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Dalal Street closed higher during the week on strong rally, helped by investors’ risk-on mood and positive domestic cues. The benchmark indices ended positively on all five days of the week. For the week, the Sensex gained 1.85% to 66,598.91 and the Nifty 50 index rose 1.98% to 19,819.95.
In broader markets, the BSE Midcap index soared 3.93% to 32,672 and the BSE Smallcap index advanced 2.26% to 38,266.53.
Top gainers were Media [5.16%], Realty [4.92%], Energy [4.2%], PSU Bank [3.69%], Oil & Gas [3.29%], Consumer Durables [2.95%], and IT [2.86%]. All indices closed in the green during the week.
During the week, FIIs were net sellers for Rs 9,321.5 crore and DIIs were net buyers for Rs 4,572.2 crore in the cash segment.
The Indian rupee rose by 28 paise to 82.94 against the US dollar on Friday.
Company News
Reliance Industries Limited (RIL): The company’s telecom arm Jio Infocomm and chip maker Nvidia announced that they will develop artificial intelligence-based applications for India. Both the companies will work together to develop India’s own foundation large language model (LLM) trained on India’s languages and tailored for generative artificial intelligence (AI) applications in the country. “We are delighted to partner with Reliance to build state-of-the-art AI supercomputers in India,” said Jensen Huang, founder and chief executive officer (CEO) of Nvidia.
RIL’s retail business — Reliance Retail Ventures — has entered into a joint venture with Alia Bhatt’s kids and maternity-wear brand, Ed-a-Mamma, for a 51% stake. Further, the retail arm received the subscription amount of Rs 8,278 crore from Qatar Holding and allotted 6.86 lakh shares to QIA.
Tata Consultancy Services (TCS): The IT major and the digital unit of Jaguar Land Rover Plc have entered into a strategic partnership to support the latter’s “Reimagine” strategy. The new partnership is valued at £800 million over five years. As a part of the new partnership, TCS will deliver a range of services spanning application development & maintenance, enterprise infrastructure management, cloud migration, cybersecurity and data services.
Hero MotoCorp: The two-wheeler manufacturer plans to invest Rs 550 crore in Ather Energy Private’s rights issue and the transaction is expected to be completed before the end of September. The company currently holds 33.1% stake in Ather, and with this investment it will see its shareholding rise in Ather.
Oil India: The state-run company has received the board approval for an investment of Rs 1,738 crore in the joint venture company North East Gas Distribution Company (NEGDCL). In the joint venture, incorporated for executing the city gas distribution (CGD) projects, Oil India will hold 49% shareholding and the remaining 51% stake will be held by Assam Gas Company.
HCLTech: The company has signed a multiyear agreement with German technology and high-tech industry giant Siemens AG to modernize its IT landscape and power cloud-led digital transformation. The IT major will focus on automating the public cloud environment, while adhering to Siemens’ high security standards. HCLTech will migrate and operate Siemens’ infrastructure on AWS and Azure and ensure its cloud resources are optimized, secure and scalable, allowing the company to focus on its core business.
HCLTech also announced that it has been selected by Elders, a leading Australian agribusiness, to accelerate digital transformation across Elders’ business operations. Under the multi-year IT services partnership, HCLTech will provide managed IT services and a diverse portfolio of IT capabilities to Elders, including the ability to harness HCLTech’s AI offerings and other industry-leading opportunities.
Larsen & Toubro (L&T): The company has fixed September 12 as the record date to determine the names of shareholders who would be eligible to participate in the buyback. Meanwhile, the market capitalisation of the company crossed the Rs 4-trillion-mark for the first time on Thursday after its shares closed 4.26% higher at Rs 2847.05.
Nazara Technologies: The company announced that its board has approved preferential allotment of equity shares to Kamath Associates & NKSquared to raise funds aggregating up to Rs 100 crore. The company is proposing to issue 14,00,560 equity shares of face value of Rs 4 each at a price of Rs 714 per equity share aggregating to Rs 999,999,840, proportionately to Kamath Associates & NKSquared. As per the Securities and Exchange Board of India, these equity shares will be locked in for a period of 6 months from the date of issue. The company said that the fresh funds will be utilized to invest in funding requirements and growth objectives of the company, including for making strategic acquisitions and investments in various entities.
Meanwhile, Nazara Technologies’ board has approved an issue of equity shares having a face value of Rs 4 each to raise up to Rs 410 crore on preferential basis, subject to receipt of approval of the company’s shareholders. The funds will be invested via three schemes of SBI Mutual Fund namely SBI Multicap Fund, SBI Magnum Global Fund, and SBI Technology Opportunities Fund.
Tata Steel and ABB India: Tata Steel and ABB India have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) and will work together to co-create innovative models and technologies to help reduce the carbon footprint of steel production. The two companies will focus on system-level assessments of the steel manufacturer’s plants and production facilities for evaluation and co-development of short and long-term options for energy efficiency, decarbonization and circularity.
Adani Ports and SEZ: The company said that it has handled cargo volumes of 34.2 million metric tonnes (MMT) in August 2023, a rise of 17% YoY. The company said that growth in cargo volumes was supported by solid growth in containers (+27.6%) and liquids & gas (+69%) cargo types. The company’s flagship port Mundra recorded its highest-ever monthly cargo volume of 15.32 MMT. During the initial five months (April-August) of FY24, APSEZ has handled 169.6 MMT of total cargo, a 12% YoY growth.
One97 Communications (Paytm): The fintech company said that its loan disbursements grew by 137% to Rs 10710 crore in July–August 2023 from Rs 4,517 crore in the year-ago period. The number of loans disbursed during the period stood at 88 lakh, up 47% YoY. The total merchant Gross Merchandise Value (GMV) processed through the Paytm platform for July-August 2023 stood at Rs 3 lakh crore, up 43% YoY. The company strengthened their leadership in offline payments, with 87 lakh merchants now paying subscription fees for payment devices, an increase of 42 lakh devices in the past 12 months and 5 lakh devices in the month of August.
JSW Steel: The company said that its consolidated crude steel production in August 2023 grew by 19% YoY to 22.86 lakh tonnes from 19.22 lakh tonnes. The company’s domestic production jumped 17% to 22.15 lakh tonnes. Production at JSW Steel USA-Ohio surged 214% to 0.71 lakh tonnes in August 2023 as compared with August 2022.
Economy News
The government’s Goods and Services Tax (GST) collections rose 10.8% YoY in August to Rs 1.59 lakh crore, according to data released by the Ministry of Finance. The August GST collections is 3.7% lower than Rs 1.65 lakh crore collected in July.
The seasonally adjusted S&P Global India Services PMI business activity index stood at 60.1 in August compared to 62.3 in July, indicating strong expansion. The S&P Global India Composite PMI Output index fell to 60.9 in August from 61.9 in July.
Global Markets
The US markets closed lower over the holiday-truncated week as investors were worried that the Fed would keep interest rates high for a longer period after data showed the US economy being resilient. For the week, the S&P 500 lost 1.29%, the Nasdaq tumbled 1.93% and the Dow dropped 0.75%.
The weekly jobless claims in the US were lower-than-expected, indicating continued strength in labor demand. The number of Americans applying for unemployment in the previous week fell to 216,000, the lowest level in six months. Nonfarm payrolls grew by a seasonally adjusted 187,000 in August. The Institute for Supply Management’s U.S. services index climbed to a six-month high in August, while the price segment ticked up to 58.9%, the data showed.
Chinese markets declined as investors were worried over the country’s weak economic outlook. The Shanghai Composite index dropped 0.53%, and the CSI 300 index tumbled 1.36%.
The private Caixin/S&P Global survey of services activity fell to 51.8 in August from July’s 54.1. The reading showed that the services activity was the slowest increase since December as poor demand continued to weigh on China’s economy. On the trade front, China’s exports fell 8.8% YoY in August from, compared to 14.5% drop in July. Imports shrank by 7.3%.
Japan’s stock markets registered mixed performance over the week, with the Nikkei 225 index falling 0.3% and the Topix index rising0.4%. China’s economic slowdown and the impact on global demand weighed on investor risk appetite.
The yield on the 10-year Japanese government bond (JGB) stood at 0.6% range. The Japanese yen weakened to about JPY 147 against the US dollar, from about JPY 146 at the end of the previous week.002
The country’s Service Purchasing Managers Index stood at 54.3 in August, unchanged from the flash estimates released in late August and higher than the 53.8 in July. Japan’s economy grew 4.8% in the second quarter on a quarter-on-quarter annualized basis, a smaller growth than the 6% seen in the preliminary estimates.