The stock markets displayed volatility on Thursday — starting the day on a weak note as the disappointing results of TCS hit sentiment only to recover almost at the end of trading day, with the fall in retail inflation swaying sentiment.

Equities tumbled on the stock exchanges as earnings season kicked off on a very weak note on Wednesday with TCS missed margin and profit estimates on constant currency basis because of weakness in the US and Europe.

Several brokerages have pinned “underperform”, “underweight” and “sell” tags on the TCS stock as US clients turn cautious on discretionary tech spends.

The market was also taking its cues from Asian bourses that stumbled after the Federal Reserve said its economists expect a “mild recession” starting late in 2023.

Notes from the Fed’s latest meeting said its economists expect lower bank lending to cause a “mild recession.”

Traders have been worried the Fed and other central banks in Europe and Asia might tip the global economy into recession as they try to extinguish inflation that is near multi-decade highs.

The markets are currently pricing a 74 per cent chance of a 25 bp rate hike at the May 2-3 FOMC meeting.

However, the benchmark equity indices Sensex and Nifty ticked higher for the ninth straight session on Thursday buoyed by fag-end buying in banking, financial and realty stocks amid encouraging domestic retail inflation data.

The 30-share BSE Sensex went up marginally by 38.23 points or 0.06 per cent to settle at 60431. The Nifty rose 0.09 per cent to 17828.

Results alert

India Inc is likely to report a halving of revenue growth in the fourth quarter of FY23, a credit rating agency said on Thursday.

The revenue growth will come down to 10-12 per cent against 22.8 per cent for the January-March period in the year-ago, Crisil’s Market Intelligence and Analytics arm said.

For the full fiscal FY23, revenue is estimated to have grown 19-21 per cent, which is slower than over 27 per cent growth registered in FY22, Crisil said.

Operating margin is likely to have moderated by 3 percentage points, it said.

MF inflows

Mutual funds remained bullish on the Indian equities in 2022-23 and invested Rs 1.82 lakh crore largely due to a strong interest from retail investors.

This comes following a similar amount of Rs 1.81 lakh crore invested by mutual funds in 2021-22.