Amid heightened volatility, investors should refrain from taking aggressive positions and instead let the uncertainty cool off, says market veteran Nischal Maheshwari. In an interview with ET Now, he stressed that the near-term setup does not justify fresh risk-taking despite selective opportunities emerging beneath the surface.

Maheshwari’s overarching message was simple: caution over action. “The best thing is to avoid it for the time being. The runup has been pretty strong,” he said, adding that despite buying equities when the Nifty slipped below 23,000, he prefers to remain on the sidelines now. “It is too early to actually do anything… Just wait it out.”

On sectors he accumulated during the recent dip, Maheshwari highlighted a consistent leaning toward structural themes. “Power is a well-known theme across the market… power and solar has been two sectors which I have been positive about and have accumulated.” Alongside this, he continues to favour metals and banking, sectors he believes still enjoy strong fundamentals and macro visibility.

One space he isn’t touching is IT. Despite steep corrections, he sees no clarity on the earnings bottom. “I would tend to avoid it because even this quarter there has been no commentary which says that we are close to the bottom… it is best to avoid for the moment.” For existing IT investors, his advice is unequivocal: “I would tend to actually get out of this.”

Maheshwari is equally cautious on the auto sector, citing the potential ripple effects of weakness in technology-led employment. “I for the moment would avoid autos… the biggest fallout is going to come in autos.”

On Reliance Industries, he acknowledged its history of subdued stock performance while still flagging meaningful catalysts. “Reliance has been attractive for a long period of time. Unfortunately, it does not perform,” he noted. Yet, at current levels, he sees merit in accumulating. “I do agree at Rs 1300, 1325 Reliance is a buy.”
Consumption stocks, particularly FMCG names, may offer tactical opportunities, he added. “It could be a good trading bet… there has been a sector rotation… there is a good trading play available in the FMCG side.”(Disclaimer: The recommendations, suggestions, views, and opinions given by the experts are their own. These do not represent the views of The Economic Times.)

Reliance Industries Limited reported a net profit of Rs 95,610 crore in FY26, becoming the first Indian company to cross the $10 billion annual profit mark (approximately $10.15 billion). The Mukesh Ambani-led conglomerate, also India’s most valuable company, posted an 18% year-on-year rise in profit after tax (PAT), up from Rs 80,787 crore in FY25.

RIL on Friday reported a 12.6% year-on-year decline in consolidated net profit for the quarter ended March 31, 2026, as weakness in the oil-to-chemicals segment and higher costs weighed on the bottom line. The company’s consumer-facing businesses, however, continued to scale, with Jio Platforms posting strong earnings growth and Reliance Retail crossing 20,000 stores.

Consolidated net profit attributable to owners of the company came in at Rs 16,971 crore for Q4FY26, down from Rs 19,407 crore in the same quarter last year. Gross revenue rose 12.9% year-on-year to Rs 3,25,290 crore.

The company’s revenue also hit a record for the full year. Gross revenue for Q4FY26 rose 13% year-on-year to Rs 3,25,290 crore. For the full year, consolidated gross revenue rose 9.8% to a record Rs 11,75,919 crore. Full-year EBITDA also hit a record at Rs 2,07,911 crore, up 13.4% year-on-year.

Also read: Reliance Industries Q4 results key takeaways: O2C drags profit down 12.6% as Jio, retail hold the fort

Despite a 15% correction in 2026 so far, RIL shares are commanding a market capitalisation of over Rs 18 lakh crore.
While the earnings season is now at the end of its second week, its nearest rivals HDFC Bank and PSU lender State Bank of India (SBI) have significant ground to cover to reach that mark.
HDFC Bank, the next most valuable company by market capitalisation (Rs 12.08 lakh crore), reported a consolidated net profit of $8.07 (Rs 76,026 crore) billion in FY26 versus $7.51 billion (Rs 70,792 crore) in the previous FY, up 7.4% YoY.
While SBI is yet to announce its January-March quarter earnings, its 9MFY26 PAT stands at Rs 63,656 crore. Top brokerages like Nomura and Nuvama Institutional Equities have pegged the Q4 bottom line at Rs 18,700 crore to Rs 20,090 crore.

If the estimates hold true, the FY26 PAT for India’s largest lender could be Rs 83,746 crore, implying a net profit of $8.89 billion.

Domestic IT bellwether Tata Consultancy Services’ (TCS) FY26 PAT stood at Rs 49,454 crore ($5.25 billion).

(Disclaimer: The recommendations, suggestions, views, and opinions given by the experts are their own. These do not represent the views of The Economic Times.)

Some private-credit investors are shifting cash from one kind of debt fund to another, capitalizing on the differences in how they are valued. All of these funds hold private loans, but some are trading at a discount to others. Wall Street has a name for trades of this nature: arbitrage.

Kolkata: Private sector RBL Bank reported an over three-fold surge in net profit for the fourth quarter at Rs 230 crore over Rs 69 crore in the year ago period, backed by healthy business expansion, improvement in asset quality and lower provisions.

The bank, where Emirates NBD is set to acquire a majority stake up to 74% for approximately $3 billion, saw its annual net profit rise 18% year-on-year at Rs 822 crore.

RBL board proposed a dividend of Re 1 per share having Rs 10 face value, making it 10% dividend for FY26.

The bank’s net interest margin however fell to 4.41%, the lowest in the past five quarters. NIM was 4.63% in the preceding quarter while it was 4.89% in the year-ago period.

Net interest income grew 7% year-on-year at Rs 1671 crore while other income stood 7% higher at Rs 1069 crore. Its operating profit grew 11% year-on-year at Rs 955 crore.

“There has not been any material impact of the West Asia crisis on our business so far,” managing director R Subramaniakumar said.
“We delivered growth that meaningfully outpaced normalised industry trends, led by sharp momentum in granular retail advances and sustained strengthening of our granular deposit franchise,” he said.The bank’s net advances grew 23% year-on-year to Rs 1.14 lakh crore with retail segment contributing 59% of it while it saw contraction in credit card receivables and personal loan portfolio. Its total deposits grew 25% to Rs 1.39 lakh crore.

Its asset quality improved with gross non-performing assets ratio falling to 1.45% at the end of March from 1.88% three months prior, helped by Rs 911 crore of technically written-off loans during the quarter. Net NPA ratio was at 0.39% against 0.55% for the same period. The quarterly provisions were lower at Rs 678 crore as compared with Rs 785 crore in the year-ago period when the bank had made accelerated provisions to cover the credit risks arising from its microfinance portfolio.

The MD said that the share of the lender’s unsecured loans reduced to 24% from 285 a year back and the bank would like to maintain it between 20 and 25%.

During the quarter, It opened 23 branches, taking the total tally to 603.

“This expanded footprint strengthens our ability to deepen customer relationships, enhance sourcing capabilities, and support growth across our retail businesses as we enter the new financial year,” the MD said.

On the strategic investment by Emirates NBD which will transform RBL into a foreign bank subsidiary, approvals from the Reserve Bank of India and Competition Commission of India are already in place while RBL is awaiting the government’s approval, required for the foreign direct investment.

(Disclaimer: The recommendations, suggestions, views, and opinions given by the experts are their own. These do not represent the views of The Economic Times.)

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Q1: 2026-04-23 Earnings Summary

EPS of $1.68 beats by $0.18

 | Revenue of $275.30M (7.49% Y/Y) beats by $7.09M

This article was written by

Non-bank lender L&T Finance on Friday reported a 27 per cent rise in the March quarter’s consolidated profit after tax (PAT) to Rs 807 crore on sharp rise in interest income and retail disbursements.

On a sequential basis, net profit rose 6 per cent.

Its core net interest increased to Rs 4,424.03 crore in the reporting quarter from Rs 4,240.07 crore a quarter ago and Rs 3.749.88 crore in the year-ago period.

“Through the course of the year, we remained steadfast in our approach, tightening credit and risk administration frameworks, strengthening collections infrastructure, accelerating our AI-led technology transformation and continuously focusing on growth across all our business lines,” Sudipta Roy, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer at L&T Finance, said.

In the microfinance business, the focus was on navigating the cycle with prudence and the efforts have yielded results, Roy said, adding that business parameters across disbursements and collection efficiencies are now reverting to near pre-crisis levels.

The company is confident that FY27 will be a stable and productive year for this segment.
The total revenue from operations increased to Rs 4,771.03 crore in Q4 FY26 compared to Rs 4,578.27 crore in Q3 FY26 and Rs 4,022.92 crore in Q4 FY25, according to its financial results.In the reporting quarter, retail disbursements grew 62 per cent to Rs 24,107 crore in Q4 FY26 from Rs 14,899 crore in Q4 FY25.

The growth in secured disbursements led by two-wheeler finance at Rs 2,930 crore, a rise of 58 per cent year-on-year.

Personal loan disbursements rose 98 per cent to Rs 3,786 crore, rural business finance disbursements increased 41 per cent to Rs 7,208 crore, investor presentation showed.

Its retail book rose 26 per cent year-on-year to Rs 1,19,508 crore, and consolidated stood at was Rs 1,21,728 crore.

The wholesale book of the company declined 14 per cent to Rs 2,220 crore as of March 31, 2026, from Rs 2,582 crore a year back.

The company has seen an improvement of 0.06 per cent in net interest margins (NIM) plus fees. It stood at 10.47 per cent in Q4 FY26 compared to 10.41 per cent in Q3 FY26.

Credit costs improved in the reporting quarter at 2.64 per cent from 2.83 per cent in the preceding December quarter.

The L&T Finance scrip closed 0.56 per cent down at Rs 290.45 a piece on the BSE against a 1.29 per cent correction on the benchmark.