TCS First Indian IT Company To Touch 100 Billion Dollar Market Value

TCS or Tata Consultancy Services' market capitalisation or market value hit 100 billion dollar today, making it the first Indian IT company to achieve the mark. TCS shares moved nearly 4 per cent higher today at day's high, extending their Friday's surge. TCS shares rose today by 4 per cent to Rs 3,557, pushing the market capitalisation of India's biggest outsourcer to over Rs 6.8 lakh crore. Shares of TCS had surged by nearly 7 per cent on Friday, making investors richer by over Rs 40,000 crore in a day. On the other hand, the rupee declined further today to edge closer to 66.50 mark against the dollar today, as compared to Friday's close of 66.12. TCS shares pared most of the gains to end marginally higher at Rs 3,415 on BSE today. 

Energy-to-telecom conglomerate Reliance Industries, led by Mukesh Ambani, is the only other Indian company that had breached the $100 billion mark, way back in 2007.

(Also read: TCS gives 120% variable pay to employees)

Deal wins in January-March helped the Mumbai-headquartered company post its biggest-ever net profit in the quarter. TCS had announced its earnings after market hours on Thursday. TCS posted a net profit of Rs. 6,904 crore, beating analysts' average estimate of Rs. 6,798 crore. TCS, part of salt-to-software conglomerate Tata group, reported Rs. 32,075 crore as income from operations - a rise of 8.2 per cent from a year ago.

Rajesh Gopinathan, CEO & MD, TCS said, ""We are indeed delighted and thankful to our employees and customers who have been instrumental in achieving this milestone - what is exciting for us is the whole business 4.0 journey and the great opportunity to be a digital partner of choice to our customers in their growth and transformation journey."  Business 4.0 strategy of TCS refers to a technology-driven transformation of businesses after the advent of the fourth industrial revolution, Mr Gopinathan said earlier.

Looking ahead, TCS expects a rebound in spending by its key banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI) clients this financial year. India's top software services exporter is more confident about BFSI revenues from North America as client discussions show there is "not much stress left in the system", and this could potentially translate into better client spending through the course of the year, Mr Gopinathan had said.

"TCS delivered a strong set of performance in Q4 with a beat on dollar revenues and profit," said domestic brokerage Prabhudas Lilladher in a note. And going ahead, "digital remains the key driver for incremental growth for TCS", it added.

Global brokerage Nomura however has a 'reduce' on TCS shares, citing high valuations. "We retain reduce as we find valuations expensive at around 20x FY20F and see risk to street expectations of double-digit constant currency (CC) revenue growth and flattish margins," the brokerage said in a note.

In dollar terms, TCS reported revenue of $4,972 million in Q4, up 3.9 per cent quarter-on-quarter and up 11.7 per cent year-on-year. "We're glad to announce we're back to double digit trajectory on dollar revenue growth," Mr Gopinathan had said. TCS board had also approved a 1:1 bonus issue of equity shares. A 1:1 bonus means that a shareholder will get one share for each share held by him/her.  (With Agency Inputs)