Eyes wide open for Infy guidance

It is a big one for Infosys.

It is the big one. Our guess is as good as anyone on what they will come out with but if they are conservative and they say that we are not going to stick our necks out and guide anything more than 12%-13% which is the Rs 91-92 that is the test for the market because you have got global factors weighing down on one side and on the other hand, the Infosys guidance will be important.

My best case is Rs 92 because I think there is a little bit of an element of the base, which needs to be understood. If they do Rs 92 then on the expected earnings for this year of Rs 81.50 EPS they are going to do about 13%. However, if you strip off some of the tax write backs the actual core earnings base for 2008 is closer to Rs 79 so if they guide Rs 92 on Rs 79 then they are guiding 15% already. So I think that needs to be kept in mind that in their minds they are going to look core earnings to core earnings and therefore 15% is the 92 line.

So I am struggling to understand or figure out why Infosys in this kind of an environment will go out very aggressive and guide more than Rs 92. That for me is the best case scenario, anything more than Rs 92-93, which would work out to more than 15%-16% guided growth I think the market will take with both hands.

The fear is if they go to Rs 91-sub 91 that I think is something, which might lead to a bit of a sell off. So those broad numbers Rs 91 is your downside cut off Rs 93 is your upside cut off after which the market starts getting happy and in the middle is the no man’s land. But we do not know they might see anything. I have seen many of these annual guidances and more times and not Infy has actually surprised. So keep fingers crossed they might say something, which is very bullish or very bearish and you maybe surprised on either side.

Earnings are crucial this time because the global situation is gotten a bit murky?

It was quite fortuitous that we did not trade yesterday otherwise we would have lost 300-400 points on the Sensex quite easily the way most global markets behaved, but sometimes markets play catch up too so one will have that lingering thing at the back of mind as you trade that you did not participate in one global sell off and that is why Infosys assumes even more importance. If it can come in with a good guidance and the mood lifts this mornings and we may not think so much about yesterdays sell-off and might focus on Infosys.

It is tough to say where the market is going we are still firmly in that range albeit a bit closer to that higher end of it but I suspect we might see a bit of volatility today but it’s absolutely impossible to predict what the market will do today because we have got the global baggage and Infosys as well so the outcome depends on many things but closer to 9:45 am before the markets are open having seen Infosys will probably have better sense of what the market will do but right now its completely  unpredictable.