Nifty India Consumption P/E at 36.5, near a five-year low

The reading

Nifty India Consumption closed at 10,903.45 on Friday, 9 October 2026, at a price-to-earnings ratio of 36.54. Its price-to-book ratio was 6.54, and its dividend yield as of 8 October was 0.86%.

These are NSE's end-of-day ratios, and the daily series since 2012 is on the Nifty India Consumption valuation page. Against the long record the P/E looks ordinary. Against the last five years it is close to the bottom, and so is the P/B.

What it holds

This is a broad index, not an FMCG one. The SBI Nifty India Consumption Index Fund held its 30 stocks like this on 30 September 2026:

Titan, Asian Paints, IndiGo, Indian Hotels, Tata Power, Dixon and DLF make up the rest. On BSE's figures for 9 October the stock P/Es spread widely: Bharti Airtel 31.0, Mahindra & Mahindra 17.2, ITC 16.5, HUL 29.2 and Titan 67.9. Eternal is at 720.7 on thin profits, and IndiGo's trailing earnings are negative.

Two records, two answers

The long record holds a stretch the five-year one does not. Between 7 June 2018 and 4 August 2021 the P/E was above 70 on 241 sessions, peaking at 361.15, and NSE left it blank on 32 sessions from 14 September to 28 October 2020. That is what the ratio does when the earnings under an index shrink towards zero. Those readings lift the long-run median. The five-year window falls wholly after NSE moved index P/Es to consolidated earnings in March 2021, which makes it the cleaner comparison.

On that window the P/B agrees. At 6.54 it is far below its five-year median of 8.33, and only two of 1,235 sessions were lower, both this month: 6.52 on 1 October and 6.44 on 8 October. The five-year high was 10.11 on 12 September 2024. Over the full record the median P/B is 5.85, because book multiples before 2021 were mostly lower: the yearly median stayed under 6.1 from 2012 to 2020.

Earnings rose, then stalled

The last column is the index divided by its P/E, a rough stand-in for earnings per index unit. It rose about 20.1% in the first of these two years and about 1.4% in the second. Over the past year the index lost 10.8% and its P/E 12.1%, so the whole fall was a lower multiple. Over two years the P/E dropped 28.2%, from 50.86 to 36.54, while earnings grew about 21.9%.

Book value moved more than earnings. Dividing the index by its P/B, the book behind it rose about 12.5% over the year, which is why the P/B fell 20.7%, much further than the price. P/B divided by P/E, a rough return on equity, is 17.9% against 19.8% a year ago.

Inside the consumption family

The narrower indices that share some of these stocks closed at very different P/Es on 9 October:

The broad index sits between its cheaper parts, vehicles and FMCG, and its dearer ones, durables and the new-age consumption names.

Against the Nifty 50

The index costs 1.90 times the Nifty 50 on earnings (36.54 against 19.27). Over 3,567 shared sessions since 2012 the median multiple is 1.79, and 2,298 sessions had a lower one. A year ago it was 1.87. So consumption is cheap on its own five-year record but not cheap next to the market, because the Nifty 50's P/E fell even further over the past year, 13.5% against 12.1%.

The index is 16.4% below its record close of 13,038.65 on 26 September 2024. Its 2026 low was 10,334.35 on 30 March.

Where the funds sit

Passive funds track the index, including the SBI fund and the Nippon India ETF Nifty India Consumption, whose NAV history goes back to 2014. Active consumption funds sit in the sectoral and thematic category; Nippon India Consumption is one. Our September look at consumption fund returns found the median fund lost 4.22% in the year to 7 September, against an estimated 5.60% loss for the index with dividends.

What this does not tell you

A low P/E against five years is not a forecast. It says where the index has traded, not where it will go, and five years is one stretch of the cycle.

Earnings move in steps. Results arrive quarterly and members change twice a year, and the published figures cannot separate the two.

The long record is distorted. Readings from 2018 to 2021 are not comparable with today's, which is why the two windows give such different percentiles.

None of this is a recommendation to buy or sell anything.

Where to go from here

The guide to reading an index P/E explains what the ratio can and cannot say, and the guide to consumption and FMCG funds covers how these funds differ from the index. For the narrower FMCG basket, see the Nifty FMCG P/E in October.