Defence stocks on roll: Mazagon Dock, BDL, Cochin Shipyard surge up to 10%

Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders hit a new high of Rs 1,584, as the stock rallied 10 per cent on reports that MoD has cleared the procurement of three additional Scorpene or Kalvari class submarines.

Shares of defence related companies were on a roll, surging by up to 10 per cent amid heavy volumes on reports that the Ministry of Defence (MoD) has cleared the procurement of 26 Dassault Rafale-Marine fighters ahead of the Prime Minister's visit to France, which is scheduled for July 13-14.

As per reports, the deal is expected to be announced during PM Modi's visit. The 26 Rafale-M fighters will be operated from the Indian Navy's Made-in-India aircraft carrier (INS Vikrant) which got commissioned in September last year.

The Indian Navy conducted flight trials of both French Dassault Rafale-M and American-made Boeing F-18 super hornet block-III from the shore-based test facility in Goa last year and selected Rafale-M as the preferred aircraft.

Among individual stocks, Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders, Cochin Shipyard and Bharat Dynamics rallied between 5 per cent and 10 per cent. Mishra Dhatu Nigam, Bharat Electronics and Hindustan Aeronautics were up in the range of 2 to 3 per cent. In comparison, the S&P BSE Sensex was up 0.62 per cent at 65,748 at 10:33 AM.

Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders hit a new high of Rs 1,584, as it rallied 10 per cent on reports that MoD has cleared the procurement of three additional Scorpene or Kalvari class submarines ahead of the Prime Minister's visit to France.

The submarines will be constructed at the facility of Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders in collaboration with France based Naval Group. As per the news sources, the deal is expected to be signed with Naval group during PM Modi's visit on July 13- 14. Contract value for these three additional submarines is expected to be around Rs 20,000-22,000 crore, ICICI Securities said in a note.

Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders is principally engaged in building and repairing ships, submarines, various types of vessels and related engineering products for its customers.

In the past seven weeks, the stock price of the ship building & allied services company has zoomed 106 per cent on a healthy business outlook. Last month, during the visit of Minister of Defence of the Republic of Germany, German shipbuilder ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems (TKMS) and Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders signed a non-binding / non-financial Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for cooperation and preparation for Submarine Project P75-I.

Meanwhile, analyst at Incred Equities remain Overweight on the aerospace and defence sector as valuations currently factor in robust growth led by a strong order pipeline on the back of various schemes like Atmanirbhar Bharat, Positive Indigenization List and Defence Modernization Plan which will provide several opportunities for companies going ahead.

The brokerage firm has an ADD rating on BEL, BDL and HAL, with their order backlog providing revenue visibility. Delay in order finalization and slower-than-expected execution are key downside risks.