India’s Fourth-Largest Portfolio Manager Bets On These Stocks In 2019

Ask Investment Managers Ltd. expects consumption-driven stocks to emerge as winners this year at a time when the market is dragged by issues such as the U.S.-China trade spat and upcoming general election.

India’s fourth-largest portfolio manager, having equity assets worth Rs 12,610.6 crore, will focus on consumption business and consumer financier stocks as these are expected to have a better uptake of margin amid a situation where capital expenditure will reduce, Chief Investment Officer Prateek Agrawal told BloombergQuint.

“We believe (consumer financing businesses) will sustain in a dicey marketplace that we foresee in the next year.”

Here are other highlights from the conversation:

Valuation

• Overall compounding from equity markets would be a little lower than earnings compounding, making valuation correction possible.

Global Growth

• Global growth would be a tad slower than previous year, hurt by softer growth in bigger economies like the U.S. and China.

Reducing Capex

• Capex would be affected as bigger industries are investing in stressed assets and the Indian government is focusing on loan waivers.
• Capacity utilisation is moving up.
• Indian corporates not making big moves in capex.

Auto Sales

• December a terribly bad month for automobile sales, due to reduced financing and larger discounts.
• If the December slowdown continues in January, the concern would increase.

Real Estate

• Muted growth prevented the profile manager company from investing in the sector.

Watch the full interaction here: