MarketBuzz
1235: Marketbuzz Podcast With Hormaz Fatakia: GIFT Nifty down 350 points; Lok Sabha polls begin today
Good morning and welcome to CNBC TV18's Market Bus Podcast this Friday morning with me, Harmas Patakya. The big day is finally here and 102 constituencies across various Indian states will commence the first phase of the Lok Sabha polls of 2024. Over 16 crore waters will be eligible to exercise their franchise in this phase of the polls. So if you are listening to us at a place where polling is taking place today, do venture out and cast your vote. And we at CNBC TV18 and CNBCTV18.com will keep bringing you all the updates from all the key constituencies and the battles to watch out for in this phase of polling so stay tuned. For the markets though the NFT is down 4 days at a stretch on first glance that does not sound alarming by any means but then the devil always lies in the details doesn't it. This is the first instance since October of last year that the index has declined 4 days in a row and the declines are not modest by any means. The NFT has already given up more than 70% of the 1000+ points rally that it saw from the lows of March 20th. And it also closed below the 22,000 mark yesterday for the first time this April series. And if the Gif NFT is anything to go by, we are expecting another gap down as the Gif NFT has seen a very sharp down tick as we speak and is down almost 300 points now this morning. And that is because of news reports coming in that some Israeli missiles have hit a site in Iran. Now these reports are coming in from Reuters who is quoting ABC News that some Israeli missiles have hit a site in Iran and which is why you're seeing the sharp drop in the Gif NFT and Brent crude has also surged back above the $90 a barrel mark on reports of these explosions that are being heard in Iran. That is the report coming in from Reuters that is quoting ABC News will keep you updated from all the updates that come in from West Asia. For this truncated week, the NFT is down over 2% and when the heavyweight bank sell-off, there is no surprise that it will have a brunt on the NFT bank as well. That index in the last four sessions has corrected over 2000 points from the record highs that it made last week well above the 49,000 mark. For the week though, the banking index is down over 3%. A big factor behind the sell-off is institutional selling particularly from foreign institutions. FIIs have sold nearly 11,000 crores in the cash market this truncated week itself and have already turned net sellers for 2024. The market was expected to face more pressure though after the shocker that Infosys delivered last evening after market hours. However, the US listed shares of the technology bellwether ended 2.5% lower after declining as much as 8% at one point. Speaking of the numbers, Infosys' numbers were a big miss on estimates. The management has guided for FII 25 revenue growth to be between 1-3% which is well below the 2-6% expectations that were there. The management though tried to strike an optimistic tone saying that the large deals that they have won in FII 24 will benefit them in the new financial year and that their focus continues to remain on cost optimization. They have also made an acquisition worth over €450 million and they say that the benefits of this acquisition are not reflected in that 1-3% guidance. Brokerages are well okay if we can call it that on Infosys. Jeffree said that the deal wins from Infosys provides some comfort to their estimates. City said that although they are neutral, they would be buyers if the stock falls to levels of around 1350 while Nomura has also lowered its EPS estimates for Infosys. On the complete extreme is Bajaj Auto who convincingly beat estimates on all parameters. The company ended FII 24 with a 10.4% volume growth while revenue, EBITDA and net profit all of them grew in excess of 25% for the March quarter. The management in his earnings call said that it expects market share gains courtesy of its premium segment and that the EV 2-wheeler distribution will ramp up to 600 stores in the next 6 months from the current count of 200 stores. Jeffree has raised its price target on Bajaj Auto to 10.5 thousand rupees and also raised its EPS estimates for FII 25 and 26 by 4%. Google Das exports has launched a QIP to raise funds. The floor price of 790 rupees a share is a 3% discount to the stocks closing price on Thursday. ITC is wholly owned subsidiary. ITC Infotech India will acquire 100% stake in Blaze Clan Technologies for 485 crores. Blaze Clan is a partner for both Amazon Web Service and Snowflake. This acquisition is expected to augment ITC Infotech's capabilities to service its customers in a multi-cloud and hybrid cloud environment. Stocks like ICICICICI security is TV18 broadcast. Network 18 will also be reacting to the results that were reported after market hours on Thursday. MaxTech which was also supposed to declare its results has postponed its board meeting to next Friday that is the 26th of April. Earnings and polls continue side by side because Vipro will be reporting results today after market hours and the expectation is that the company will guide for a 0% to 2% growth for the first quarter of FII 25 but the CEO stepping down before his term ending will be a key question on which the street will await more clarity from the management. Alongside Vipro we have geo financial services and HDFC AMC also reporting results today and going into the weekend we have the big boy HDFC Bank that will be reporting results on Saturday. The handover from Wall Street is mixed but mind you the US futures are trading sharply lower right now. The SFP 500 fell for the fifth day in a row and another factor that added to this pain is that more Fed officials now are speaking out in the open that rate cuts may be off the table at least till the end of the year. In fact Minneapolis Fed President Neil Kaskari even went on to say that there may be no rate cuts in 2024 at all. New York Fed President John Williams went one step further and said that if the data demands the Fed can even hike interest rates. Asian markets have opened lower this morning both Japanese and South Korean benchmarks are now down over 3% extending their early morning losses and as I highlighted earlier the gift nifty is down over 300 points so a gap down opening is definitely in the offing. That's all for today we wish you a happy a better day of trade and a happier weekend of course but before that yet another reminder do go out and vote today as every vote counts and for the sharpest markets and election related analysis stay tuned to cnbctv18 and cnbctv18.com [BLANK_AUDIO]