Rate-sensitive stocks mixed bag: Nifty Bank and Financials rise after RBI keeps key rate unchanged

Rate-sensitive stocks were a mixed bag with Nifty Bank and Financials recovering in the trade after the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) monetary policy committee kept key interest rates unchanged on Thursday, June 8, 2023.

This is in line with expectations as most economists had estimated that the central bank will keep the repo rate on hold once again after surprising the market with a status quo in the April 2023 review.

Nifty Bank, Nifty Financials, and Nifty Pvt Banks recover in trade, gaining between 0.3-0.5 per cent, after the RBI Governor Shakitkanta Das announced to keep repo rates unchanged for the second time in a row on Thursday.

On the contrary, Nifty Auto slipped marginally by 0.06 per cent, while Nifty Realty stayed in the red, down by 0.6 per cent after the much awaited the RBI's monetary policy decision

With respect to stocks, banking and financials stocks such as HDFC, IndusInd Bank, HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank, and SBI were among the top gainers, while Kotak Bank, M&M, Axis Bank, and Maruti Suzuki were among the top laggards after the RBI's monetary policy decision.

The Reserve Bank of India on Thursday opted for a pause second time in a row, maintaining the key benchmark policy rate at 6.5 per cent as inflation moderates. The rate increase cycle was paused in April after six consecutive rate hikes aggregating to 250 basis points since May 2022.

Announcing the bi-monthly monetary policy, RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das said the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) unanimously decided to keep the rate unchanged at 6.5 per cent.

While keeping the interest rate intact, Das said headline inflation still remains above RBI's target of 4 per cent and is expected to remain so during the rest of the year.

The MPC meeting took place against the backdrop of consumer price-based (CPI) inflation declining to an 18-month low of 4.7 per cent in April.

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