Consumer-facing firms see no 'immediate impact' of RBI's rate hike

The repo rate hike announced by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Wednesday is unlikely to have an immediate impact on consumer-facing sectors such as automobiles and consumer durables, but could hit demand in the medium to long term, according to top executives at some of these firms. 
 

Shashank Srivastava, senior executive officer (sales and marketing) at Maruti Suzuki India, said that though higher retail loan rates could adversely impact demand, the industry would have to wait and see “as the demand parameters are stable” at present. 
 

Close to 78 per cent of the cars in India are bought