The top five Indian IT firms will report their worst second-quarter results in a decade, as analysts fear a slew of factors will mute the sector’s growth for the rest of the year, and prompt the industry to cut full year forecast.
Slowing growth in the banking and financial services sector, Britain’s decision to leave the European Union, weaker discretionary spending and growing pricing pressure in the traditional business have led Indian IT firms to temper down expectations in the run-up to the earnings season.
Tata Consultancy Services, the largest IT services player, and mid-sized Mind tree have already toned down their expectations in what should be a seasonally strong period. Infosys, which has already cut its forecast once this year, is widely expected to lower its guidance again. Analysts expect Infosys to forecast growth of around 9% for the year, cutting its already lowered guidance of 10-11.5% growth.
“Revenues at the top-5 large cap companies in our coverage universe are expected to grow by just 1.5% QoQ in Q2 FY17 or about 2.3% in CC terms — which is the slowest Q2 growth in the past decade. HCL Tech and Infosys will lead revenue growth. Wipro will lag,” Kuldeep Koul, analyst with ICICI Securities, said.