Stock Market Highlights: Sensex sheds 598 points, Nifty ends below 15,100 dragged by metals, banks

Manish Hathiramani, Proprietary Index Trader and Technical Analyst, Deen Dayal Investments

The Nifty made some recovery post the gap down opening. The overall trend remains positive as we have not broken the support of 14,600-14,700. The index still has wings to go higher and achieve targets closer to 15,400-15,500. Traders can utilize corrections like today’s to accumulate long positions.

Market At Close

– Rising US Yields Weigh On Market; Sensex & Nifty Slip 1% Each

– Midcap Index Outperforms; Gains 2% From Lows To End 0.5% Higher

– Heavyweights (HDFC Bk, ICICI, Axis & SBI) Drag Nifty Bank; Index Down 1.6%

– Metals Stocks Top Nifty Losers On Reports Of Price Cut; Nifty Metal Slips Over 2%

– Sensex Slips 599 Points To 50,846 & Nifty 165 Points To 15,081

– Nifty Bank Drops 561 Pts To 35,803 While Midcap Index Rises 120 Pts To 24,608

– Cement Shares Gain On Reprots Of Price Hike; UltraTech & Shree Cement Top Nifty Gainers

– Adani Ports Moves 3% Higher After 31% Stake Buy In Gangavaram Port

– JSW Steel, Hindalco, HDFC, Tata Motors & Bajaj Finserv Top Nifty Losers

– Rane Madras, Indiabulls Real Estate, Adani Power, Gland Pharma Among Top Midcap Gainers

– Market Breadth Favours Advances; Advance-decline Ratio At 5:4

Closing Bell | The Indian equity market ended over a percent lower on Thursday, snapping 3 sessions of gains as another spike in bond yields weighed on the overall global market sentiment. The benchmark Sensex ended 598.57 points, or 1.16 percent lower at 50,846.08, while the Nifty declined 164.85 points, or 1.08 percent to close at 15,080.75. Broader markets outperformed the benchmark indices, as the Nifty Smallcap100 and Nifty Midcap100 ended 1.17 percent and 0.49 percent higher.

A broad-based selling was witnessed across sectors with banks, metals, and financials dragging the most. JSW Steel, HDFC, Hindalco Industries, Tata Steel and Tata Motors led the decline among Nifty50 constituents, while UltraTech Cement, Adani Ports & SEZ, Shree Cement, Grasim Industries and Dr Reddy’s Laboratories were the top gainers.

Will be able to see order inflow of Rs 9,000 crore: Kalpataru Power

Kalpataru Power has bagged new projects worth around Rs 1,550 crore. The order win is from India and Latin America in the power transmission business. Manish Mohnot, MD & CEO of Kalpataru Power said, “Today we have L1 around Rs 1,500 crore so my own assessment is reaching Rs 9,000 crore should not be a challenge. We already did Rs 8,000 crore and getting further Rs 1,000 crore in the next 3-4 weeks will not be a challenge. So, we should be at Rs 9,000 crore for sure.” Continue reading.

Dilip Buildcon | The company has received the letter of acceptance (LOA) from Mahanadi Coalfield Ltd for Mine Developer cum operator (MCL), for MDO contract for the development and operation of SIARMAL open cast proiect in the state of Odisha. The contract value is Rs 36,819.07 crore.

CLSA on Cadila Halthcare

The high contribution of gAsacol HD to current profit and impending margin squeeze once this product sees competition in 3QFY22 has been a key investor concern for Cadila Health. While we acknowledge this, Cadila has ample margin levers such as complex generic launches in the US and a rising contribution from its India prescription and consumer business as well as emerging markets (EMs). This raises confidence in its ability to sustain double-digit core earnings growth in FY23 even as the contribution from gAsacol HD declines. Novel R&D initiatives should drive long-term growth. We retain our BUY rating.

NCC | The company’s promoter has released pledge on 18.1 lakh shares (0.3 equity) on March 2.

Will grow at 20% CAGR YoY with the current infrastructure: MTAR Technologies’ Srinivas Reddy

Precision engineering solutions company, MTAR Tech expects strong growth going forward. Talking to CNBC-TV18, Srinivas Reddy, MD & Promoter of the company said that he sees the firm growing at 20 percent CAGR YoY with the current infrastructure.

“We are expecting very good growth in the coming years. Our current CAGR is at around 16 percent and we are expecting to grow higher in the years to come. We can go beyond 20 percent CAGR on a year-on-year (YoY) basis comfortably with the current infrastructure that we have,” he said in an interview. Read more.

Positive on IT, cautious on auto sector, says Carnelian Capital’s Vikas Khemani

Vikas Khemani, Founder at Carnelian Capital Advisors remains very positive on IT services. “This is one sector where India has no competition. Only Indian companies cater to global demand,” he said in an interview with CNBC-TV18. According to him, this is a beginning of a very big bull market. As the economic recovery pans out, across the board money is being made. “You will see a fairly diversified bull market. Banking and financial services stocks would do very well. The manufacturing segment is the one segment where we are seeing a very big investment cycle picking up in the next three-four years. Capital goods stocks, industrials will do extremely well according to us,” he stated. Read more.

Vivimed Labs | The company said that the FDF manufacturing unit in Jeedimetla, Hyderabad’s GMP certification by Ukraine’s Health Ministry has been renewed up to February 4, 2022.

Market Watch: Jay Thakkar, Marwadi Shares & Finance

One can buy Dr Reddy’s Laboratories targeting around Rs 4,650 to Rs 4,700 with a stop loss of Rs 4,485. It has formed a nice double bottom pattern on the daily charts with a clear reversal in its momentum indicators with a positive divergence. Based on these technical parameters, I feel that it is quite likely to inch towards Rs 4,700 in the short term.

Berger Paints seems to have completed its wave 4 consolidation on the daily as well as weekly charts and the stock has started to form higher tops higher bottom formations. The stock is also trading in a nice upward sloping channel. So, one can buy Berger Paints targeting Rs 750 to Rs 765 in the short term and one can place the stop loss at Rs 715.

MTAR Technologies IPO subscribed 5.57 times so far on second day

The Rs 596-crore initial public offering (IPO) of MTAR Technologies had been subscribed 5.57 times by noon on March 4, the second day of bidding. The offer received bids for 4.04 crore equity shares against the initial public offerings (IPO) size of 72.60 lakh equity shares, as per the subscription data available on exchanges.

Ashoka Buildcon | The company has entered into a share purchase agreement with India Infrastructure Fund (IIF) for purchasing directly or through its subsidiary, 49 percent stake held by IIF in Ashoka Highways (Bhandara) Ltd along with Zero Interest Shareholders Loan for an aggregate consideration of Rs 35.98 crore.

CLSA on Oil & Gas sector

Domestic gas production has risen by 6 percent or 4.6 mmscmd in the past two months to 82.3 mmscmd (Jan 2021) as gas output from eastern offshore fields rose 3.4x, or 4.4 mmscmd, mainly led by a ramp-up in production at the RIL-BP fields. This, and recently concluded auctions for 12.5 mmscd of gas by RIL-BP should raise investor belief in the 35% rise in domestic gas production over the next two years.

Rising domestic output may keep Indian LNG demand growth muted and this makes us prefer gas consumption plays such as GSPL, IGL, MGL and GGas more than Petronet LNG.

Unsure of big correction, but market may not rise much either: Ambit Capital’s Dhiraj Agarwal

Dhiraj Agarwal, co-head of equities at Ambit Capital, on Thursday said he is not sure of a big correction, but the market has turned very volatile. Concerns over rising interest rates globally have so far triggered two selloffs in the Sensex and Nifty in the last six weeks.

In an interview to CNBC-TV18, Agarwal said, “Big correction, I am not too sure at this point of time but the market is turning a lot more volatile than what it was till November 2019. However, in the last 2-3 months we have seen largecaps, a few of them, going into the red and that’s causing volatility which will continue.” Agarwal also does not see the markets going much higher from here and Nifty could consolidate as most heavyweights are fully priced. Read more.

Buzzing | Adani Ports shares gain over 2% on acquiring stake in Gangavaram Port

The share price of Adani Ports and Special Economic Zones rallied more than 2 percent on Thursday after the company announced the acquisition of a 31.5 percent stake in Gangavaram Port. In an exchange filing, Adani Ports & SEZ said that it was acquiring the 31.5 percent stake held by Windy Lakeside Investment Ltd (an affiliate of Warburg Pincus) in Gangavaram Port Ltd (GPL) for Rs 1,954 crore.

In FY20, GPL had a cargo volume of 34.5 MMT, generated revenue of Rs 1,082 crore, EBITDA of Rs 634 crore (margin of 59 percent) and PAT of Rs 516 crore. GPL is debt-free with a cash balance of over Rs 500 crore, it added. Read more.

Yash Gupta Equity Research Associate, Angel Broking

Easy Trip Planners Ltd has a large base of Airlines and hotels, currently company having access to 400 international and domestic flights along with this 1.1 Mn hotels in India or abroad. Even in this time of lockdown the company demonstrated its strength and was able to report revenue of 50 crores in 9MFY2021 and positive earnings per share of 2.86. The company stands at 3rd among the Key Online Travel Agencies in India in terms of gross booking revenues in FY 2020. They were the only profitable online travel agency among the Key Online Travel Agencies in India in 2018, 2019 and 2020, in terms of net profit margin.

The competition will always remain a concern for this industry as well as companies, Easy Trip Planners need to compete with Paytm in Air tickets booking and aggregators like OYO in hotel business etc. We have a positive outlook for Easy Trip Planners Ltd IPO.

Rupee slumps 27 paise to 72.99 against US dollar in early trade

The Indian rupee slumped 27 paise to 72.99 against the US dollar in opening trade on Thursday, weighed down by a rebound in the US dollar and lacklustre opening in domestic equities. At the interbank forex market, the domestic unit opened at 72.99 against the US dollar, registering a fall of 27 paise over its previous close.

On Wednesday, the rupee had settled at 72.72 against the American currency. Meanwhile, the dollar index, which gauges the greenback’s strength against a basket of six currencies, rose 0.12 per cent to 91.05. Read more here.

Alembic Pharmaceuticals |  The company’s joint venture, Aleor Dermaceuticals Ltd, has received USFDA final approval for Testosterone Gel. Alembic has a cumulative total of 138 ANDA approvals (122 final approvals and 16 tentative approvals) from USFDA.

HDFC Securities initiates Buy on Bharat Forge with target price of Rs 720

We initiate on Bharat Forge with a Buy rating as the company is expected to benefit from its wide-ranging capabilities and near-term cyclical pick-up in CV sales. We believe that the initiatives in the defence segment are likely to materialise (after several years) as India’s defence-based capital expenditure has risen by ~20% in FY21 and the government is aggressively pushing for localisation.

We set a target price of Rs 720 at 32x FY23E EPS as we expect earnings growth to recover over FY22-23E. We value the stock at its average historic long-term P/E multiple to factor in (1) the pick-up in the business cycle and (2) emerging opportunities across defence and the PV segments. Key risks: a sharp increase in commodity input prices and delayed orders in defence; steel price increase could lead to margin volatility in the near term.

Gold rate today: Yellow metal falls below Rs 45,000 per 10 grams level

Gold prices in India traded lower on the Multi Commodity Exchange (MCX) Thursday tracking weakness in international spot prices on rising US bonds yields and strength in the dollar. Silver prices also declined one percent. At 10:50 am, gold futures for April delivery fell 0.32 percent to Rs 44,804 per 10 grams as against the previous close of Rs 44,948 and the opening price of Rs 44,735 on the MCX. Silver futures traded 0.82 percent lower at Rs 67,440 per kg. The prices opened at Rs 67,526 as compared to the previous close of Rs 68,000 per kg. International gold prices on Thursday hovered near a nine-month low hit in the previous session, as rising US Treasury yields kept the non-yielding bullion under pressure, a Reuters report said. More here

Market Watch: Shrikant Chouhan, Kotak Securities

“Today insurance companies are really doing very well, in that space we like ICICI Prudential which is currently trading at Rs 495-496. Here if we see the formation then it is moving towards the levels of Rs 530-540 and it has absorbed selling pressure which was around Rs 495 levels with a stop loss at Rs 480 certainly ICICI Prudential is a buy at current levels.”

“The other stock which we like is Titan currently it is trading at Rs 1,480-1,485 here we are expecting Rs 1,550-1,560 with a stop loss at Rs 1,450 on the downside.”