business

Markets rally despite DIIs selling, retailers caught in frenzy

December 8, 2020

Markets rally despite DIIs selling, retailers caught in frenzy

Even as domestic institutional investors (DIIs) catch the flight off the stock markets, India’s two main indices have consistently risen to new highs, backed by foreign inflows amid prospects of a faster economic recovery.

As per provisional numbers available on the NSE, domestic institutional investments were net sellers of Rs 17,226 crore over the last seven trading sessions. In contrast, foreign institutional investments were net buyers of Rs 23,738 crore in the cash markets.

“Selling by the domestic institutions was more than offset by buying by FPIs,” said Deepak Jasani, Head of Retail Research at HDFC Securities.

Last month, the Indian equity market witnessed a significant dichotomy as the DIIs logged the highest outflow of funds at $5.9 billion, although net FIIs purchase touched an all-time high for any month ever.

Analysts cited expensive valuations, rising volatility and a chance to book profits among the reasons for the steady sell-off by DIIs.

On Monday, the Indian markets received healthy foreign inflows of Rs 3,792.06 crore.

“Markets might continue to rally even after the exit of DIIs from the market as it is not the sole indicator of the strength or sentiments pertaining in the market,” said Gaurav Garg, Head of Research, CapitalVia Global Research.

“DIIs squaring of their positions could be a part of their rebalancing strategy. Therefore, investors are advised to go through the fundamentals of the stocks in detail before adding them to their portfolio,” Garg added.

Lately, the Indian indices have had a stellar run, which was triggered by better-than-expected macro-economic indicator, healthy Q2 results, and faster-than-anticipated recovery in the GDP.

Stock-wise, Adani Green, Tata Steel, Mphasis and IndiGo are some of the stocks in the Nifty 200 space which have generated decent returns since their March lows.

“Almost all the stocks have generated more than 100 per cent returns to the investors who have added these stocks to their portfolios in March,” Garg said.

Other stocks such as Hindalco, M&M, Tata Motors, Grasim, Tata Steel, RIL, Cipla and Axis Bank have given more than 100 per cent returns from March 24 to December 7.

Even on Monday, despite some profit booking, both the key indices rose with NSE Nifty50 and S&P BSE Sensex reaching record intra-day highs.

The S&P BSE Sensex touched a record intra-day high of 45,458.92 points, while the Nifty50 on the National Stock Exchange touched a new record high of 13,366.65 points.