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Informist, Thursday, Mar. 5, 2026

 

By Vaishali Tyagi

 

NEW DELHI – Corporate bond yields remained steady on Thursday as traders refrained from taking aggressive positions and exercised caution amid the ongoing geopolitical conflict in West Asia, dealers said. "The fixed income market was stable, with mutual funds actively buying and selling, and churning their portfolios, mostly focusing on up to three-year maturity bonds due to uncertainty and avoiding bets on longer tenure bonds," a dealer at a brokerage firm said. "Even four- and five-year segment saw very dull volume today (Thursday)."

 

Dealers said that the effect of global turmoil was largely limited to equities and the rupee on Thursday, with minimal to no impact on the corporate debt market. "One party is buying, another is selling, but there's no significant impact on yields was seen today (Thursday)," a fund manager at a mutual fund house said.

 

According to market participants, corporate bond yields are unlikely to move significantly until mid-March if the situation remains unchanged as traders have limited their activity to need-based trades. "Market participants are assessing the situation and will wait for some time. The current situation has a more immediate impact on government bonds, which is not affecting the corporate bond market much for now", the dealer quoted above said.

 

Majorly mutual funds were involved in need-based trading of bonds, while a few mutual funds and companies bought bonds of up to three-year maturity. Banks and insurance companies also sold and purchased bonds in low volume in the secondary market, dealers said. Pension funds were largely absent from the market. The volume of trades in the secondary market nearly doubled, with deals aggregating to INR 152.42 billion being recorded on the National Stock Exchange and BSE combined, against INR 86.50 billion Wednesday.

 

Papers issued by State Bank of India, Kerala Infrastructure Investment Fund Board, HDB Financial Services, Power Finance Corp., Housing And Urban Development Corp., LIC Housing Finance, Andhra Pradesh State Beverages Corp., Edelweiss Financial Services, and National Bank For Agriculture And Rural Development were traded the most.

 

On the primary market front Thursday, bond issuances rose to nearly INR 8 billion from INR 192 billion Wednesday. Several non-banking financial companies were scheduled to raise funds Thursday. However, deals were not confirmed till the time of reporting. On Friday, INR 47 billion worth of bonds will hit the market. Torrent Power will raise INR 20 billion through three bonds with different maturities, while Altius Telecom Infrastructure Trust has invited bids to raise INR 14.50 billion through seven-year bonds maturing on Mar. 9, 2033. Several other key issuers include 360 One Prime and Aditya Birla Sun Life Insurance Co.

 

In the primary market, issuers are adopting a wait-and-watch approach, hesitant to lock in higher yields to raise capital. "Nobody (issuers) wants to lock in higher yields if they have the bandwidth to wait...therefore, they will assess the market and make moves accordingly," the fund manager quoted above said.

 

UDAY BONDS

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In the secondary market, one Ujwal DISCOM Assurance Yojana bonds was traded Thursday, according to data on the RBI's Negotiated Dealing System-Order Matching system.

 

* INR 13.90 million of Rajasthan's 8.19%, 2026 bond was dealt at 5.8801%

 

BENCHMARK LEVELS FOR CORPORATE BONDS:

Tenure	Thursday	Wednesday
Three-year	7.10-7.15%	7.09-7.15%
Five-year	7.25-7.27%	7.25-7.30%
10-year	7.39-7.41%	7.39-7.43%

 

End

 

Edited by Deepshikha Bhardwaj

 

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