Zensar Technologies
Cluster: Ugly Duckling
Recommendation: Buy
Price target: Rs484
Current market price: Rs342
Zen(sar) and the art of growing
Key points
- Strengthening its portfolio of service offerings: Zensar Technologies (Zensar) has effectively utilised the inorganic route to gain the required critical mass in the fast growing enterprise solutions segment (through the acquisition of OBT Global and ThoughtDigital), to strengthen its footprint in under-penetrated geographies such as Japan (through joint venture with Eza, Japan), and to gain access to marquee clients.
- Maintaining the growth momentum: Zensar is well poised to report a healthy growth of over 40% in FY2008. It is witnessing a strong traction in its organic business and the incremental revenues of Rs110 crore from the recent inorganic initiatives would only add to the overall growth momentum in its revenues. Consequently, even after factoring in the adverse impact of the rupee appreciation, the company is expected to achieve its stated revenue guidance of Rs850 crore in FY2008.
- Margins are sustainable: Zensar is also expected to buck the general declining trend in margins in FY2008. That's because some of its relatively new businesses of ITS and BPO that have been in the investment mode are expected to show a substantial improvement in their margins. It also has other margin levers like a favourable revenue mix and lower overhead costs to cushion against the adverse impact of wage hikes, the appreciation in the rupee and the consolidation of the relatively lower-margin revenues of ThoughtDigital.
- Key concern of stake sale by Fujitsu has been dispelled: The acquisition of the entire stake of Fujitsu in Zensar by the RPG group has eliminated a key concern that was a drag on the stock's valuations.
- Attractive valuations: At the current market price the stock trades at 10.6x FY2008 and 8.2x FY2009 estimated earnings; the valuations are extremely attractive considering the estimated earnings growth of 33% CAGR over FY2007-09. We recommend Buy on the stock with a price target of Rs484.
STOCK UPDATE
ICICI Bank
Cluster: Apple Green
Recommendation: Buy
Price target: Rs1,173
Current market price: Rs918
Preferred play on insurance boom
Key points
- India's largest private sector lender ICICI Bank plans to raise Rs20,125 crore ($5 billion) through a follow-on public offer (FPO). The FPO is to be equally distributed in the domestic and foreign markets. The FPO would remain open from June 19- 22, 2007 and the offer price band is at Rs885-950 with a Rs50 discount offered to retail bidders. Further issue details are provided on next page.
- The bank's management has indicated that the pace of growth in the economy as well as the bank's business in the past few years is unprecedented and the FPO tries to address the increased capital requirements of the bank for the next three years.
- The life insurance sector has been growing at a scorching pace for the past few years and ICICI Prudential Life Insurance is the private sector leader with a 30% market share among the private players and a 10% market share in the overall insurance market. The insurance sector is considered to be a sunrise sector and currently there are no listed insurance companies to play on the boom in the insurance sector. Hence, ICICI Bank, which has a 74% stake in ICICI Prudential Life Insurance, remains our preferred choice to play on the insurance story.
- In the past the bank has had to divert a significant amount of the capital raised through its earlier issues to fund its insurance subsidiaries. However this time we feel the difference is that ICICI Bank has already made arrangements for continuous funding of its insurance businesses. Thus with the funding of the insurance businesses taken care of, we feel, there will be more capital available to the bank to grow its core banking business without frequent dilutions in future. However, the huge FPO would take its toll on the return on equity (RoE), which is expected to come down to 10.3% and 10.5% in FY2008 and FY2009 respectively from 13.3% in FY2007.
- We feel one of the concerns pertaining to the bank revolves around its subsidiary ICICI Financial Services (IFS). The formation of the subsidiary is still in the conceptual stage and the bank has only received a firm commitment of Rs2,650 crore for a 5.9% stake sale. To fully materialise and be executed in black and white from the conceptual stage the deal would require regulatory clearance from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority (IRDA) and Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB).
- We feel the stock will continue to consolidate around the current levels, as has been the case in the past after the announcement of any equity issuance. This provides a good opportunity to buy the stock. At the current market price of Rs918, the stock is quoting at 20.1x its FY2009E earnings per share (EPS), 8.9x its pre-provision profits (PPP) and 2.0x FY2009E book value (BV). We maintain our Buy recommendation on the stock with the price target of Rs1,173.