Hat-trick on rate hike almost certain, but will the RBI change its stance?

Given the rupee's slide and soaring crude prices, it's almost certain that the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) will raise the repo rate for the third time in a row.

In the last policy meet, the RBI hiked repo rate by 25 basis points to 6.50 per cent, for the second time in a row. Reverse repo -- the rate at which the Reserve Bank borrows money from commercial banks within the country -- was adjusted to 6.25 per cent. The MPC had kept its policy stance neutral.

Most analysts expect the central bank to hike rates by 25 basis points (bps) when it announces monetary policy today. However, the key thing to watch out for this time around is whether the RBI will change its policy stance.

That apart, RBI is also expected to employ various liquidity management tools to ease the tight liquidity and the volatility in the money markets caused by the sharp depreciation in the rupee and the recent defaults in Commercial Papers (CP) by a large conglomerate.

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OMCs, aviation stks drop as crude rises; IndiGo, Jet Airways hit 52-wk lows

Shares of aviation and oil and gas companies came under selling pressure on Tuesday as the crude oil prices hit a four-year high.

State-run GAIL was trading over 4 per cent lower at Rs 365.65 apiece on BSE, after hitting an intraday low of Rs 364.90. BPCL was down nearly 3 per cent at Rs 357.40.

Shares of Hindustan Petroleum (HPCL) was trading two and a half per cent lower at Rs 242 while those of Indian Oil was down 1 per cent at Rs 153.5. Oil India was trading at Rs 217, down 0.37 per cent.

At the time of writing this report, the S&P BSE Oil & Gas index was down 1 per cent at 14,762.

In the aviation space, all the three stocks - SpiceJet, IndiGo and Jet Airways, hit their respective 52-week lows.

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