“It is going to be very difficult to time the market from a top-down perspective,” he told ET Now. “But there are many interesting ideas when you go bottom-up and look at what is actually doing well on the ground — and which remains insulated from this fall.”
Why this selloff may be close to a floor
Saboo points to an important structural support that often goes unnoticed in panic selloffs: domestic institutional liquidity. With IPOs, QIPs, and block deals being pulled amid the turmoil, that capital hasn’t disappeared — it’s sitting idle with domestic funds, ready to be deployed. Mutual funds, which have continued receiving steady retail inflows, have been quietly absorbing FII selling for months. That wall of domestic money, in Saboo’s view, sets a credible floor under the market.
“The best thing to do right now is look at bottom-up stocks rather than taking any top-down calls.”
The shopping list: 6 themes, specific names
Saboo outlined a broad set of opportunities across sectors, with conviction calls in each.
On IT: AI fears are overblown
Saboo pushes back firmly against the narrative that AI will hollow out Indian IT. His argument: the reliability standards that enterprise clients demand cannot yet be met by AI platforms alone. Rather than cannibalising IT revenues, he believes AI will expand the addressable opportunity — something already visible in rising Total Contract Values being reported by major Indian IT firms. With multiples having corrected sharply and free cash flow yields turning attractive, he sees IT as another dip worth buying.
ETMarkets.comThe through-line in Saboo’s framework is simple: this is not a market to navigate with big macro calls. It rewards investors willing to do the stock-level work, buy quality at distressed prices, and resist the urge to wait for a clean all-clear signal that rarely arrives before the best recovery gains are already booked.
