Metals Shine on D-Street: Benchmark indices were trading higher on Wednesday amid steady global cues, and healthy buying in metals. The index added over a per cent in the morning session on January 18.
Metal stocks in domestic trading advanced as much as 1.3 per cent, benefitting from China’s flurry of policies, rolled out to assist homebuyers and property developers and relieve a long-running liquidity squeeze in the industry.
Hindalco Industries and Tata Steel rose over 2 per cent each to be the top gainers on the Nifty 50. The other gainers included Hindustan Zinc, APL Apollo Tubes, Jindal Steel & Power, SAIL, Vedanta, and JSW Steel.
The global brokerage and research firm CLSA believes that a faster reopening in China and stimulus are helping drive a recovery in metal demand in India.
“The US recession now looks imminent but could be shallower than earlier expectations. While domestic demand is resilient, large steel capacity addition could keep dependence on exports high," the research firm said.
The brokerage has upgraded its coverage on the Tata Group mega-cap stock Tata Steel from ‘Sell’ to ‘Outperform’, meaning the global brokerage has turned super bullish on the metal stock from bearish and has raised its target price on the heavyweight stock from Rs 90/share to Rs 135.
At Tata Steel’s opening price of Rs 120/share on Wednesday, CLSA’s upgraded target price is at an upside of 12.5 per cent.
Tata Steel is also the global brokerage firm Jefferies’ top pick in the Indian metal sector, followed by the country’s biggest aluminium manufacturer Hindalco.
“While we turn incrementally positive on ferrous, we continue to prefer Hindalco Industries over steel names. We upgrade Jindal Steel & Power to ‘underperform’ from ‘sell’ and raise target to Rs 610 from Rs 430 per share," CLSA added.
CLSA also has Hindalco Industries as a ‘buy’ and has raised the target to Rs 580 from Rs 515 per share and has maintained the ‘sell’ rating on JSW Steel with the target raised to Rs 640 per share while it has an underperform rating on Vedanta with target at Rs 295 per share.
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