a month before, due to increased supply, following the arrival of winter crops in the markets.
The rupee has posted its biggest single-day fall in more than four months to end at 62.95 against the dollar.
Softening of global commodity prices might not help much
Jaitley said inflation has been under control for long and is likely to remain so on the back of good monsoon and unlikely spike in oil prices.
The Reserve Bank of India's latest data indicate that spending per card is rising steadily - something that consumers should worry about
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