MUMBAI: India Inc is expected to report a muted 5-7 per cent revenue growth for the September quarter, which would be a 16-quarter low mark. Usually, lower revenue and profit growth numbers weigh on investor sentiment and put downward pressure on stocks.
The slower growth would be due to “stagnant performance in the construction vertical, which accounts for a fifth of India Inc’s revenue, besides a decline in the industrial commodities vertical and subdued growth in investment-linked sectors,” an analysis of 435 large companies by the market intelligence & analytics arm of Crisil noted. These 435 companies account for nearly half of India’s total market capitalisation, the report said.
Construction, industrial commodities and investment-linked sectors – which account for about 38 per cent of all companies included in the sample for the analysis – grew only 1 per cent , weighing down overall growth in the second quarter, according to the report. “The agriculture sector, including fertilisers (2 per cent of the sample set’s revenue), saw a 20-22 per cent drop in revenue.”