RIL among 10 most desired stocks by mutual funds in earnings season

NEW DELHI: Notwithstanding the unexpected drop in Q2 profit of Reliance Industries (RIL), mutual funds raised their bet on the Mukesh Ambani-led company in October. The other two top stocks which were lapped up with both hands by money managers included private lender IndusInd Bank and IT bellwether Infosys. Both of them managed to surprise the Street with their Q2 print.

The list of top 10 most sought after stocks by mutual fund managers in October also included HDFC, Dabur India, Tata Chemicals, ICICI Lombard, Zee Entertainment, Bajaj Finance and UltraTech Cement, shows data from Nuvama Institutional Equities.

IndusInd Bank, whose Q2 profit rose sharply by 60.4% year-on-year (YoY) to Rs 1,787 crore and also reported improvement in asset quality, was the most in demand.

Mutual funds that turned bullish on the bank stock included DSP Mutual Fund, Franklin Templeton, HDFC MF, IDFC MF, Edelweiss MF, Kotak MF and Tata MF.

Those who raised bets on RIL were JM MF, SBI MF, Mirae, Motilal Oswal MF and Quant MF. Similarly, Infosys was fancied by Aditya Birla Sunlife AMC, Axis MF, Invesco, SBI MF and Tata Mutual Fund.


After disappointing performance of the mainstay oil-to-chemicals (O2C) business weighed on RIL overall earnings for the September quarter, at least six brokerages reduced their target prices on the stock last month. Fund managers, however, seemed to have a divergent view as they bought 4.7 million shares of the company in October.

On the other hand, money managers pared stakes in Axis Bank, Coal India, Bharti Airtel, HCL Technologies, L&T, Sun Pharma, Bharat Electronics, NMDC, Cholamandalam and Voltas. SBI and Adani Enterprises too were dumped despite their recent outperformance.

India's largest mutual fund SBI MF picked Bajaj Finance, RIL, Infosys, ICICI Bank and Shree Cement last month. On the other hand, HDFC MF added shares of HDFC Bank, IndusInd Bank and Bharti Airtel. ICICI Prudential did major additions in ICICI Lombard General, Zee Entertainment and Maruti Suzuki.

Consistent Favourites and Dropouts
The list of key additions for three consecutive months includes HDFC Bank, Hindustan Unilever, Bajaj Finance, Asian Paints, Alkem Labs, Balkrishna Industries, Yes Bank, Cummins India, Union Bank of India, Hindustan Copper, Eureka Forbes, Balaji Amines, Akzo Nobel, and Easy Trip Planners.

Key reductions were seen in LIC, Bharti Airtel, Wipro, Tata Motors, Tata Steel, Vedant Fashions, L&T Tech, Aditya Birla Fashion, Aurobindo Pharma, Power Finance Corp, Mangalore Refinery, Sundaram-Clayton, Amara Raja Batteries, Quess Corp and Metropolis Health, shows the data from Nuvama.