Nomura names ‘Titans’ in Indian stocks

Nomura research team has spilt the Asian shares into three categories — Titans,Heroes and Mortals — according to their performance.

‘Titans’ have been defined as a company of “best of breed” stocks,which would dominate their respective industries in the coming years and are using the current slowdown as an opportunity.

In case of Indian firms,Nomura has put five companies — Reliance Industries,NTPC,L&T,Sun Pharma and Hindustan Unilever — under the Titan category.

‘Heroes’ are defined as those companies that can surprise investors and become the best of breed,while the third category of ‘Mortals’ comprises those firms which “will live forever in the shadow of Titans and Heroes”.

Ratan Tata-led Tata Power has been placed under the Heroes category along with the country’s largest auto maker,Maruti Suzuki,Piramal Healthcare,FMCG player Marico,Hyderabad-based engineering firm IVRCL Infrastructure and Glenmark. Meanwhile,the country’s second largest realty developer,Unitech,and auto major TVS have been placed under the Mortal category by Nomura,which refers to firms which are always going to follow the leaders in the market.

Besides,Nomura in a report said that an improving terms of trade,steep yield curves and pre-emptive policy responses to domestic credit crunch has left Asian region with a relatively decent position to weather the aftermath of the financial crisis.