6 stocks to buy this festive season: These are Axis Securities’ top picks

With the Indian economy’s resilience in FY23 to date with an uptick visible in most of the high-frequency indicators, domestic brokerage and research firm Axis Securities has suggested six stocks that investors can consider buying as part of its festive ideas, as it believes the stocks are well-placed to be the beneficiaries of robust festival demand.

Axis Securities' top festive stock picks -

Maruti Suzuki: The brokerage expects a rise in demand from new launches along with upgradation of existing product portfolio, softening commodity inflation and improving ECU shortages to support recovery in the margins.

"The company would gain further market share, driven by an expected shift towards petrol, CNG and hybrid vehicles. Looking at the existing order book we expect the company’s volumes to witness strong growth H2FY23 onwards," the note stated. The brokerage has Buy on the auto stock with a target price of ₹9,801 per share.

Bajaj Finance: The company’s digital initiatives and business transformation are key positives to look forward to and are currently progressing well with sequential improvement visible across metrics, as per Axis Securities which has maintained its Buy tag on the stock with a target price of ₹8,250 per share.

SBI Cards: “Robust business momentum, improving NIMs, and muted credit costs will help SBIC deliver superior RoA/RoE of 6-6.3%/27-28% over the medium term. The RBI’s proposal on linking of RuPay Credit cards with the UPI is structurally positive for the credit card industry as it will help in increasing the acceptance of Credit cards amongst UPI merchants. With over 1 Mn RuPay cards, SBIC should be a key beneficiary of the proposal,” it said while recommending Buy on the stock with a target price of ₹1,050/share.

Trent: Superior store metrics, supply chain optimization, diligent focus on cost rationalization, aggressive store expansion, higher contribution from private brands, and innovative offerings in value space would be key growth drivers in the long run, as per the brokerage. It has Buy rating on the stock with a target of ₹1,530.

Relaxo: “We believe value players such as Relaxo and V-Mart should see earnings and profitability improvement as rural and small towns recover coupled with market share gain from smaller/unorganized players, continued demand for quality value-for-money products in rural and smaller towns, strong festive season, and sustained product additions. We recommend Buy with a TP of ₹1120.”

V-mart: Axis Securities believes value players such as V-Mart should see earnings and profitability improvement as rural and small towns recover coupled with market share gain from smaller/unorganized players, continued demand for quality value-for-money products, strong festive season and sustained product additions. Its Buy rating on the stock comes with a TP of ₹3,350.

The views and recommendations made above are those of individual analysts or broking companies, and not of Mint.