Vikas Pershad, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Veda Investments tells CNBC-TV18 in an exclusive interview that the Sensex can gain 15-20% by the first quarter of the calendar year 2010. However he adds that it is unlikely to see a big correction in the markets. “India can hit all-time highs in 12-24 months.”

He advices investors to play on telecom via strangles and go long on gold and uranium. Not long on financial in India, he cautions them not to hold anything in the infrastructure space.

Pershad likes coppers and finds energy stocks more appealing. Suzlon remains one of his favourite shorts and says investors can buy Educomp for the long-term.

Here is a verbatim transcript of an exclusive interview with Vikas Pershad on CNBC-TV18. Also watch the accompanying video.

Q: What is your call till the year end? Is the market going to break out above 5,000 or do you see a correction as more likely?

A: The correction is something that we have been waiting for or year. Since March, people didn’t believe in a rally. In March and April, you have had detractors all here. I believe that a big correction is not likely. We have these 5-10% sell offs every few weeks. It would be flattish until the end of the year. However, I see no reason why India and particular should not hit all time highs within the next 12-18-24 months. Just looking at the values out there and the growth trajectories, it is not likely that we will have a huge sell off any time soon.

Q: Some of your peers have made the case for 20,000 Sensex by the time we are done with the year. What is your view?

A: I think that is little aggressive. These days nothing would surprise me but being up 15-20% between now and six weeks from now, it seems a little aggressive. However, maybe by the end of Q1, it is not so aggressive.

Q: Do you own any telecom stocks in your portfolio now or you have cleaned the amount?

A: If you look back from May 18 we had the big spike of Bharti Airtel, Idea Cellular, Reliance Communications and Tata Communications. All were down by 35%. I think the sell off is over done. The previous guest was talking about selling strangles out of the money strangles, selling the puts and the calls. I do like that idea. I think it is a good idea in this situation. Perhaps not in a 1:1 ratio, I am just not a big fan of selling naked calls, but maybe if you do 1.5:1 or 2:1. I do like the telecom valuations here. They are migrating towards more like a utility type valuations. I am long on some other emerging market telecom stocks around the world is MICC, which is the leading provider in Africa and Latin America, there is Vimpelcom in Russia. The competition here in India is gaining quite tense. It has been evolving towards that point of the past two years or so. However, this seems over done in the telecom sector.

Q: The other unloved space lately is the capital goods/infrastructure space. What do you still hold there?

A: In that space, nothing in India right now.