Nifty Revenue grew by 16% (y-o-y) and Profit grew by 7.6% (y-o-y) in Q4 FY18. Ex- Financials, Nifty Profit grew by 13% (y-o-y).

East and South regions drove the double-digit growth: Based on data published by listed companies, aggregate volumes grew 13.6% YoY in Q4FY18 to 71.2mn (t). East outperformed the India average with growth of 18% because of strong growth in Chhattisgarh, Odisha and Bihar. Demand in North region remained weak with growth at 6%, impacted by unavailability of sand...

Headline inflation soared to 4.9% (y-o-y) in May as against 4.6%(y-o-y) in previous month. Bloomberg Consensus estimate for December inflation was 4.9% (y-o-y).

pressures. Delay in the pass-through of commodity price rise hampered the margin performance of Ancillaries. While margin pressure for companies is expected to continue over the near term, growth drivers like predictions of normal monsoon, pick up in infrastructure activities and rural demand scenario looking up, provide optimism for robust volume growth to prevail over the current fiscal. Given the aforesaid factors, our preferred picks are M&M;, Tata Motors and Ashok Leyland. Also, we remain positive on Maruti Suzuki and Motherson...

Q4FY18 earnings of Capital Goods sector saw most companies report improved performance after many quarters of disappointment and earnings cut. Commentary on end markets like Power T&D; led by SEB/O&G;/Roads/Urban transport(metro)/Railways/Defence/Water/Genset/B&F; were positive for the year ahead with improved viability of pipeline for fresh orders. Corporates are relatively positive compared to the past in terms of enquiry levels and project pipelines. Corporates believe awarding activity/momentum is likely to stay for next 2-3 quarters as government tries to award increased number of projects with an eye on...

Consumer Price Index or CPI inflation in May 2018 is likely to come in at 5%, up from 4.6% in the poll 2018. Click Here previous month. While this can be partially attributed to the base effect, food and fuel prices have also edged up. Core inflation is also likely to harden further to over 6% (in the range of 6.1%-6.4%) from 5.9% earlier. Nevertheless, there is respite in the fact that both headline CPI and core CPI are likely to peak in June 2018 and moderate thereon. Wholesale Price Index or WPI inflation is likely to rise to 3.9% in May 2018 from 3.2% in the previous month. Again, while base effect has a role to play, it also reflects higher food prices and pass-through of higher industrial commodity prices. Core WPI inflation is also likely to harden to 3.5% from 3.2% in the previous month. The Index of...

India's Forex Reserves decline $593.7m to $412.2b Asian Markets are trading mixed as investors remained cautious ahead Shanghai is trading lower by 0.46%. Indian indices are expected to open in the green. Sgx Nifty is trading higher by 0.16%. The US markets ended higher however lingering concerns over trade continued to weigh on investor sentiments as G-7 summit started. The Dow Jones gained 75 points or 0.30% to close at 25,241 while NASDAQ...

Cognizant: With Elliott Out, Will Growth Focus Be Back To The Detriment Of Peers? NBIE Values your patronageThe March 2018 quarter US SEC filings of Elliott Capital Management indicate that it has exited its holding in Cognizant Technology Solutions (CTS) completely. Elliott had taken a 4% stake in CTS in the December quarter of 2016 and had exerted pressure on the company to embark on a substantial capital return policy in February 2017 (first dividend in its history, US$3.4bn stock buyback over two years till 2018, 75% of US FCF to be used for capital return in 2019 and beyond) and also to focus on growing its non-GAAP EBIT margin from 19%-20% that it held for about two decades to 22% by CY19. This hefty capital return plan triggered similar moves within the entire Indian peer set in FY18. The focus on increasing margins had led CTS to trim costs (including a voluntary retirement scheme or VRS for senior employees), a rejig of its digital business,...

Indian oil products consumption for May 2018 grew by 3.4% yoy and 5.9% mom to 18.7mmt. Base effect was stronger as May 2017 recorded 6.9% yoy growth. Diesel/petrol sales growth was weaker at 0%/2% yoy while petcoke/ATF/LPG/lubes was strong at 9%/11%/14%/19% yoy. Naphtha/bitumen rose by 3%/4% while FO/kerosene fell by 14%/20% yoy. Other products were up 11% yoy. For 2MFY19, total demand growth was 3.9% with diesel/petrol up 1%/5%, bitumen/lubes/ATF/LPG up 9%/12%/12%/14% yoy, petcoke/naphtha/others up 4%/5%/6% while FO/kerosene was down 12%/14% yoy. OMCs have been cutting diesel and petrol prices daily since the last 10 days with overall...

Moody's expects India to meet its fiscal deficit target of 3.3 %of GDP for FY19 prices. Nikkei is trading lower by 0.10%, Hangseng is trading lower by 1.03% while Shanghai is trading lower by 0.95%. Indian...

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has increased policy rates by 25bps while maintaining its neutral stance. pleased if you vote for us as the We have long been expecting a rate hike in 1QFY19, and so this was largely in line with our expectation. feedback helps us align our equity research offerings to meet your...

Shanghai is trading higher by 0.34%. Indian indices are expected to open higher. Sgx Nifty is trading higher by 0.46%. The US markets ended higher led by gains in banking stocks as investors took note of economic data. On the data front a report showed that the U.S....

Sensex companies (ex-banking space) continued their positive momentum with Q4FY18 the first quarter that was marked by double digit bottomline growth. It is largely attributable to robust consumer demand and successful economic transformation post demonetisation and GST. For Sensex companies (ex-banks), net sales in Q4FY18 are up healthy 15.7% YoY to | 538,048 crore. Companies continued to witness falling gross margins (down 186 bps) on account of a rise in commodity prices, which was more...

Realisation Gain Offsets Cost Escalation, But Sustainability Is Key We have reviewed the March 2018 quarterly earnings performance of 12 cement companies under our coverage universe and made an attempt to measure the key trends. We have been positively surprised (with our estimates beaten) by realisation gains, by north based companies. Realisation gain on an average was ~7.5% (of the 12 companies under our coverage) driven by higher exposure to the western region (Gujarat) like Sanghi Industries (SNGI) and JK Lakshmi Cement (JKLC). This was followed by strong price gains in Central India as indicated by the performance of HeidelbergCement (HEIM) with a gain of ~10% YoY. These gains were partly because of change in the accounting policy and partly due to a weak base in 4QFY17...

The much awaited central bank policy decision came in with a 25 basis points hike in the benchmark policy repo rate which stands at 6.25 per cent.

RBI reversed its earlier Aug'17 rate cut, by hiking the repo rate by 25bps to 6.25% and maintaining its neutral stance. Reverse repo stands at 6.0% and MSF at 6.5%. RBI has turned relatively more hawkish by recalibrating inflation projection for H2FY19 by 40bps to 4.7%. Although some of the underlying inflationary risks like rising commodity prices have materialized earlier than anticipated, RBI is increasingly concerned about core CPI (ex-HRA). Even with a 25bps rate hike, the stance is still not one of tightening. In our view, this rate hike could lead to a tightening stance if inflation risks accentuate along with...