Indices end 1% higher, Sensex jumps 650 pts, Nifty closes at 17,800; Bank shines

Indian benchmark indices soared on Thursday and gained 1% in the session. Sensex added a whopping 660 points to close at 59,688. Nifty ended with a gain of 175 points to close just below 17,800.

Bank indices did exceptionally well, especially PSU Bank which registered a gain of 2.5%. IT and Financial Service indices also ended with decent gains.

Metal remained under pressure throughout the day with Hindalco and Tata Steel topping the list of stocks that dropped in value today.

Shree Cement continued its dream run and added 5% in today's session. BPCL, Axis Bank, and Tech Mahindra also rose above 3%.

Most Asian markets ended in green on Thursday. Japan's Nikkei share average ended at a one-week high on Thursday, tracking Wall Street's overnight strong finish. The Nikkei jumped 2.31%.

China stocks took an exception from the Asian rally and closed lower on Thursday as lingering domestic COVID-19 outbreaks kept sentiment subdued and clouded the economic outlook. The Shanghai Composite Index lost 0.3%.

Hong Kong's main benchmark, meanwhile, dropped for a sixth consecutive session. The Hang Seng Index fell 1%.

European stock markets gained at the open Thursday but pared some of the gains soon.

This was ahead of major policy decisions from Britain and the European Central Bank aimed at tackling sky-high inflation. Some traders estimate central banks will announce a record 75 basis point interest rate hike.

Schneider Electric Infrastructure (SEIL), engaged in the heavy equipment electric segment, is a small cap stock on exchanges. Amidst a strong market rally, SEIL recorded a terrific Thursday with shares hitting a new all-time high. So far in the day, SEIL shares have given more than 17% returns to investors. The stock is currently below ₹200 on Dalal Street and is a multi-bagger. In a span of two years, the shares have skyrocketed by nearly 109% and doubled investors' wealth.

Commerce and industry minister Piyush Goyal has met US-based semiconductor companies to explore greater collaboration with Indian firms amid the ongoing chip shortage globally.

This comes after the union government, earlier this year, approved an outlay of ₹76,000 crore for the development of semiconductors and display manufacturing ecosystem. (Full Story)

Fintech company Angel One Limited continues to add 0.44 million clients to grow its client base to 11.18 million, an 81.9% YoY increase, in August 2022, said the company. The company also recorded growth in its average daily turnover by 117.9% YoY to ₹12.38 trillion.

Angel One recorded 72.53 million orders, a 44.9% YoY increase, processed in August 2022. Meanwhile, the company’s Overall Equity Market Share stands at 21.5% for the month. Angel One’s Average Client Funding Book for August 2022 stood at ₹13.72 billion.

ICICI Bank share price today hit a new life-time high of ₹900.80 apiece on NSE in early morning deals. ICICI Bank share price opened upside on Thursday morning session and went on to climb to its new record high. Incidentally, this has happened one day after the private lender clarified on news of ₹10,000 core fund raise through infra bonds in one or more tranches. In its reply to the exchanges, ICICI Bank Limited made it clear that it has the requisite annual board approvals which permits the issuance of bonds or securities. It also said that the information in this regard has been shared with the exchanges in its previous exchange filing.

An Indian central bank official said on Thursday that a focus on spending on infrastructure would help the country contain long-term, supply-side inflation.

Sitikantha Pattanaik, an executive director at the Reserve Bank of India, was speaking at an event in New Delhi.

Ashima Goyal, a member of India's Monetary Policy Committee, told the event that uneven rainfall in some regions could impact crop output and may not augur well for inflation. (Reuters)

Aris Infra, a Mumbai-based business-to-business (B2B) platform in construction and infrastructure materials, on Thursday said it has acquired a majority stake in Unitern Advisors, a Bengaluru-based end-to-end real estate solution provider. The acquisition--at enterprise valuation of $13 million--was funded by a combination of stock and cash.

The new entity, ArisUnitern, will provide advisory services, working capital solutions, access to construction materials at a single click in a seamless manner bringing the full on a combined platform. (Full Story)

Finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Thursday said that importing Russian oil was part of the country's inflation management strategy and that other countries were also doing something similar.

While attending ICRIER Conference on Taming Inflation in Delhi, the finance minister said, "I give credit to the statesmanship of the prime minister to make sure globally that we did keep up the relationship with all countries but yet managed to get the Russian fuel which is what Japan is doing today, which is what some other countries are doing." (Full Report)

The Ministry of Finance is all set to start the exercise to prepare the annual Budget for the next financial year -- 2023-24 -- from October 10.

"Pre-budget meetings chaired by the secretary (Expenditure) shall commence on October 10, 2022," the Budget Division of the Department of Economic Affairs said.

"Financial advisers should ensure that the necessary details required in appendices I to VII are properly entered. Hard copies of the data along with specified formats should be submitted for cross-verification," it added. (PTI)

Cement stocks have been rallying in the past few days and domestic brokerage and research firm Motilal Oswal expects cement demand to rise 2-3% YoY in July-August 2022 (5-6% on a three-year CAGR basis). Demand in a few markets (such as Punjab) was impacted by sand unavailability issues. However, it expects cement demand to improve after the monsoon season ends.

UltraTech Cement is Motilal Oswal's top stock picks in the largecap space. The brokerage house has preferred Dalmia Bharat shares and Birla Corp in the midcap space. (Full report)

European stock markets rose at the open Thursday, ahead of major policy decisions from Britain and the European Central Bank aimed at tackling sky-high inflation.

London's benchmark FTSE 100 index climbed 0.3% to 7,261.10 points.

In the eurozone, Frankfurt's DAX index gained 0.6% to 12,995.52 points and the Paris CAC 40 won 0.5% to 6,133.15.

New British Prime Minister Liz Truss was Thursday expected to announce that she will freeze domestic fuel bills to help ease the burden of a UK cost-of-living crisis.

Meanwhile in Frankfurt, the ECB is forecast to hike eurozone interest rates by a record-high 75 basis points. (AFP)

Kunal Vora, Head of India Equity Research, BNP Paribas India:

· Domestic macro improving but risk-reward unfavourable

· Nifty has witnessed c4% consensus earnings estimates cuts so far

· Gross margins back to high-yield/inflation period

· Global risks to remain elevated; domestic macro situation indicates a mixed picture with more positives

· Slowing global demand, lofty valuations; we remain cautious with a bias for growth at a reasonable price

BNP PARIBAS Top Picks - Axis Bank, HDFC Bank, Infosys, Bharti Airtel, Sun Pharma, ITC and Whirlpool

Reserve Bank of India Deputy Governor M Rajeshwar Rao on Thursday said the recently released digital lending norms are designed to end regulatory arbitrage and protect customers.

Speaking at an event organised by industry body Assocham, Rao said there was unbridled engagement of third parties, misselling, breach of data privacy, unethical recovery practices and exorbitant interest rates recently which led the RBI to regulate the activities.

On August 10, RBI came out with digital lending norms after extensive consultations and last week asked the industry to implement those by November this year.

Some players in the fintech industry have expressed concerns that the norms on lending will impact their operations. (PTI)

Asian benchmarks mostly rose Thursday, as investor optimism got a perk from a rally on Wall Street that's on track to break a three-week losing streak. Japan's benchmark Nikkei 225 surged 2.3% to finish at 28,065.28.

Shares of Sonata Software Ltd rallied more than 7% on the BSE at ₹576 apiece on the BSE in Thursday's early trading session as the IT stock started trading ex-bonus today, ahead of the record date for its bonus issue of equity shares that it had recommended in the ratio of 1:3 and revised the record date to Saturday, September 10, 2022. (Full Story)

Metal index remain under pressure, while IT and Bank indices are trading higher. Shree Cement once again zoomed today, adding 6%.

Tirthankar Das, Technical & Derivative Analyst, Retail, Ashika Stock Broking Ltd: On the technical front, Nifty long bull candle after opening lower with this the Index has now entered second consecutive day of decline however buying interest at lower levels indicates that emergence of buying interest at the lower levels is likely to act positively for the market. Market though has been restricted to head higher but with positive market breadth and outperformance of our domestic Index in comparison to its global peers might propel to challenge the immediate resistance of 17700-17750 zone while on the downside crucial support is placed at 17350 hence the broader trading zone for Index is amidst 17400-17800 and until we see a breakout on either side, traders are advised to be stock specific and avoid index directional trades. Present setup though indicates that Nifty can move towards 17,992 followed by 18,114 in the coming days. During the day index is likely to open on a positive note due to positive global cues and decreasing crude oil prices hence intraday decline need to be hunted to create long position in the market with an upside target of 17,900-18,000 in near term.

Fitch Group's unit CreditSights said it had discovered calculation errors in its recent debt report on two power and transmission companies controlled by India's richest person, Gautam Adani, following a conversation with the management. Its report last month called the conglomerate ‘deeply overleveraged’ and flagged other risks.

In a note published following a call with the conglomerate’s management, CreditSights cited elevated leverage at one unit and for another the risk of future acquisitions hurting its credit profile. But there was no mention of the word “deeply," and the Fitch Group unit also corrected a profit and a debt figure for Adani Transmission Ltd. and Adani Power Ltd. respectively. (Full Report)

Retail sales of automobiles in India grew 8.31 per cent in August this year on the back of increase in registrations of vehicles across all major segments, automobile dealers' body FADA said on Thursday.

As per data released by the Federation of Automobile Dealers Associations (FADA), total vehicle retail sales in the country stood at 15,21,490 units last month as compared to 14,04,704 units in August 2021.

Passenger vehicles (PV) retail sales stood at 2,74,448 units as compared to 2,57,672 units in the year-ago month, a growth of 6.51 per cent.

Two-wheeler (2W) retail sales also grew by 8.52 per cent at 10,74,266 units in August 2022 as against 9,89,969 units in the same month last year, it added. (PTI)

India has logged 6,395 new covid-19 cases and 33 deaths in the last 24 hours, the union health ministry data showed on Thursday. The country’s active caseload is nearly 50,000 while total number of covid cases rose to 4.4 crore with 5,28,090 fatalities so far. (Full Report)

Amit Jain, Co-founder, Ashika Global Family Office Services: India leaped past the UK in the final three months of 2021 to become the fifth-biggest economy. The Indian economy is expected to grow more than 7% this year. A sharp rebound in Indian stocks this quarter has seen their weighting rise to the second spot in the MSCI Emerging Markets Index, trailing only China.

IMF’s forecast show India overtaking the UK in dollar terms on an annual basis, positioning it right behind US, China, Japan and Germany. Rising and thriving each day.

Accelya Solutions India(formerly Accelya Kale) is a software solutions provider to the global airline and travel industry. On 3 August 2022, the company declared a final dividend to the tune of ₹45 per share (450% on face value).

The record date for payout of the final dividend is 10 October 2022. The stock will trade ex-dividend on 6 October 2022.

Combined with the interim dividend, the total dividend for financial year 2021-22 comes to ₹62 per share. 

(Read this article to know why you need to keep track of the companies which are paying out high dividends)

Oil prices rose nearly $1 per barrel on Thursday after dropping through key technical support levels in the previous session, as an energy standoff between European nations and Russia focused investor minds on how tight fuel supply may become.

Brent crude futures rose by 91 cents, or 1%, to $88.91 per barrel by 0331 GMT after closing at their lowest since early February in the previous session. U.S. crude futures were up 95 cents, or 1.2%, at $82.89 per barrel.

Prices drew support from Russian President Vladimir Putin's threat to halt the country's oil and gas exports if price caps are imposed by European buyers. (Reuters)

India will seek review of its free trade agreement with Japan during a meeting between Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal and his Japanese counterpart in Los Angeles on Thursday.

Nishimura Yasutoshi is the Japanese Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry.

In such reviews, normally two countries seek more market access for their respective domestic products and resolve issues which are hindering trade. (PTI)

Market uncertainties notwithstanding, Indian investors have pumped in around ₹11,500 crore into small-cap mutual funds since the start of the year.

Experts say that many quality companies in this space have witnessed significant correction over the past six months, and are thus attracting a lot of interest from value investors who are looking to invest in quality companies at compelling valuations. (Full story)

Sameet Chavan, chief analyst-technical and derivatives, Angel One Ltd: For the third consecutive session, we witnessed a gap down opening on the back of nervous global cues. Similar to previous sessions, the early morning dip once again got bought into. Thereafter, the range bound action continued with a lot of stock specific moves to attract the market participants. Eventually, the Nifty ended the session marginally in the range above the 17600 mark.

The overall strength in our domestic market is providing the cushion at lower levels; whereas the uncertainty in US bourses is not letting us surpass the higher range. In our sense, it’s a matter of time we would see oversold US markets rebound, which will provide the much needed impetus to our key indices. As far as levels are concerned, the sturdy wall remains unchanged at 17700 - 17800; whereas on the flipside, 17600 followed by 17500 are to be treated as key supports. 

Online sales during the 2022 festival season is likely to grow 28% year-on-year to touch $11.8 billion, according to estimates by Redseer Strategy Consultants.

The festival season is generally defined as a period starting from the first sales event and lasting roughly till Diwali week, including non-sale or business-as-usual days in between. Redseer estimates sales to reach $ 5.9 billion in the first week itself. Compared to pre-pandemic sales in 2018, Redseer projects online festive sales to triple in gross merchandise value or GMV this year. (Full Story)

The government will invite bids for battery storage projects from players looking to invest in the renewable energy sector, Union Minister RK Singh said on Wednesday.

Bids will also be invited for green hydrogen and green ammonia projects, the power, new and renewable energy minister said at 'India Ideas Summit' organised by the US-India Business Council (USIBC) here.

Singh also informed that the bid for 1,000 MW storage project invited by the government earlier has been finalised.

"The bids which I got...(are) quite expensive. The only way to bring down the prices of solar is to start manufacturing here. That is what we are going to do...," he said. (PTI)

Consumer electronics manufacturers, and online and offline retailers, are relying on the festive season to recoup a tough year for sales so far.

The industry is hoping that deep discounts during the festive season, along with new product launches, and consumers’ looking to upgrade to 5G phones, will help make up for the sales lost during the first half of the year due to supply constraints and weak demand. (Full Story)

Hybrid working is here to stay as about 63 per cent of corporates are currently embracing the flexible model, according to a survey by Colliers India.

Real estate consultant Colliers surveyed occupiers of office space to understand their current and future workplace strategies.

The survey was carried out during May-June 2022 across various occupier segments and about 300 responses were received from occupiers. Small-sized (less than 500 employees), mid-sized (501-5000 employees) and large-sized firms (over 5,000 employees) participated in the survey. (PTI)

Gautam Adani, the world’s third richest man, on Wednesday said his group would set up three gigafactories as part of its commitment to invest $70 billion in green energy and related businesses. This will lead to one of the world’s most integrated green energy value chains, Adani said.

Adani added that these gigafactories and planned investments will generate an additional 45 gigawatts (GW) of renewable energy to add to the group’s existing 20GW capacity and 3 million tonnes of hydrogen—all of which will be completed before 2030. (Full Story)

STOCK IN FOCUS

Wipro (CMP Rs.407)

We have Buy rating on Wipro with a 1-Yr Target Price of Rs480, valuing the stock at a P/E multiple of 18.5x FY24E EPS.

Intraday Picks

AXISBANK (PREVIOUS CLOSE: 755) BUY

For today’s trade, long position can be initiated in the range of ₹745- 750 for the target of Rs. 810 with a strict stop loss of ₹735.

HDFCLIFE (PREVIOUS CLOSE: 577) BUY

For today’s trade, long position can be initiated in the range of ₹570- 574 for the target of Rs. 585 with a strict stop loss of ₹566.

ESCORTS (PREVIOUS CLOSE: 1992) SELL

For today’s trade, short position can be initiated in the range of ₹2020- 2040 for the target of Rs.1975 with a strict stop loss of ₹2050.

Domestic airlines industry is expected to report a net loss of around ₹15,000-17,000 crore this fiscal on account of elevated price of Aviation Turbine Fuel (ATF) and a weak rupee, a report said on Wednesday.

The losses for the industry in the previous fiscal were estimated at around ₹23,000 crore, credit ratings agency Icra said in its report.

However, the debt levels for the industry are expected to be at around ₹1 lakh crore (including lease liabilities) as on March 31, 2023, as per the ratings agency. (PTI)

Bitcoin price today rose to trade above the $19,000 level. The world's largest and most popular cryptocurrency was trading more than 3% higher at $19,213. The global crypto market cap today was back below the $1 trillion mark, as it was up over 3% in the last 24 hours at $1.02 trillion, as per CoinGecko. (Read More)

The initial public offer of Tamilnad Mercantile Bank got subscribed 2.86 times on the last day of subscription on Wednesday.

The ₹831.6-crore public offer received bids for 2,49,39,292 shares against 87,12,000 shares on offer, according to an update with the NSE.

Retail individual investors' category received 6.48 times subscription, while the quota for non-institutional investors was subscribed 2.94 times. The category for qualified institutional buyers (QIBs) got 1.62 times subscription.

The initial public offer of 1.58 crore equity shares had a price range of ₹500-525 a share. Private sector lender Tamilnad Mercantile Bank on Friday mobilised a little over ₹363 crore from anchor investors. (PTI)

Singtel entities on Wednesday have jointly offloaded a 1.76% stake in Bharti Airtel for about ₹7,128 crore, according to sources.

Bharti Airtel promoter Bharti Telecom Ltd has bought a 1.63% stake from Singtel entity Pastel Ltd for ₹6,602 crore through an open market transaction.

According to the bulk deal data available with the National Stock Exchange (NSE), Bharti Telecom purchased 9,62,34,427 shares, amounting to a 1.63 per cent stake in the company.

The shares were acquired at an average price of ₹686 apiece, taking the transaction value to ₹6,601.68 crore. (PTI)

Delta Corp will continue to remain under the F&O ban stock list for the fourth day. The stock will be under the ban for the F&O segment as it has crossed 95% of the market-wide position limit (MWPL), as per the NSE. (Full Story)

Russian President Vladimir Putin threatened to halt all energy shipments to Europe if Brussels goes ahead with a proposal to cap the price of Russian gas and suggested restricting a U.N.-brokered deal for Ukrainian grain exports via the Black Sea.

In a combative speech to an economic forum in Russia's Far East region, Putin said on Wednesday that Russia would not lose its war in Ukraine, which he says is being waged to ensure Russian security and to protect Russian speakers there. (Full Story)

Rakesh Gangwal, co-founder of India’s biggest airline, IndiGo, will sell up to a 2.8% stake in Interglobe Aviation Ltd through a block deal that will fetch him at least $250 million, according to deal terms reviewed by Mint. The selling shareholders include Rakesh Gangwal, Shobha Gangwal and The Chinkerpoo Family Trust, collectively the Rakesh Gangwal promoter group, which owned a 36.6% stake in the airline as of 30 June. (Full Report)

Tokyo stocks opened higher Thursday as investors cheered rallies on Wall Street while keeping an eye on a surging dollar driven by lingering fears of aggressive US rate hikes.

The benchmark Nikkei 225 index jumped 1.21%, or 331.14 points, to 27,761.44 in early trade, while the broader Topix index added 1.18%, or 22.70 points, to 1,938.35.

US stocks staged a broad rebound following slides in recent weeks, while investors cheered a drop in US Treasury yields that sent bond prices higher.

But the market remained cautious about the Federal Reserve's campaign to tame inflation amid fears that its aggressive rate hikes may harm growth. (AFP)

With a market worth of ₹14.03 Cr, Kaarya Facilities & Services Ltd. is a small-cap company that engages in the commercial services industry. The company provides a wide range of services for facilities management needs, including specialized cleaning and hygiene services, housekeeping, pantry, MEP (Mechanical, Electrical, Handyman services - repair & maintenance), pest control, landscaping, guest house management, and façade cleaning. The shares of Kaarya Facilities & Services Ltd opened today at ₹29.75 apiece and closed today at an upper circuit limit of ₹30.00 with an upside gap of 19.52% from the previous close. The total number of shares traded today was 18,000 shares. (Full Report)