Stock market benchmark Sensex may soar past the 19,000-point level this year, propelled by domestic factors like robust economic expansion and decent corporate earnings growth, the country's top brokerage and investment banking entity ICICI Securities has said.
The only negative headwinds the Indian market can witness could be due to negative cues from global markets, but investors willing to stay invested for at least 15-18 months will not be disappointed with their returns, I-Sec Managing Director and CEO Madhabi Puri-Buch told PTI.
"Markets are partly linked to real economy and the corporate earnings and then also partly to global liquidity... Real economy in India, as also the corporate earnings, will continue to grow and the growth is here to stay," Buch noted.
The I-Sec chief noted that even 15 per cent corporate earnings growth, which would be a reasonably low estimate as per the prevailing trends, would be sufficient to propel the Sensex past the 19,000 level and the surge could be much bigger if there are other positive triggers, such as those in the form of favourable global cues.
"However, we should be conscious of the fact that there could be some negative cues due to liquidity issues in the global economy," Buch said, but quickly added that any negative cues would only have a very short-term impact.
"It should not worry the investors who have at least 15-18 months of investment timeframe in their minds and those looking to stay invested for 3-5 years will certainly not be disappointed with the kind of returns they would get from Indian markets," she said.
Indian equities have been under pressure for the past few weeks, mostly because of the European financial crisis that has led to a sharp sell-off in markets across the world. However, global markets, including the US, rebounded sharply on Friday after clarity emerged about the US and Europe taking remedial actions for the deep crisis having engulfed the Western economies for about two years now.
Buch said that a volatile market is actually good for investors, as downslides actually give buying opportunities, as has been the case with recent fall in the market.
The Indian benchmark Sensex has dropped about 7 per cent, or close to 1,250 points, in the past one month and settled at 16,445.61 points on Friday.
The index has, however, more than doubled from the lows below the 8,000-point level it had plunged to after emergence of the global economic crisis in late 2008.
It rose to as high as 18,047.86 points on April 7, 2010, its highest level in a year, but has been mostly on a downward spiral since then due to the economic financial crisis.
The Sensex had scaled its all-time high of 21,206.77 points on January 10, 2008.
Some other market players, including UBS Securities and Deutsche Bank, are expecting the Sensex to scale new record highs above the 22,000-point milestone by the end of the current fiscal.
UBS Securities recently raised its Sensex target for FY10-11 ending March, 2011, to 22,000 points, from 21,000 previously. Deutsche Bank has also said that it was expecting the Sensex to hit 22,000-point mark this fiscal, notwithstanding the negative cues from European markets.
