Samvat 2080: Why Reliance & Poonawalla Fincorp are top picks for Dharmesh Kant

Ambit Asset Management and Bhargav Buddhadev are bullish on mass consumption, manufacturing, and exports. Positive outlook on market share regaining, margin improvement, chemical, and consumer discretionary companies. India's growth potential remains promising. Buddhadev further says: We believe smallcaps should not be viewed through a different lens, especially now, given that several companies have also become liquid.

“What happens in all these financial companies is that when they raise money at a higher book value, then on price to book, they start looking cheaper, that is what happened with Bajaj Finance and it rallied and Chola is doing the same thing. So, many of these companies are just taking advantage of the very high price to book they are getting to raise capital.”

HDFC's NIM has risen to 3.6% from 3.5% last year, while the spread has been stable at 2.29%, according to Keki Mistry. He expects mid-to-high teens growth even next year and strong growth following the merger between HDFC and HDFC Bank expected to be complete by July 2023. Asset repricing may have contributed to the growth, with a contract specifying changes in interest effective at the end of a three-month period.

For the new calendar year 2024, the brokerage firm has picked 9 stocks within the broader themes of manufacturing, PSU banks, NBFCs, IT services, and consumption. The nine stocks recommended by Axis are Pitti Engineering, Sansera Engineering, Archean Chemicals, Amber Enterprises, JK Lakshmi Cement, SBI, Manappuram Finance, Cyient, and Westlife Foodworld.

Theres often a movement of capital towards ‘long stocks when interest rates are low. These are the stocks of companies believed to have many years of rapid growth ahead. For these companies, more of the projected cash flows are in the distant future. Yet, investors may become more attracted to these stocks when the rates are low.

Porinju Veliyath suggests a strategic approach to value investing in small and midcap stocks amidst the current market correction. He emphasizes the long-term economic growth potential of India, projecting a $6-7 trillion economy by 2030. He further poitbs out that he is 100% sure it is not a repeat of 2018 which I have gone through and suffered very badly with huge underperformance to the market.

Reliance Consumer Products has acquired two new fast-moving consumer goods brands, Raskik and Toffeeman, as part of its push to build a strong consumer goods business in India. The acquisitions will add to RCPL's existing product range, which includes staples, biscuits, beverages, confectionery and chocolates. Reliance Retail, the parent company of RCPL, added over 3,300 new stores in FY23, taking its retail footprint to over 18,000 stores. The company recorded gross revenue of INR260,364 crore ($35bn) for FY23, a growth of 30% YoY, and footfalls of over 780 million, up 50% YoY.

India’s growth in the next 10 years will be driven mostly by electrification (EV), energy transition, green technology and renewables as they stand to offer a huge and long-term business opportunity for the country, said Paul Marriott, President, SAP, Asia Pacific.

Reliance Industries has reported an 18% rise in quarterly profit, beating analysts? expectations, driven by strong growth across its various business segments, including refining and telecom. The O2C business was the primary boost to earnings, reporting earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization (Ebitda) of INR16,293 crore ($2.2 billion) in the fiscal fourth quarter. The company?s retail and telecom businesses also continued to deliver steady performances.

Companies like Godrej Consumer Products, Dabur, and Emami said price-led growth will be back for the industry. Dabur said it has just taken a price increase by 2.5% for the food portfolio, while Emami said it is looking at around 3% price hikes this year.