After banks cut lending rates, realty stocks soar; DLF, Oberoi Realty head list

Nine of the top ten realty stocks went up by 0.72% to 6.65% on January 2, after the domestic banks have started cutting lending rates after a massive inflow of deposits post demonetisation. The BSE Realty index rose by 4.23% and closed at 1,318.38 in the first session of CY2017.

The biggest gainer from the realty index was DLF, up 6.65% at the end of Monday’s closing. A spurt in DLF’s volume has been registered on Monday, the volume increased by 2.27 times from last two weeks average of 9.39 lakh to 21.31 lakh.

Stock prices of Oberoi Realty, Indiabulls Real Estate and Unitech have gone up by over 6% on Monday.

Prestige Estates Projects is the only realty company in the top ten, by market capitalisation,whose price fell by 1.17% and closed at R169.20.

After the government banned high currency notes on November 8, the BSE Realty index has fell by over 20%. Major realty stocks like DLF, Indiabulls Real Estate, Godrej properties, Housing Development and Infrastrcture (HDIL) fell between 20%-25% during the period.

The country’s largest lender, State Bank of India (SBI), cut its marginal cost of funds-based lending rate (MCLR) across all tenors by 90 basis points (bps) on Sunday. The one year MCLR is now 8% and the three-year rate stands at 8.15%.

Other public sector lenders Punjab National Bank (PNB) and Union Bank of India (UBI), Dena Bank, IDBI Bank, State Bank of Travancore, Kotak Mahindra Bank, too, have brought down the interest rate. The lending rate cut by banks will benefit borrowers, especially customers with long-term home loans of 20-25 years. The 90 bps cut will reduce the tenure of a 25-year home loan by almost five years.

DLF Ltd