The Reserve Bank on Monday barred IIFL Finance Ltd from disbursing gold loans, with immediate effect following multiple supervisory concerns, including serious deviations in assaying and certifying the purity of the yellow metal. A leading financial services provider, IIFL Finance offers a range of loans and mortgages. The latest directions from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) pertain to only the gold loan business.
Stocks in the automotive, financial, cement, metal, and hotel sectors are likely to benefit if the Narendra Modi-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) comes back to power for a third time. The key investment themes have been identified after analysing the Sankalp Patra - the party's manifesto for the next five years - released on Sunday.
The liquidity in the banking system moved into surplus almost after three months as the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) absorbed over Rs 40,000 crore from the market on Monday, predominantly on the back of increased government spending. However, this situation may be short-lived given the higher demand for funds to pay taxes and year-end targets, treasury executives said. Meanwhile, two variable reverse repo rate (VRRR) auctions held on Tuesday received weak response.
'The deal pipeline across products is robust for 2024.'
In January, overseas investors had pumped in Rs 33,688.19 crore (Rs 336.88 billion) in Indian debt and equities.
Foreign Portfolio Investors (FPIs) continued their buying spree and poured close to Rs 4,800 crore in the Indian equity markets in the first week of January driven by confidence in the country's robust economic fundamentals. Additionally, they injected Rs 4,000 crore in the debt market during the period under review, data with the depositories showed. With expectations of a prolonged decline in US interest rates in 2024, there is an anticipation that FPIs will likely escalate their purchase, particularly in the initial months of the New Year leading up to the general elections, V K Vijayakumar, chief investment strategist at Geojit Financial Services, said.
Equity fundraising through qualified institutional placements (QIPs) has gained traction, thanks to supportive equity markets and the need for fresh fundraising to meet capital expenditure (capex) requirements.
'Given the inherent volatility, investors should take at least a three to five-year view.'
Credit-to-deposit (CD) ratio of major public sector and private sector banks during the October-December quarter of FY24 inched up as compared to the previous quarter though government-owned lenders reported a lower rate than their private peers. CD ratio is the ratio of the funds that banks lend as compared to the funds raised in the form of deposits. The CD ratio of top public sector banks (PSBs) - State Bank of India, Punjab National Bank, Bank of Baroda and Canara Bank - was lower than their private counterparts.
The Supreme Court on Friday asked the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) what the capital markets regulator intends to do for ensuring the protection of investors from extreme volatility in the stock market.
JM Financial on Wednesday said it had a "careful and detailed review" of the Reserve Bank's order imposing restrictions on the company's financing business and asserted that there was "no material deficiencies" in its loan sanctioning process. The Reserve Bank on Tuesday imposed restrictions on JM Financial Products Ltd after it found the company indulged in various manipulations, including repeatedly helping a group of its customers to bid for various IPOs (initial public offerings) by using loaned funds. "After careful and detailed review of the order issued by the RBI on the action against JM Financial Products Ltd, we strongly believe that there have been no material deficiencies in our loan sanctioning process.
The recent price correction in broader markets has hit cement companies hard. So far in the current month, smallcap firms like Visaka Industries, Andhra Cements NCL Industries, Sahyadri Industries, and KCP have lost 19.7 per cent, 14.3 per cent, 13.8 per cent, 13.5 per cent, and 11.5 per cent, respectively. On the contrary, largecap companies, while registering losses for the month, have seen a softer blow.
Several mutual funds (MFs) have recently approached the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) as they renew efforts to increase their overseas investment limit. In June 2022, the capital markets regulator Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) permitted MFs to invest in foreign stocks within the aggregate mandated limit of $7 billion after a correction in stocks. One of the proposals shared with the RBI is to link MFs' foreign investment limit to the country's foreign exchange reserves.
RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das on Thursday said the central bank does not "emulate" others when it comes to regulations and asserted that the bank's as well as his own opposition to cryptocurrencies remain unchanged, a day after US regulators allowed bitcoin Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs). He also said that emerging markets and the world cannot afford to have a "crypto mania". "What is good for another market need not be good for us.
Swift gains on Dalal Street this year have also led to a sharp surge in shares of equity market intermediaries like depositories, exchanges, and registrar and transfer Agents (RTAs). The stock prices of BSE, CDSL, CAMS, and KFin Technologies are up 24-283 per cent so far in 2023 when compared to a 9 per cent rise in the benchmark Nifty index. With the market buoyancy expected to keep up the pace, analysts believe these stocks are a good long-term bet despite the sharp rally, which can trigger an intermittent correction.
The total number of unique investors directly investing in the stock market has surged to 80 million for the first time, with the latest 10 million additions taking place in just eight months, according to data shared by the National Stock Exchange (NSE), the country's largest bourse. "The 80 million unique PAN (permanent account number) investors correspond approximately to around 50 million unique households in India amounting to around 17 per cent households directly investing in the Indian stock market via NSE's extensive nationwide network of trading members," said the exchange. In 2021, the number of domestic households were pegged at 300 million.
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said Sebi would develop new products in the commodity derivatives space apart from taking steps to deepen the corporate bond market.
'Valuations of midcaps and smallcaps have reached very high levels, and hence to that extent leave little margin of safety.'
With the government clearing the decks for direct listing at the Gujarat International Finance Tec-City (GIFT City) International Financial Services Centre (IFSC), issuers will wait for the ecosystem to develop further before firming up their listing plans. In the meantime, most companies may continue to prefer listing in the onshore market, even as the new avenue provides key benefits such as tax waivers and reduced foreign exchange risk. Sources said that a few key things need to be ironed out further.
Capital markets regulator Sebi has kept in 'abeyance' the proposed initial share sale of securities depository NSDL. However, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) did not clarify further. The National Securities Depository Ltd (NSDL) filed its preliminary papers with the capital markets regulator on July 7.
'They have since only tried to improve systems. Also, with regulatory guidance from time to time, we are in a position to assess a situation and react in time.'
'Clients deemed higher-risk are required to update their KYC more frequently.'
The benchmark Nifty and Sensex could see another 8-10 per cent from the current levels, said HDFC Securities in its outlook for equity markets in 2024. The brokerage said that the market movement in the next year will not be linear, and there will be more volatility. When asked about the market reaction to the General Elections in 2024, Dhiraj Relli, managing director and CEO of HDFC Securities, said more than the outcome of the elections, the market movement in the next three to four months will decide the market trajectory post elections.
The retail broking industry's top line could more than double over the next five years, according to the estimates of consultancy firm Bain & Company. The industry, which facilitates stock market trading for investors, has already witnessed its revenues double from Rs 14,000 crore during 2018-19 (FY19) to Rs 27,000 crore in 2022-23 (FY23), reflecting an annualised growth rate of 17 per cent. "This growth has been fuelled by the emergence of India's mass-affluent and affluent segments, coupled with increasing financial literacy.
Investors are keenly focused on new govt's first full-year Budget.
Banks are likely to see their net interest margins (NIM) - broadly the difference between interest earned on loans and paid on deposits - shrink by another 30 basis points (bps) over the next few quarters. After hitting a peak of 3.3 per cent in the third quarter (Q3) of the financial year ended March 31, 2023 (FY23), NIMs have been on a downward trajectory, touching 3.13 per cent in Q2FY24 on higher cost of funds, according to capital markets firm CARE Ratings. Banks are still grappling with the Reserve Bank of India's policy rate increases - that have made deposits costlier as the interest payable to customers has increased - and the regulatory actions on unsecured lending.
Mutual funds (MFs) are seeing higher growth in new systematic investment plan (SIP) accounts in rural areas (beyond 30 or B30 centres) compared to the top 30 (T30) cities. However, the average inflows from these areas remain significantly lower than those from the larger centres. Data from the Association of Mutual Funds in India reveals that investors from B30 contributed Rs 1,725 on average to MFs through SIPs, which is 70 per cent lower than the average ticket size of T30 investors at Rs 2,940.
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.
Overall, net investment by foreign investors stood at Rs 2.58 lakh crore in 2014.
'We do not see people getting reduced, but because of automation, we will do more work.'
Assuming we still have a Modi-led majority government after May 2024, there is no guarantee that reforms will move at anything more than a snail's pace, though we must be thankful even for that, notes R Jagannathan.
The Securities Appellate Tribunal (SAT) has set aside capital markets regulator Sebi's order that imposed a penalty of Rs 5.25 crore on Cairn India for making a misleading announcement regarding buyback of shares in 2014. Cairn India, which was merged with Vedanta Ltd in 2017, was accused of making a misleading public announcement designed to influence investors' decisions. "We hold that the violations of provisions of... the Prohibition of Fraudulent and Unfair Trade Practices (PFUTP) Regulations and... the Buyback Regulations are not proved against the company (Vedanta)," a bench consisting of Justice Tarun Agarwala and presiding officer Meera Swarup said.
Jio Financial Services Limited, the demerged financial services unit of Reliance Industries, will be excluded from various indices of NSE, including the benchmark Nifty 50, from September 7. Shares of Jio Financial got listed on the stock exchanges on August 21, after its spin-off from parent Reliance Industries. In accordance with the index methodology, as JIOFIN has not hit price band on two consecutive trading days on September 4 and 5 at NSE, the Index Maintenance Sub Committee (Equity) of NSE Indices Ltd has decided to exclude JIOFIN from various indices effective from September 7, 2023 (close of September 6, 2023), as per a statement by NSE Indices Ltd on Tuesday.
'We have not seen too many large deals compared to last quarter.'
Domestic investors are tightening their grip on the ownership of listed companies. The gap between the shareholding of domestic institutional investors (DIIs) and foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) narrowed to 13.11 percentage points at the end of the September 2023 quarter. At the peak, the gap was nearly 50 percentage points in March 2015, according to an analysis by Prime Database, a leading provider of data on the capital market.
'We like certain stocks from banking, insurance, retail, hospitals and capital goods.' 'Though some of these stocks may seem expensive, they will compound well over the long term, thus justifying their current multiples.'
Mutual funds focused on small-caps have emerged as the winner with a net inflow of close to Rs 11,000 crore in April-June quarter, as fund managers struggle to create alpha in the large-cap space, and the trend is expected to continue for some time. On the other hand, large-cap space, which is yet to pick up momentum, witnessed an outflow of Rs 3,360 crore during the quarter under review, data from the Association of Mutual Funds in India (Amfi) showed. Apart from the June quarter, small-cap funds logged an inflow of Rs 6,932 crore in three months that ended in March.
The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) has for the first time proposed to regulate online platforms offering fractional ownership in real estate, a model already popular in countries like the United States and UAE. In a consultation paper floated recently, the capital markets regulator stated that such fractional ownership of real estate assets was proposed to be brought as MSM (micro, small, medium) REITs under Sebi (Real Estate Investment Trusts) Regulations. This model allows investors to own a fraction or a small share in a real estate asset like buildings and office spaces, which could include warehouses, shopping centres, conference centres.
Despite multiple headwinds at the start of 2023, the Indian markets delivered a strong performance, posting 19-20 per cent growth for the year. Even as new records were set, investor sentiment remains strong going into 2024, given the lower inflation, expectations of steady to lower interest rates, higher economic growth, and strong inflows. However, the overriding concern for most brokerages is valuations.
The Securities Appellate Tribunal (SAT) has granted an interim stay on a Sebi order that slapped a penalty of Rs 2 crore on Yes Bank's former MD Rana Kapoor in a case of mis-selling the private sector lender's AT1 bonds. Kapoor has been in jail since March 2020 in connection with the DHFL money laundering case. The interim relief came after capital markets regulator Sebi in July issued a demand notice to Kapoor, warning arrest and attachment of his assets over non-payment of the fine of Rs 2 crore, along with the interest.
© 2026 Rediff.com - Investor Information - Advertise with us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy - Sitemap - Feedback - About us - Terms of use - Grievances