Maruti Suzuki falls over 3% after UBS downgrades stock to sell

NEW DELHI: Shares of Maruti Suzuki declined 3.5 per cent on BSE in Friday's morning trade after global brokerage UBS downgraded the stock to sell from buy.

It slashed the target price by 27.5 per cent to Rs 5,800 per share from Rs 8,000 per share.

The brokerage said it felt surprised by a sharp decline of over 20 per cent in volumes during April and May.


We expect a 2 per cent year-on-year decline in growth in FY20E against 4 per cent growth earlier, the brokerage added.

The company is unlikely to gain from BS-VI norms as negative operating leverages have not built in, UBS said.

Meanwhile, Maruti Suzuki on Thursday said it has increased the price of its popular compact sedan Dzire by up to Rs 12,690 on account of compliance with new safety and emission norms.

Dzire is now compliant with "AIS-145 Safety Norms" (both petrol and diesel). Dzire Petrol is also now BS-VI compliant, Maruti Suzuki India said in a regulatory filing.

"This will result in a price increase in all variants of Dzire. Depending on features introduced across variants, the ex-showroom price in Delhi and NCR (National Capital Region) region shall vary from Rs 5,82,613 to Rs 9,57,622," it added.

The new price will be effective from June 20, it said.

Shares of the company closed 3.39 per cent down at Rs 6,412.45 on BSE.