21 BSE500 stocks doubled investor wealth in 6 months! Did you manage to catch any?

NEW DELHI: As many as 21 BSE500 stocks have doubled investor wealth in the past six months, as optimism over a delay in US Fed rate hike lifted domestic equity benchmarks to fresh 18-month highs, and India VIX — a gauge for volatility in the market — tumbled below 13 from a high of 25.96 in February.

Data from corporate database Capitaline showed 21 BSE500 stocks have risen up to 178 per cent from their six-month low levels. This is about the same time when India VIX started receding and Rs 58,000 crore worth of foreign flows entered the market.

Shares of Manappuram Finance have almost tripled to Rs 92 from a six-month low of Rs 31.40 hit on March 2. Indian Bank has zoomed 177 per cent to about Rs 220 from Rs 78.80 and Delta Corp has soared 174 per cent to Rs 148.15 from Rs 52.25, which was the six-month low hit on the same day as Mannapuram Finance.

Shares of Escorts, GHCL, Dalmia Bharat, V-Guard Industries and Vedanta have spiked 161 per cent, 153 per cent, 152 per cent, 127 per cent and 125 per cent, respectively, from their six-month lows hit in March.

Among others, cement stocks Birla Corporation, India Cements, Heidelberg Cement and JP Associates, pharma firms Biocon and Piramal Enterprises and NBFCs Edelweiss Financial Services and Muthoot Finance jumped in excess of 100 per cent from their six-month lows.

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This is against an 18.66 per cent rise in the BSE Sensex during the period mentioned. From March 1 till date, foreign investors have pumped in Rs 58,039 crore into domestic equities.

“Fund flows have continued both from foreigners and domestic investors. That is clearly a positive sign. There has been some discussions about the fact that earnings growth in the market has really been not as strong as people would have hoped it to be. Valuations are clearly expensive in most emerging markets. India is probably one of the most expensive emerging markets at the moment. Having said that, it undoubtedly remains the favourite emerging market,” said Gautam Trivedi, CEO of Religare Capital Markets.

That said, “India-dedicated funds that have money from overseas investors are not seeing any inflow at all. Net flows are at best a trickle. A lot of money still remains passive and/or regional allocations as far as the FII community is concerned,” Trivedi said.

“One needs to take a slightly longer term view,” said Bharat Iyer, MD for Global Research, JP Morgan India. “Our weights in the indices are nowhere in relation to what our potential is. If you were to look at the potential, I think there is still a long way to go in terms of our markets being over-invested,” he said.