Deven Choksey, MD, DRChoksey FinServ Pvt Ltd, on Thursday, said the market looked concerning at current levels. As an investor, if you are sitting on cash and get an opportunity to enter at lower levels, the focus should be on investing rather than trading in calls, the market veteran told Business Today TV.
When asked about the cement space, he said, "I remain bullish on the sector and it is going to play out significantly as we see more infrastructure-linked with construction activity continuing in the economy. The entire cement business has become pan-India. Earlier, we used to have a lot of influence on the local players. But today, the influence is coming from the pan-India companies. Companies like Adani Group of companies like ACC Ltd, Ambuja Cements Ltd and UltraTech Cement Ltd have the ability to drive the price and logistics on the supply side of the activity."
Those who are expanding their footprints can be relatively better choices subsequently, which is the likes of Shree Cement Ltd, Choksey suggested. "The structural change is in the area of increment in the margin. Given that direction and strong demand scenario, the larger capacity companies would be a better choice to add to a portfolio," he added.
In response to a query on metals, the market specialist said the tailwind is extremely favourable for Vedanta Ltd. "The structural changes such as demerging companies and deleveraging balance sheets and the company will start this entire outcome playing out well somewhere around the first quarter of the next financial year 2025-26 (FY26). If one is taking a position six months ahead of such an event, this is the right time to possibly bet on Vedanta. Having said that, the commodity prices are remaining very stable," DRChoksey explained.
From the energy place, the market expert liked Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL). "Reliance is playing out very well on the oil-to-chemical business despite of adversities everywhere, he said.
Meanwhile, Indian equity benchmarks recorded a sharp fall today due to weakness across all sectors. The 30-share BSE Sensex and the broader NSE Nifty crashed over 2 per cent, each. India VIX, fear index, spiked 13.84 per cent to 13.65-level. Broader markets (mid- and small-cap shares) were also down.
All the 16 sector gauges -- compiled by the NSE -- were trading in the red. Sub-indexes Nifty Auto, Nifty Financial Services, Nifty Oil & Gas, Nifty Private Bank and Nifty Realty were underperforming the NSE platform by falling as much as 2.72 per cent, 2.59 per cent, 2.63 per cent, 2.74 per cent and 4.10 per cent, respectively.
The overall market breadth was weak as 2,974 shares were declining while 975 were advancing on BSE.
Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) offloaded Rs 5,579.35 crore worth of shares on a net basis during the previous session while domestic institutional investors (DIIs) purchased Rs 4,609.55 crore worth of shares, exchange data showed.