The domestic equity market witnessed bloodbath during the week gone by, scaring even the staunchest bulls. Global and local events triggered the carnage. Trump’s surprise levy of import tariffs on steel and aluminium imports led to global selloff on fears of retaliation and cross retaliations between large economies of the world.
PSU banks were at the receiving end as the saga of bad loans and banking frauds kept on deepening. Irrespective of value, stocks spanning across all sectors were beaten down. Next to PSU banks, sugar stocks were also heavily marked down on expectation of bumper crop this year at 29.5 million tonnes, which will keep sugar prices subdued impacting sector profitability. Sugar price cycle alternates; the year of excess sugar production will lead to fall in sugar prices consequently reducing the production for next season which again self-perpetuates, rise in sugar prices thereby increasing the profits for the companies. This goes on and on: Sugar companies are very good for trading but not for long-term investments.
Events of the Week
US, the biggest proponents of global free markets, was able to keep inflation below 2 per cent for a long time in spite of loose monetary policies, but all these will change permanently with the imposition of import tariffs at 25 per cent on steel and aluminium at 10 per cent. Subject to larger repercussions on the global trade practices henceforth, the inflation will rise in US, which will further push the Fed to increase interest rates harder thereby puncturing the equities rally across the world.
The world’s economic order will change, breeding inefficiencies and thereby increasing cost of capital and therefore interest rates will remain alleviated.
Technical Outlook
The Nifty50 has broken the long-term trend line this week which was valid since last one year, indicating that a serious and long drawn correction is under way. Ideally, the prices should pull back to the lower trend channel which could be a good shorting point for the traders. The Nifty50 generally respects the 200 SMA and, therefore, odds of prices rising and touching the lower trend channel are greater. Currently the market is risky for want of safe shorting levels.
Expectation from the Week
The market is undergoing a state of rapid iteration with capital shifting from fundamentally weak businesses to stronger ones, particularly those companies which are catering to India focused markets.
Export-oriented businesses are expected to take a hit going forward in the new world order. Currently domestic factors have taken a back seat, but beginning new financial year, when results are rolled out, the market will take important clues after assessing the corporate scorecard till that time market is expect to remain subdued to range bound. Select investments in only bluest of the blue stocks can be done at these levels from long term investments perspective. Nifty 50 closed the week at 10,226 down by 2.21 per cent.
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