Titan, United Spirits, Vedant Fashions Top Wedding Season Picks Of Nuvama’s Abneesh Roy

With the wedding season kicking off in India, Abneesh Roy, executive director of research at Nuvama Institutional Equities, has listed a number of sectors that are likely to gain from the large-scale wedding spends.

Several companies across sectors are set to gain from an extended wedding season after a sluggish demand in the first half of the ongoing financial year.

Sectoral players expected to benefit from the rising consumption this wedding season include liquor, jewellery and FMCG companies, among others.

While discussing how the wedding season will benefit the listed companies, Roy also revealed to NDTV Profit his top stock picks across the sectors.

“I think, definitely, Vedant Fashions is a clear play on that (wedding season),” he said. Vedant Fashions Ltd., is the owner of the Manyavar brand known for its ethnic wear and wedding apparels like sherwanis and bridal collections, including lehengas.

At the same time, Roy noted that multiple other listed companies will also gain from wedding season spend.

“For example, the liquor companies. We are positive on United Spirits Ltd., United Breweries Ltd. Both should see benefits,” he said.

Roy also picked jewellery stocks that are likely to gain. “This (the wedding season) obviously benefits the jewellery companies significantly because, obviously, in any marriage, jewellery spends are quite high. So Titan clearly, we have a buy and that should also benefit,” he said.

The Nuvama analyst said that the brokerage was also positive on discretionary stocks.

“We are positive about Trent. We are positive on Vedant Fashions also. We are positive on Titan, United Spirits. So, yes, we have comfort in (the) valuation that has come. They will take into care the urban slowdown and will also have the trigger of wedding days,” he said.

Apart from jewellery and apparel, consumers are expected to spend on food, snacks and paints and that is likely to benefit key players in these segments.

“I'll still caution that this will be more in terms of reversing some of the urban slowdown. Rural, there is a recovery. So I will say that the weddings will also obviously happen in the rural areas (also),” he said.

In the FMCG space, four companies are expected to gain, according to the analyst. “Marico, HUL, Britannia, Colgate—these are some of the names in the FMCG space because whenever weddings happen, there is a huge crowd and the consumption of FMCG also happens,” he said.

However, Roy added that these stocks are going to witness a gradual recovery. “Next two quarters, the urban slowdown will continue because the food inflation is there and the wage growth also has been slower than the initial expectations,” he said.

The staggered wedding season should be viewed as a buying opportunity because the bottom cannot be predicted, the analyst said.