CEO poll shows India Inc loading capex gun

Against a backdrop of the Union finance ministry underscoring its own capital expenditure push while that of the country’s private sector yet to show any sign of recovery, a quick survey of CEOs of India Inc has indicated that big companies are loading the capex gun to take advantage of the rising consumption in different sectors and the government’s Rs 10-trillion investment in infrastructure.

The Business Standard has reported that a dipstick survey by it showed that more than 86% of the respondents have invested in capex in the past 12 months and are likely to do so again in the next few months.

One of the drivers of the planned capex push by the private sector is the public sector investment in roads and railways. This huge investment can pave the way for big orders coming their way and this has prompted some companies to raise capacities to handle such orders.

RBI data too indicate green shoots of private sector capex. It said that projects from the private sector worth Rs 2.7 lakh crore witnessed financial closure from banks and financial institutions in FY23. In fact, it was the first time that this figure went past Rs 2 lakh crore since the Rs 4.1 lakh crore recorded in 2010.

Also, the share of project loans to private sector by banks stood at 2.2% of all loans in FY23 which was a definite improvement over 1.3% in FY22. Disbursement of 1.4% of the loans is still pending, according to RBI data.

Predictably, the large companies are leading the investment in capital expenditure. One of the most names is L&T, which is aiming for a $4 billion investment in green hydrogen along with its partner companies. Reliance Industries, the Tatas and Adani are all gunning for the renewable energy market. While Adani is targeting $70 billion in this sector by 2027, the Tatas and Reliance are investing $9.2 billion each.

During the survey, while 27% of the CEOs have pointed out that galloping prices provide a cause for concern, as much as 59% think that the markets will be on the upswing. In fact, rising prices was pointed out as the biggest concern by 27% of the CEOs.

After inflation, a concern for duopoly was underscored by 23% of the CEOs. 18.18% of the CEOs pointed out unequal growth as a concern.

As much as 59% of the CEOs said they were not really concerned with the investigating agencies looking into alleged irregularities by some corporates. However, the rest of the CEOs said there is cause for concern.

However, 91% of the CEOs thought that the government ought to give more tax relief to the salaried class that is sandwiched between rising inflation and the absence of any new tax incentives in the past few years.

As many as 73% regarded the performance of the Modi government “good”, while 23% though it was “average” and 4.55% said it was “bad”.

As many as 54.55% though that the rupee which has already earned the distinction of being the worst performing Asian currency in 2022, would slide further against the dollar. 40.91% said it would not while the rest offered “don’t know” for a response.

However, all the respondents agreed that the infrastructure in the country has improved in the past nine years.

A total of 22 CEOs were surveyed by the newspaper across the country.