Rush To Quality

As lockdown opens across the country, India’s micro economy is finally beginning to show signs of life even as the macro economy remains in deep freeze. But that’s just one of the contradictions the nation’s beleaguered economy is dealing with. Stock markets, for instance, are completely divorced from the real economy. Even when the GDP is set to shrink by a record 10-12 per cent this year, the Sensex — already past the 40k mark — hit a new all-time high of 42,645.33 on November 9, 2020. Among other contradictions, economic growth in rural India has been far better than in urban India for the past few quarters; and right through the slowdown of the last 18-odd quarters, larger firms have performed substantially better vis-a-vis medium and smaller firms.

This year’s BT500 captures these trends. Combined market capitalisation of BT500 companies