5 key themes Ajay Bagga is bullish on

economictimes.indiatimes.com:

Going into the budget, it is best to stay on the sidelines. We will get some more clarity on February 1, says Ajay Bagga, Chairman, Elyments Platforms. Edited excerpts:

If I had to ask you one big theme that you are watching out for or any big announcement, what comes to mind?

Unlock Leadership Excellence with a Range of CXO Courses

More or less, it will be the election manifesto for the ruling coalition that you will see in the budget. There will be an enumeration of all that has been done over the last 10 years, and then what are the plans going ahead for the next five and 10 years. It will be a balance between welfare measures. We are expecting the farmer support to go up from 6,000 to 8,000 rupees and some amount of standard deduction increase to help the salaried middle class.

Then on the growth side, infrastructure should continue at 10 lakh plus with a moderate increase, a single digit increase, maybe 10.5 lakh or something. The market has more or less discounted it, be it railways, be it defence related, be it power stocks or infrastructure stocks. The problem we are facing is the valuations. Valuations had run too high and on a little bit of disappointment on earnings, we have seen some amount of selling coming through add to that the FII sell-out. Now, will the budget be the cause of that? Has the budget been the cause? I do not think so. Nothing is really expected which will jolt the markets. It will be a mildly supportive budget, balanced budget between welfare and growth measures and the infra focus will continue.