Largecaps ITC and Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) witnessed significant buying action in March from mutual funds, which bought shares worth Rs 7,700 crore in the former and Rs 5,700 crore in the latter, a Nuvama report suggested.
Among the funds shopping for ITC were ICICI Prudential MF which topped the charts with a share purchase worth Rs 4,892 crore. It was followed by DSP MFs and Kotak MF which added shares worth Rs 432 crore and 377 crore, respectively. The other large additions included Aditya Birla Sun Life MF which bought shares worth Rs 306 crore while Axis MF bought ITC shares worth Rs 356 crore.
Mutual funds held a 9.66% stake in ITC at the end of the December quarter according to the latest shareholding data available on the BSE. The March quarter data is still not available but MF holdings are expected to go up in the quarter.
With over 8% returns in the past 12 months, ITC has underperformed the sectoral index Nifty FMCG, which has given over 16% returns during the period.
As for TCS, SBI MF’s prominent addition in March was this IT stock where the latter bought shares worth Rs 2,205 crore according to Nuvama’s estimates. The details of other MF buys were not disclosed by the Nuvama note.
The shareholding data of TCS for the March quarter is not yet out. At the end of the December quarter, total holdings of mutual funds stood at 3.51%.
TCS shares have delivered returns of over 25% in the past 12 months, which are on par with the returns given by Nifty IT and those given by broader Nifty in the said period.
On Friday, TCS’ reported revenue for the January-March quarter stood at Rs 61,237 crore, up 3.5% year-on-year and 2.2% YoY in constant currency terms. The profit for the reported quarter stood at Rs 12,434 crore, up 9.1% YoY.
Prominent mutual fund buying action was seen in Kotak Mahindra Bank and HDFC Bank while selling in State Bank of India (SBI) and Jio Financial Services.
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