India Inc. commenced earnings season on a weak note, with Infosys declaring its Q4 results that showed almost nil growth in net profit, YoY. The disappointing factory output data for February declared the previous day added to the sentiments, causing benchmark indices to end with losses. Meanwhile, president Pranab Mukherjee gave his assent to the four enabling GST Bills on Thursday.
Infosys shares closed 3.86 percent down at Rs 931 on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), after hitting an intraday low of Rs 927. The BSE IT index plunged 2.73 percent, with other IT stocks such as Wipro, HCL Technologies, TCS and Tech Mahindra also closing with losses.
"For, 4QFY2017 the results were below expectations, on the sales front the company has posted revenue of $2,569mn v/s expectations of $2,589mn, with 0.7% QoQ growth. On the CC (constant Currency), the revenues have remained flat QoQ," Sarabjit Kour Nangra, VP Research- IT, Angel Broking, said in a note on Thursday.
The BSE Sensex ended 182 points lower at 29,461 while the NSE Nifty lost 53 points to close at 9,151.
Top Sensex losers were Infosys, Bharti Airtel, Tata Steel and TCS.
"A weak start to Q4 result season led by IT heavyweight and disruptive global market dragged the domestic market. Additionally, IIP data was not encouraging, rise in food inflation and anticipation of below normal monsoon impacted markets sentiment. Going ahead the performance of Q4 earnings will define the trend of the market," Vinod Nair, Head of Research, Geojit Financial Services, said.
On Wednesday, the government released the provisional IIP data for February. The 1.2 percent decline was in sharp constrast to the 2.7 percent growth in the previous month. The growth for the period April 2016 to February 2017 came in at 0.4 percent.
"Not only the IIP data for the month of February 2016 is disappointing, even at aggregate level that is April-Feb FY17 it shows a flat growth as compared to 2.6% growth during the same period in FY16. The situation at the manufacturing level is even worse," Sunil Kumar Sinha, Principal Economist, India Ratings & Research, said in a statement.
President Mukherjee gave his assent to the four GST Bills — Union GST, Integrated GST, Central GST and GST (Compensation to States) Bill. This is pursuant to the Lok Sabha passing the legislations on March 29 and the Rajya Sabha on April 6.
