Auto stocks rise up to 6% ahead of GST council meeting. Tata Motors, Maruti, M&M defy weak August sales

Auto stocks rallied as much as 6% on Monday ahead of the all important two-day GST council meeting that starts on Wednesday, September 3. Sectorally, auto trumped its peers with the Nifty Auto index finishing the day with 2.8% uptick. All the 15 stocks settled in the green. The positive sentiments helped stocks sail through despite lackluster August auto sales numbers in many of the major passenger vehicle makers.

Tube Investment of India was the top gainer in the pack, rising 6.4% today and was followed by Exide Industries and Samvardhana Motherson International which were up 4%, each.

Two-wheeler major Bajaj Auto shares surged 4% to finish the session at Rs 346.50. The company posted a 5% YoY growth in sales in the reported month at 4,17,616 units versus 3,97,804 units in the year ago period.

Meanwhile, Mahindra & Mahindra (M&M) shares rallied 3.5% despite reporting a 1% YoY decline in total sales at 75,901 units in August. Likewise, Tata Motors shares rose over 3% to end at Rs 689.70 despite the company reporting a 2% year-on-year drop in domestic sales numbers at 68,482 units. On a month-on-month basis total passenger vehicles (PVs) witnessed a 3% drop to 43,315 units in August 2025.

India’s largest passenger car maker Maruti Suzuki settled with an uptick of 0.5%. The company sold 180,683 units in August 2025 versus, down from 181,782 units in the year ago period.

Other Nifty Auto constituents viz. Hero MotoCorp, Eicher Motors, MRF, TVS Motor Company, Bosch, Balkrishna Industries, Bharat Forge and Ashok Leyland saw their share prices increase between 3% and 0.8%.Royal Enfield maker Eicher Motors saw a stellar sales uptick of 55% in August 2025 at 1,14,002 units versus 73,629 units in the year ago period. TVS also reported a monthly sales of 509,536 units in August 2025 with a growth of 30% as against 391,588 units in the month of August 2024. The high-powered GST Council meeting chaired by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on September 3-4 will be keenly watched by the Street. Any development on the two-slab taxation regime could act as a market trigger. The trend has been visible in auto and consumption stocks that are being seen as top beneficiaries of the reform. These sectors were top performers in August which was otherwise a lackluster month for market participants.

Nifty Auto has been the best performing sector in August with index returns of 10% in the past one month.

(Disclaimer: Recommendations, suggestions, views and opinions given by the experts are their own. These do not represent the views of Economic Times)