George Soros exiting Indian markets ?

Billionaire investor George Soros’ Fund Quantum M has been selling its holdings in different companies. As per the filing of shareholding patterns on BSE, Quantum M has sold its holdings in Reliance Capital, Future Capital, GVK Power & Infrastructure, Orissa Sponge Iron & Steel, Indiabulls Real-Estate and Indiabulls Financial Services. In April, his fund has been selling shares of Rel Infrastructure (595895 shares sold in March quarter and 1304191 shares on 6th April) and JSW Holdings (311232 shares of 965991 shares held by his fund as on 31st March’09) according to the bulk deals on BSE. Quantum’s holdings in Dish TV is awaited.

His fund still holds 1.5% stake in Anant Raj Industries, 5.63% in Gujarat Ambuja Exports Ltd, 3.17% in Karuturi Global as on 31st March’09. So he has not completely exited the Indian markets.

One can make out clearly that there are higher number of stocks his fund sold in the March quarter than the stocks his fund holds. Soros is known for his currency bets. He has fared poorly in equities.

George Soros mentioned in his 28th Jan article in FT,

Although I positioned myself reasonably well for what was coming last year, one thing I got wrong cost me dearly: there was no decoupling between markets of the developed and the developing worlds. Indian and Chinese were hit even harder than those in the US and Europe. Since we did not reduce our exposure, we lost more money in India than we had made the year before.

Infact, his fund was on a buying spree in February and July last year!

Rakesh Jhunjhunwala’s holdings as on 31st March’09

This is just a small brief on the shares Ace investor Rakesh Jhunjhunwala bought/sold in the March quarter.

He bought 6,50,000 shares of Geometric Ltd, 1,75,000 shares of Karur Vysya Bank, 1,34,000 shares of Lupin

He sold 1,21,000 shares of Titan Industries, 7,00,000 shares of Pantaloon Retail and 11,00,000 shares of Nagarjuna Constructions.

No change in holdings in Rallis India, Praj Industries, Punj Llyod, Crisil and Mid-Day Multimedia.

I will keep on updating the changes in shareholdings in other stocks. For a detail check on his holdings, visit The Equity Desk. If I have missed any stock, do let me know!

Barclays’ Economist got it all Wrong

Barclays Capital’s Economist Sailesh Jha has been consistently getting all his forecast wrong since August last year. His forecast started with Inflation touching 17% in 2008 and we know that inflation never went above 13%. In the current year, he predicted rupee will tumble to 56 to the dollar by June. Rupee has appreciated in the past few weeks and is now trading around 50 to the dollar. Dollar-Rupee movement is highly correlated to Sensex movement. So Rupee will hit 56 only if Sensex tumbles to 7000.  Since anything can happen in the next two months, we will see how the prediction pans out. Jha predicts that bonds yields will fall to 5.1 by the end of Q2CY09. Yields are currently trading at 7.01%. With the huge government borrowing in the coming quarter, I am sure his prediction will fail. According to the Barclays economist, Indian economy is likely to grow by 4% in FY10. If our economy can grow by 5.3% in a tight liquidity scenario, we will probably grow above 5% in an easy liquidity condition. Infact, we have seen signs of recovering in Q4FY09 in major industries except textiles and gems and jewellery. I believe the effect of low interest rates have been underestimated by economists and analysts.

I hope Barclays is not acting on his forecast. But then for what is he paid for ? Unfortunately, Economists don’t get fired too easily. As someone rightly said,” When your neighbour loses a job, its a recession and When an economist loses a job, its a depression“.