India Stocks Advance, Paring Worst Sensex Quarterly Loss
India Stocks Advance, Paring Worst Sensex Quarterly Loss
(Bloomberg) -- India stocks advanced on Tuesday as some investors found value in riskier assets with the benchmark equity index capping its worst quarter ever.
The S&P BSE Sensex Index rose 3.6% at the close in Mumbai. The quarterly drop of 29%, as the nation saw an acceleration of virus cases and imposed a three-week lockdown, surpasses the previous record of a 28% decline in 1992 after a balance of payments crisis.
“Volatility is here to stay in the near term, given so much is still unknown about the trajectory of the infection and related global lockdowns,” Citigroup Inc.’s analysts Surendra Goyal and Vijit Jain wrote in a note. “We advise buying the dips and sticking to large, liquid names,” the note added.
Coronavirus cases in the world’s second-most populous country have ticked higher in the past week, raising alarm over the ability of India, with a fragile health-care system and battered economy, to handle a virus crisis of the magnitude of China or Italy’s.
India’s policy makers have rolled out a $22.6 billion spending plan and delivered an emergency interest rate cut to cushion the economy from the fallout of a nationwide lockdown. Adding to equity market stress, the state of Maharashtra, where the financial capital of Mumbai is located, has the highest number of virus cases.
India’s rupee strengthened against the U.S. dollar, while its sovereign bonds gained after the central bank lifted restrictions on purchases of some government bonds by foreign investors. The NSE Nifty 50 Index rose 3.8%. While India has seen 32 deaths and just over 1,250 cases, experts fear the real tally could be much higher.
The Numbers
All 19 sector sub-indexes compiled by BSE Ltd. advanced, led by a gauge of oil and gas companies.
Reliance Industries Ltd. and Oil and Natural Gas Corp. were among the top gainers on the Sensex index, while IndusInd Bank Ltd. slumped.
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