India's equity market capitalisation drops to six-month low in February

The 10 most active securities during Feb 2022 were Reliance Industries, HDFC, Cipla, Tata Power, Adani Wilmar, Vodafone Idea Ltd, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Adani Power, Tata Motors and Infosys

The total equity market capitalisation (m-cap) has dropped to a six-month low of Rs 2,52,39,045.09 crore in February 2022.

However, the market valuation has jumped 25.68 per cent in comparison to February 2021, when it stood at Rs 2,00,81,095.73 crore.

The 10 most active securities during February 2022 were Reliance Industries, HDFC, Cipla, Tata Power, Adani Wilmar, Vodafone Idea Ltd, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Adani Power, Tata Motors and Infosys.

The share of Reliance Industries in the total market capitalisation during the month was the highest at 6.11 per cent, followed by TCS (5.15 per cent) and Infosys (2.82 per cent).

Equity market capitalisation in January was at Rs 2,64,41,207.18 crore.

The market valuation of BSE-listed companies was on a consistent rise since November 2021, only to drop in February 2022.

The previous low for m-cap was in August 2021 at Rs 2,50,02,084.01 crore.

During the month under review, equity m-cap was at its lowest on February 24 at Rs 2,42,24,179.79 crore, the day Russian President Vladimir Putin announced a military operation in Ukraine.

"The market-cap depends entirely on the market trend, which in turn, is entirely swayed by news from the Ukraine front now. If the Ukraine crisis ends soon, there will be a sharp uptrend in the market for a while.

"But this is unlikely to sustain since the Fed is expected to tighten monetary policy starting March. This monetary tightening by the Fed will be a major headwind for global equity markets in 2022," said V K Vijayakumar, chief investment strategist at Geojit Financial Services.

The peak valuation this month was Rs 2,70,64,905.75 crore on February 2.

Also, the equity market turnover in February fell to Rs 96,248.87 crore from Rs 1,07,293.71 crore in January. There were a total of 20 trading days in both the months.