Don't wait to time the market; invest your Rs 100 now, says Kamlesh Rao of Kotak

Fence-sitters, go and invest now; there is no point in waiting. This is the message Kamlesh Rao, CEO, Kotak Securities, has for investors.

“Investors are constantly getting worried about the market is high priced and also are looking for a reasonable bottom to come in. My sense is even where the market is at this point in time, it may not be a bad time at all (to invest),” he told Firstpost in a pre-Budget interview.

He said all the broad indicators are positive. Interest rates at best can remain the same or can come down; the NPAs will come down over a period time; the capex cycle will start kicking in and inflation is reasonably under control, he said.

“Don’t try and time the market too much. When the indicators for the future are so much more strongly positive as compared to the present and the past, then timing does not make sense,” he said.

Moreover, he doesn’t think the market has run-up too much ahead of the Budget. Even if the Budget misses the expectation, the Nifty is unlikely to go below 8,500.

“While the bottom from here is far lower, the upside is a significant 30 percent from the current level. I think the upside is far more than the expected down side,” he said.

So if you have even Rs 100 surplus to invest, do it now and get a good Rs 40-50 return in the near term.

If you wait, you will have to enter at a higher level and then the returns will be lower, he warns.