-kiyD--621x414@LiveMint_1643850975257.JPG "Stock Market Today: Sensex, Nifty had a negative start on Thursday")
PremiumIndian indices witnessed a negative start on Thursday. The previous three sessions saw the key indices extend gains. Strong earnings from US tech firms on Wednesday helped global stocks close higher. The OPEC+ plans for moderate oil output helped to counter jitters over weak economic reports. On Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.63% and the S&P 500 gained 0.94%. The Nasdaq Composite added 0.5%. Crude oil eyed seven-year highs and the dollar eased. In Asia, among the few markets that are open, shares in South Korea advanced over 2%, while Japan and Australia witnessed decline.
Lenders to India's Future Retail have started classifying loans to the retailer as a "non-performing asset" after the company missed payments to the banks, they told the country's Supreme Court in a filing seen by Reuters.
The lenders also said they would be required by law to provision 80 billion-90 billion Indian rupees ($1.07 billion-$1.2 billion) in their books on account of the default by the country's second-largest retailer.
"Lenders have already classified/begun classifying the loan account of FRL as a non-performing asset ("NPA") since the payment was not made within" the stipulated time, they said in the filing, reviewed by Reuters.
The brokerage firm ICICI Securities has retained its Buy rating on multibagger stock Neogen Chemicals with a target price of ₹2,160 apiece with target period of around twelve months, on the back of better growth outlook from custom synthesis business.
The rupee declined 8 paise to 74.91 against the US dollar in opening trade on Thursday weighed down by the strength of the American currency and muted domestic equities.
Forex traders said elevated crude oil prices also dragged down the local unit.
At the interbank foreign exchange, the rupee opened at 74.84 against the US dollar, then slipped further to 74.91, registering a decline of 8 paise over the last close.
The rupee on Wednesday had settled at 74.83 against the American currency.
Though the ongoing third COVID wave poses a threat to near-term earnings of the hospitality sector, higher vaccination and lower hospitalization rates will lead to a much stronger rebound than the second wave. Thus, brokerage Motilal Oswal views this weakness as a buying opportunity for Indian Hotel shares.
As the last quarter of the financial year is about to end, all eyes are on the mega initial public offering (IPO) of LIC. The government is likely to file draft papers for LIC IPO with market regulator Sebi by next week, news agency PTI reported quoting a top official.
The three-day initial public offering (IPO) of Vedant Fashions Ltd, which owns ethnic wear brand Manyavar, will open for public subscription on Friday, February 4, 2022 and conclude on February 8. The price band has been fixed at ₹824-866 for its initial share sale.
Metals and mining company Vedanta Limited on Thursday issued a statement in which it denied media reports of combining Vedanta Resources with self. The company said that such reports are speculative & misleading to investors as no such proposal is under consideration.
10 Companies to Add to Your Watchlist
Shares of select tyre manufacturers took a hit in opening deals on Thursday, falling 2-3.5% on the National Stock Exchange. The decline was the result of the Competition Commission of India (CCI) announcing a monetary penalty on five major tyre manufacturers for "indulging in cartelisation".
The Union Budget has laid down a strong platform for capacity creation and productivity improvement for the economy. We believe that Banks like ICICI Bank, SBI, HDFC Bank can witness strong lending growth coupled with margin expansion on the back of assets getting repriced faster than liabilities. Another sector that should do well is Capital Goods since the Government wants new capacities to come in, and thus the additional PLI schemes getting announced. Some of the stocks we recommend in the Capital Goods sector are Siemens, Voltamp Transformers, and L&T.
India's dominant services sector expanded at its slowest pace in six months in January as restrictions due to a new wave of COVID-19 cases and surging prices weighed on demand, a private survey showed.
The IHS Markit Services Purchasing Managers' Index slumped to 51.5 in January from 55.5 in December, far below the 53.0 expected in a Reuters poll of economists but still above the 50-mark separating growth from contraction.
"The escalation of the pandemic and reintroduction of curfews had a detrimental impact on growth across the service sector," noted Pollyanna De Lima, economics associate director at IHS Markit.
We believe strong growth in kitchen appliances and Non-South region are DCF accretive. We continue to like V-Guard’s business model due to (1) strong market shares in stabilizers, water heaters and pumps, (2) investments in distribution and brand-building and (3) investments and likely success in kitchen appliances over the medium term. However, we cut our earnings estimates due to continued input material inflation. We maintain ADD rating on the stock with a revised DCF-based TP of Rs240 (implied P/E 30x of FY24E EPS).
The Indian government may reduce by as much as 600 billion rupees its planned record market borrowing of 14.95 trillion rupees ($200 billion) for the next fiscal year, two government sources said.
The sources said the latest bond switch conducted by the government with the central bank at the end of January was not factored into budget estimates released on Tuesday.
The reduction could be announced before the end of March, the sources said requesting anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter.
India's 10-year bond yield continued to rise on Wednesday, hitting a two-and-half year high, largely in reaction to the latest borrowing plan, which was over 40% higher than the borrowing slated for this year.
Markets had been expecting borrowing of 12-13 trillion rupees for 2022/23.
We maintain our ADD rating on DLF with an unchanged Mar’22 SoTP based target price of Rs434/share. Key risks to our rating are weakness in office leasing and slowdown in residential demand.
The markets are facing some upside pressure and have resisted around the 17800 level. That has now become a crucial patch to get past for the markets to start a new upward trajectory. If we can close above 17800, we should see higher levels. On the flip side, the current support is at 17200 and if that breaks, we will resume the current downtrend.
At market pre-opening, the Sensex was at 59,528, down 30 pts, or 0.05%, while Nifty was at 17,767, down 12 pts.
Here is the list of the top 10 stocks that are likely to be in focus on Thursday
Adani Wilmar IPO allotment is likely today. Those who have applied for the public issue worth ₹3600 crore need not to move from pillar to post as they can check Adani Wilmar IPO allotment status online as well.
Bond yields from New Zealand to Japan declined as Meta Platforms Inc.’s earnings disappointment added to concern that a faster pace of monetary policy tightening will hurt the global economy.
Eurozone data Wednesday showed inflation unexpectedly quickened to a record last month, fanning speculation that the European Central Bank could raise rates earlier than expected. The Bank of England, meanwhile, is expected to deliver its first back-to-back rate hike since 2004 on Thursday.
-Earnings are due from Amazon, Ford Motor
-Bank of England, European Central Bank rate decisions, Thursday
-Fed Board of Governors confirmation hearing, Thursday
-U.S. factory orders, initial jobless claims, durable goods, Thursday
-U.S. payrolls report for January, Friday
-Winter Olympics kick off in China, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin due to attend opening ceremony, Friday
Though set up as an institution operating above the partisan fray in Washington, the Federal Reserve has again become a political football, with Republicans and business groups attacking President Joe Biden's nominees to serve on the central bank's board.
Biden last month announced a slate of candidates who would at long last fill all the seats of the seven-member board, and include the first Black woman to hold the position since the Fed was founded 108 years ago.
If all are three confirmed, the majority of the board members would be women for the first time, and most would be named by a Democratic president.
Record eurozone inflation will feed a tense debate within European Central Bank over whether to raise interest rates when its policy-setting governing council meets on Thursday, with the bloc under pressure from supply disruptions and high energy prices.
Inflation unexpectedly rose to 5.1 percent in the euro area in January, figures from Eurostat showed on Wednesday, the highest value since records for the currency club began in 1997.
While its counterparts in the United States and Britain are laying the ground for rate hikes in the near future, the ECB has so far expressed little interest in raising borrowing costs this year.
ECB President Christine Lagarde has repeatedly said that a tightening of monetary policy in 2022 was "very unlikely", but the surge in inflation will embolden critics who say action should come sooner.
Tokyo stocks opened lower Thursday as investors' worries grew over the intensifying crisis in Ukraine.
The benchmark Nikkei 225 index dropped 0.88 percent or 242.42 points to 27,291.18, while the broader Topix index fell 0.47 percent or 9.19 points at 1,927.37.
The dollar fetched 114.37 yen, off from 114.42 yen on Wednesday in New York.
The U.S. gave the green light to plans to move more troops to Europe and dispatch soldiers already stationed on the continent further east as it seeks to send a stronger military message alongside its diplomatic efforts with Russia over Ukraine.
About 2,000 soldiers will travel from the U.S. to Europe in the coming days, while 1,000 troops based in Germany will be deployed in Romania, Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said at a briefing. The moves are temporary, he added.
Russia quickly criticized the decision. Moscow has decried the presence of North Atlantic Treaty Organization troops near Russian borders and called for the alliance to withdraw its forces to positions they occupied in 1997, before it expanded into former Warsaw Pact countries.
Futures tracking the Nasdaq 100 Index fell after Facebook parent Meta Platforms Inc. and streaming service Spotify Technology SA plunged in late trading on disappointing outlooks.
March futures tracking the technology-heavy index slid as much as 2.4% to 14,755 in Asia on Thursday, halting a four-day advance. Contracts on the S&P 500 declined 1%, while those on the Dow Jones lost 0.1%.
Gold was steady after a three-day advance, as investors weighed the drop in employment at U.S. companies ahead of a key jobs report, along with simmering geopolitical tensions.
U.S. businesses’ payrolls fell last month by the most since the early days of the pandemic, due to the spread of the omicron coronavirus variant, according to ADP Research Institute data. That release came before Friday’s employment report from the Labor Department.
Newly renamed Meta is investing heavily in its futuristic “metaverse" project, but for now, relies on advertising revenue for nearly all its income. So when it posted sharply higher costs but gave a weak revenue forecast late Wednesday, investors got spooked — and knocked almost $200 billion off the valuation of the company formerly known as Facebook.
Meta’s shares fell 22.6% to $249.90 in after-hours trading. If the drop holds until the market opens Thursday, the company's overall value, known as its market capitalization, is on track to drop by a figure greater than the size of the entire Greek economy, based on data from the World Bank.
Global stocks rallied on Wednesday to close higher as strong earnings from U.S. technology companies and OPEC+ plans for moderate oil output helped to counter jitters over weak economic reports.
Investors also shrugged off the pace of central banks' interest rate hikes.
The STOXX index of 600 European companies rose 0.45%, up for a third straight session, to recoup nearly half its losses during January's global rout in shares.
MSCI's gauge of stocks across the globe gained 0.80%.
Crude oil eyed seven-year highs and the dollar eased. On Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.63% and the S&P 500 gained 0.94%. The Nasdaq Composite added 0.5%.
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