Back in the limelight, will re-rating work this time? 4 power sector stocks with upside potential of up to

In 2008, the IPO of a power company got subscribed in less than a minute of its opening and the size of that issue was Rs 11,563 crore. This just shows the desire to own power sector stocks at that point of time. From those days of frenzy to the nadir in 2014, when power companies were on the top of the list of NPA of the banks. Power companies have seen both the extreme of valuations. It is a sector where after many failures and to some extent a consolidation, some companies have emerged which know how to deal with all kinds of economic and industry cycles. That is probably the reason why a number of companies from the power sector have seen a sharp re-rating in the last one year. Hoping the survivors have learnt their lessons.

Among many industries which have seen a strong transformation in the last nine years due to policy initiatives has been the sugar industry. This is despite the fact that sugar is a state subject where central policies can only play a limited role. If one looks at the balance sheet of a large number of them, they are far better placed than they were six years ago and to some extent in the last two years even the institutional investors have started to take exposure in this sector which they have avoided for more than three decades.

While they come under the broad umbrella word of “Chemical sector” the fact is that each specialty chemical company is literally an industry itself with its own operating matrix of supply chain and demand. There are some companies where the trouble in China means big bonus, while for others it might mean supply chain issues which means that their production in India’ get impacted. At this point there are many parts of the chemical industry which are facing headwinds due to oversupply and dumping by China. But are well prepared given multiple changes which some segments of the chemical sector have seen in India in just the last three years. We look at the stocks where analysts have “hold” recommendation at a time when chinese headwinds are blowing.

One change for making higher provision for unsecured loans and we see all the NBFC stocks tumbling. But four weeks later what is the situation, no one on the street is even talking about it and stocks have crossed the level when the announcement was made. The fact is that some regulatory measures are indicators of overall growth potential which the regulator is just trying to moderate in order to avoid overheating of some segment of industry. The other question is that an industry like NBFC which is bound to grow given the fact that capital was, is and will remain a scarce commodity, which are the benchmark which one should use to take exposure with a long term perspective.

Every industry has different operating conditions which have high correlation with the kind of ROE companies in the industry generate. The bigger question is how sustainable that number is. Of all the stocks, which our algorithms come up with, we took companies from, FMCG, software, financial services and speciality chemical. ET screener powered by Refinitiv’s Stock Report Plus lists down stocks with high upside potential over the next 12 months, having an average recommendation rating of “buy” or strong buy .

If one looks at how the policies have panned in the last nine years. It is clear that one by one every sector has been looked upon and if that sector has been getting government subsidies in any form, the government has tried to improve the delivery mechanism of that subsidy by plugging leakage in a manner that the right person gets the subsidy and the government gets the intended result. In the case of the fertilizer industry, it started with urea getting coated with neem which was not a financial measure but had a financial impact. Similarly, there were some measures which in the short term impacted some fertilizer companies but over a period, there has been a clean up going in the industry. Will the street be having a re-look at them ?

Cement has been a sector where most of the analysts have been caught off guards. The stocks have done well and a large number of analysts have been sticking to their stands that pricing and capacity utilization is an issue. What they probably ignored was the fact that any industry which has been facing headwinds for a long time tends to sort the issues and few players are able to make a comeback as consolidation takes place. Pretty much what we have seen in power.

Between 2005 and 2008 a number of new players entered into the power sector, right from established industrial houses, to new companies without any experience in the power sector. Anything to do with power got valuations which were unheard of in that sector. Very soon, there was a u-turn on the street, with power stocks becoming the worst performer. The reason, a large number of these companies got stuck with legal cases, due to coal issues and the captive mine case hit them very badly. After a long gap some of them, including PSU’s, are back on the buying list.

The pharma sector is overcoming previous headwinds and is expected to perform better. Pricing pressure is reducing, new product launches are anticipated, and margin expansion is likely. The sector benefits from being defensive in volatile markets. Sectorally, all these headwinds that they had faced in the past are gradually going away for the sector to emerge better.