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Benchmark indices closed higher on institutional buying, lower crude prices and as investor confidence returned. For the week, the Nifty rose 3.02% to 17,670.45 and the Sensex jumped 3.34% to 59,276.69.
Top Nifty sector gainers were Realty [5.7%], Financial Services [5.1%], Bank [4.9%], PSU Bank [4.8%], Media [4.2%] and FMCG [3.4%]. Nifty Metal slipped 0.4% and Pharma was down 0.2%.
Institutional buyers returned to the Indian stock market. On a weekly basis, FIIs bought for Rs 5,590.1 crore in the cash segment, while DIIs bought for Rs 5,025.5 crore.
Oil prices cooled down as Brent Crude fell to $104.39 per barrel and WTI Crude slipped below $100 per barrel to $99.27 a barrel.
Company News
Axis Bank: The private sector lender announced its acquisition of Citibank’s consumer businesses in India. The bank will pay a consideration up to Rs 12,325 crore to Citibank for the acquisition. Axis will acquire the consumer businesses of Citibank India, which includes credit cards, retail banking, wealth management and consumer loans.
Hero MotoCorp Ltd: The Income Tax Department raided the premises of India’s largest two-wheeler maker due to alleged multiple irregularities. The IT raids revealed that illegal business expenses of over Rs 800 crore, Rs 60 crore “unaccounted” cash used to purchase land in Delhi and role of some shell companies. Shares of the company fell 5.81% over the week.
Bharti Airtel: The telco said it has acquired 4.7% stake in Indus Towers from Vodafone Group for about Rs 2,388 crore. The transaction was executed at a price of Rs 187.88 per share. After this acquisition, Airtel will hold 46% stake in Indus Towers, while Vodafone will hold 21% stake in Indus.
Airtel has announced strategic partnership with Tech Mahindra to co-develop and market 5G use cases in India. The two companies will set up a joint 5G innovation lab for developing ‘Make in India’ use cases for Indian and global markets. The companies will also offer secure Cloud and Content Delivery Network solution for businesses.
Reliance Industries Limited (RIL): The company’s retail arm has privately defended an abrupt takeover of the stores of debt-laden rival Future Retail, saying mounting dues of $634 million compelled it to act beyond expectations, a company letter shows, according to Reuters news report. The company has said that the takeover was significant steps to ensure business continuity at Future and make sure there was no impediment to their deal.
Future Retail: The debt-ridden company’s CEO Sadashiv Nayak has resigned from the post seven months after his appointment, according to its regulatory filing. Future Group CEO Kishore Biyani has been re-appointed as executive chairman of the company for three years, a regulatory filing said.
State Bank of India (SBI): The country’s largest lender is considering offloading pools of non-performing retail loans worth less than 10 billion rupees ($132 million) to asset reconstruction companies, Reuters reported. SBI also expects the country’s bad bank, an ARC which is focused on resolving larger corporate soured loans, to start submitting binding offers for bad loans worth more than Rs 500 billion.
The bank will acquire the entire stake of over 13 per cent held by three other banking partners in SBI Global Factors Ltd (SBIGFL), the bank said. The other three banking partners are SIDBI, Bank of Maharashtra and Union Bank of India. SBIGFL, a subsidiary of SBI, is a non-banking financial company that offers domestic and export factoring services.
Asian Paints: The company will buy Obgenix Software (popularly known by the brand name of ‘White Teak’) for the acquisition of 100% of its equity share capital in a staggered manner over three years, subject to certain conditions. The company would acquire 49% for Rs. 180 crore (approx.) along with an earn out up to a maximum of Rs. 114 crore, payable after a year, subject to achievement of mutually agreed financial milestones. The remaining 51% of the equity share capital would be acquired in a staggered manner, the consideration for which would be based on achievement of defined financial milestones.
In addition, the company will infuse Rs. 19 crores (approx.) for acquisition of 51% of the equity share capital of Weatherseal Fenestration. The company has also agreed to buy further stake of 23.9% in Weatherseal Fenestration over the next three years.
Tata Consumer Products (TCPL): The company has announced reorganisation of its India and overseas businesses to leverage synergies and efficiency. This plan includes the demerger of plantation business of Tata Coffee Limited (TCL) into TCPL Beverages & Foods Limited (TBFL), a wholly owned subsidiary of TCPL and the merger of the remaining business of TCL, consisting of its extraction and branded coffee business with TCPL. The company also proposed to purchase of a 10.15 per cent minority interest in its UK subsidiary, TCP UK, from Tata Enterprise (Overseas), Switzerland, (TEO).
Maruti Suzuki India Limited (MSIL): The company has sold a total of 170,395 units in March 2022. Domestic sales stood at 137,658 units, sales to other OEM totalled to 6,241 units and its exports stood at 26,496 units. For FY22, the company posted a total sales of 1,652,653 units with a growth of 13.4% YoY. Total sales included domestic sales of 1,365,370 units, sales to other OEM of 48,907 units and exports of 238,376 units.
Tata Motors: Tata Motors: The automaker said that TPG RISE Climate, a private equity fund, has subscribed to 3.75 crore compulsorily convertible preference shares of the face value of Rs 1,000 each in its subsidiary Tata Passenger Electric Mobility.
In other news, the automaker said its total domestic sales increased by 30 percent to 86,718 units in March as compared to 66,462 units in the year-ago period. The company said its passenger vehicle wholesales rose by 43 percent to 42,293 units in March 2022 as against 29,654 units in March 2021. Its commercial vehicle sales stood at 47,050 units in March, up 16 percent from 40,462 units in the same month last year.
Hindalco Industries Ltd: The company will spend as much as $7.2 billion to expand its aluminium business over the next five years, as global supply shortages and strong demand prospects push prices toward unprecedented levels, Bloomberg reported.
It has set aside about $2.4 billion for its Indian aluminium operations during the five years ending March 2027 as it expects consumption to double in the next decade, it said in an investor presentation. Unit Novelis, its subsidiary, will invest as much as $4.8 billion in the U.S., Brazil, Asia and Germany during the period.
IIFL Wealth Management: America-based private equity firm Bain Capital will acquire a 24.98% equity stake in IIFL Wealth Management from General Atlantic Singapore and FIH Mauritius, which is owned by Indian-Canadian billionaire Prem Watsa’s company Fairfax. Bain will acquire 22.15 million shares at Rs1,666 apiece amounting to nearly Rs 3,700 crore.
SpiceJet: The low-cost domestic carrier and Credit Suisse AG have reached an in-principle commercial settlement of the dispute and the process of documentation is underway.
Meanwhile, the Supreme Court has asked Spicejet and Kalanithi Maran to amicably settle the share transfer dispute.
GAIL India: Shares of the company closed higher after the company approved buyback of about 5.7 crore shares of face value of Rs 10, representing 1.28%, at Rs 190 per share, for an aggregate value of Rs 1,082.72 crore. GAIL has sets April 22 as the record date for eligibility of shareholders for buyback.
Larsen & Toubro (L&T): The Ministry of Defence has signed a contract with the conglomerate for acquisition of two multi-purpose vessels (MPVs) for Indian Navy at an overall cost of Rs 887 crore under “Buy-Indian” category. The MPVs will be the first of its kind platform, constructed to provide a cost-effective solution to meet a variety of requirements of Indian Navy.
ONGC: The Indian government will sell up to 1.5 per cent of its stake in ONGC to raise about Rs 3,000 crore, the company said in a regulatory filing. The Offer For Sale (OFS) by the government will be open on March 30 and 31. The floor price for the OFS has been set at Rs 159 per equity share.
Punjab National Bank (PNB): The lender’s board has approved a proposal to raise Rs 12,000 crore through issuance of bonds to fund business growth. It will issue Basel III compliant AT-1 bonds up to Rs 5,500 crore and Tier II bonds up to Rs 6,500 crore, in one or more tranches, PNB said in a filing.
Bharat Electronics Ltd: The company and the defence ministry has sealed a contract for the development of an electronic warfare equipment for the Indian Air Force at a cost of Rs 1,109 crore. As part of the contract, Instrumented Electronic Warfare Range (IEWR) will be developed and the ministry described it as a “significant step” toward enhancing the capabilities of the IAF to prepare for future warfare.
Economy News
The gross GST revenue collected in March 2022 stood at Rs 1,42,095 crore, up 6.8% from the previous month, according to data released by the finance ministry. The revenues for the month of March 2022 were % higher than the GST revenues in March 2021 and 46% higher than the GST revenues in March 2020.
The average monthly gross GST collection for Q4FY22 stood at Rs 1.38 lakh crore, Rs 1.10 lakh crore in Q1, Rs 1.15 lakh crore in Q2 and 1.30 lakh crore in Q3.
Global Markets
Major equity indices in the US rose marginally as gains in consumer staples and utilities were offset by losses in financial and technology stocks. For the week, the S&P 500 edged up 0.1%, Nasdaq rose 0.7% and the Dow edged down 0.1%.
On the economic front, nonfarm payrolls report showed that job gains were lower-than-expected at 431,000 as against 490,000. Meanwhile, unemployment rate fell to 3.6%. Monthly growth in average hourly earnings were according to expectations at 0.4%.
Japan’s stock indices fell over the week due to concerns over the progress of peace talks between Russia and Ukraine, rising inflation and the impending hike in interest rate. All these factors weighed on the risk appetite of investors as Nikkei 225 dropped 1.72% and the broader Topix fell 1.88%.
Chinese markets gained for the week as the government signalled at supporting the economy and market which eased investor concerns. The Shanghai Composite index rose 2.19%, Hang Seng zoomed 2.97% and the CSI 300 climbed 2.43%.