The number of companies with minimum market capitalisation of Rs 1 lakh crore have crossed half-century for the first time, even as the benchmarks yielded a sub three percent returns for the year 2022. That compares with 69 percent increase seen in 2021. The elite club with 53 firms boast of a combined market capitalisation of Rs 164.2 lakh crore, which is 58 percent of the aggregate market capitalisation of all BSE listed firms.

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To be sure, the pandemic led sell-off in 2020 had witnessed the number of such firms falling to 29 from 31 companies a year back. The new entrants to the list include Coal India, Adani Power, Ambuja Cements, Britannia Industries, Siemens and Bajaj Auto, whereas Tech Mahindra, Divi's Laboratories and Zomato got ousted as rout in high-flying technology stocks intensified during the year.

Interestingly, while Divi's Laboratories loses it’s one lakh crore tag in 2022; after staying in the club for preceding two years, Coal India made a comeback after a gap of two years. Shares of Divi's Laboratories have given up almost quarter of their value so far in 2022, marking its first underperformance since 2016. The stock had surged as much as 35 percent in 2018 when the benchmark Nifty50 yielded a negative return of 5.5 percent.

While a 65 percent correction from the peak resulted an exit for Zomato, collapses of similar altitude in stocks of PayTM and Nykaa saw none of the platform stocks featuring in the list. Both PayTM and Nykaa had briefly breached Rs 1 lakh core market cap in November last year. Among newly listed firms, LIC of India hold the fort with a market cap of Rs 4.2 lakh crore.

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Moreover, as many as 11 companies from the Nifty50 are not featured in the list. Among the Sensex constituents, Tech Mahindra and IndusInd Bank have market cap of less than Rs 1 lakh crore each.

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