On average, they invested Rs 15,100 crore a month via MF SIPs in 2023, while 26.8 million new demat accounts till November showed large direct retail participation. Foreign investors panicked halfway through the year but, in the end, flocked back to pump in highest-ever Rs 1.75 lakh crore, bettering 2020s Rs 1.73 lakh crore.
Naveen Kulkarni says: "Our learnings from 2023 have been to remain focused on fundamental strengths and invested in the markets. It is not very easy to enter a market at higher levels once you have missed opportunities at lower levels. Thus, time in the market continues to remain the most critical factor. Risk-taking is rewarded in the market when underlying fundamentals are seeing sharp improvement, and vice versa is also true."
Rohit Srivastava says: “Markets may continue to attempt going higher towards maybe 21,600, 21,700. But we retain some level of caution heading into what is usually a seasonal high in markets around January of each year. Therefore, we would really want to stay slightly light into this rally. And then only use the next pullback as a better entry point.”
Across the banking sector, deposit growth has remained sluggish in the past few years but has seen some growth revival in the past few quarters. The uptick in deposit growth is mainly attributed to higher interest rates offered by banks and their intense efforts in mobilizing deposits.
On a year-to-date basis, the S&P BSE PSU index has rallied more than 50% and scaled a lifetime high of 15,531 earlier this week. Meanwhile, the benchmark Sensex has given a little over 16% returns in the same period. A significant chunk of the gains in PSU stocks came in December, with as many as 28 of them clocking double-digit gains, after the strong victory for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the state assembly elections of Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, and Rajasthan.