MarketBuzz
1263: Marketbuzz Podcast with Hormaz Fatakia: Nifty set for weekly losses; Jio Fin, Apollo Hospitals in focus
Good morning and welcome to CNBC TV18's Market Buzz podcast. I am Harmas Patakia. It's the final trading day of the week, the final trading day before the all important exit polls on Saturday and if the street reaction is anything to go by, they just cannot wait to get rid of both the exit polls and the election results on Tuesday as well. Just so that this volatility is over and done with and the market can have a clearer direction forward. This week though, the market has traded only in one direction and that is lower. It may not happen often but the NFT is down 2% so far for the week and this is the week that it made a record high and it crossed a landmark as well. Such has been the volatility this week that Monday is high of 23110 almost seems distant memory now but the NFT is now down over 600 points from those levels. At one point on Thursday, the index almost broke below 20-400 but has managed to stay above that and remain close to the 22-500 mark. Today, the 20DMA, the levels of 2480, that remains the key for the NFT and it has closed exactly around those levels on Thursday. Aside of the last two sessions, the NFT bank has been the one that has stood tall and tall it did stand on Thursday as well. It even crossed 49,000 on an intraday basis but couldn't sustain above that yet it managed to end with gains being one of the only two indices that ended higher on Thursday. If one looks at the list of the NFT contributors to the upside yesterday, you will only find banks because the rest were lower. For the week, the bank NFT is down just around half a percent so it has been an out-performer this week. Another sector to keep an eye out for is the metals sector and after two weeks where the index gained nearly 10%, the metals index is down 4% this week giving up all the gains that it made last week. The stocks like Hindustan Zing, Vedanta with saw gravity defying moves in the interim period have corrected significantly from the highs that they made. Hindustan Zing in particular which even crossed the 800 mark at one point is back to levels of 660 and Nigel De Sousa and I wrote about this last week and you can read that on cnbctv18.com. The last of the earnings season, I'll bring to you before we take a month-long break from reporting about results, Apollo hospitals reported net profit and EBITDA margins that were better than expectations. Its average revenue per occupied bed also improved by 12% from last year, the revenue for the hospitals business also went up by 16% and the digital health and pharmacy business saw its EBITDA loss narrow to just 60 lakh rupees from a 10 crore rupee loss last year. So plenty of positives there for Apollo hospitals that will be a stock to watch out for today. The other earnings reaction comes from Muthoot finance where both net interest income and net profit were better than expectations. The ticket size for the gold loans went up by 10% as it's under management also grew by 20% the asset quality improved but margins were under a bit of pressure when it compared to last year. However, they were better compared to the December quarter. PSU results have been mostly disappointing this quarter with multiple companies seeing significant margin erosion but the horror dynamics is not one of them. Its profit went up by 90% during the quarter even as revenue only grew by 7%. EBITDA grew over 70% year-on-year while margins expanded to 37% from just 23% that it reported in the same quarter last year. Welshman Corp has guided for 17,000 crore rupees in revenue for FY25, 1700 crore rupees of EBITDA and a 20% target for the return on capital employed or ROCE. Its consolidated net debt has also seen significant reduction from last year to just under 400 crore rupees. EBITDA was well over 1100 crores at the end of FY23. The quarter though was weak on the operational front for Welshman Corp because its EBITDA fell by 21% and margin pressures also persist because the EBITDA margins for the quarter were down to just 7.5%. Now, Praj Industries, SunTech, Realty, Swan Energy, PTC, India, Moltec packaging are some of the stocks that will be reacting to their earnings that were reported after market hours on Thursday. Now, Geofonential Services has launched the Geofonance App in a beta version. It integrates digital banking, UPI transactions, bill settlements and insurance advisory all under one umbrella. They keep an eye out on Geofonential Services as well. Now, insurance companies have been in focus all through yesterday because of the CNBC TV 18 news break and they will be in focus today as well. Now, they have approached the GST Council seeking a lower GST on insurance products. Now, they are seeking a 12% GST instead of 18% on life insurance products. Now, these insurers are saying that the higher GST rate is pushing people away from the life insurance products and they have asked the GST Council to lower the tax rates on life insurance first and on health insurance later. The Wall Street handover is anything to go by. There is more volatility in store for the market today. The DAO fell over 300 points, the S&P 500 and the NASDAQ also ended lower. The latter two are set to snap a 5-week gaining run. For the month though, the NASDAQ has gained a significant 7% while the S&P 500 is up 4%. Now, Asian markets have opened higher after an entire week of underperformance, so that is some bit of positive that the bulls can take. The gift nifty as we speak is also indicating a positive start for our own markets and a rebound from the lows that we have seen. That's all for today. We wish you a happy and safe trading day. Do stay tuned to CNBCTV18 and CNBCTV18.com for the sharpest market insights, of course, but also for the exit polls coverage tomorrow. Let's not forget, there is one more phase of polls to go, so for people listening in those areas, do step out and exercise your franchise. Thank you so much for tuning in. [MUSIC] You