Indian markets likely to regain the cheerful mood after a day of break

26 Dec 2011 Evaluate
The Indian markets lost their momentum on the last trading day of the week and lost about half a percent for the day. Some last hour profit booking led the benchmark indices lower. Though,most of the regional markets are not trading today but still there are sufficient cues to give the domestic markets a positive start. Banking stocks are likely to remain buzzing with the announcement of interest rates hike on fixed deposits held by non-resident Indians in a bid to attract dollars after the rupee hit record lows. The Reserve Bank of India deregulated interest rates on non-resident external rupee deposits and ordinary non-resident accounts last Friday to provide greater flexibility to banks to attract dollars. Meanwhile, the government wants all state-run banks to go for a common strategy on lending and debt recast plans for four sectors - aviation,power, telecom and textiles - that are facing stress. However, RBI’s recent stress test showed that if bad loans were to increase 150%, 20 banks representing 46% of bank lending in India would be forced to seek capital support as their core capital adequacy would fall below the prescribed 6%. On the same time the telecom stocks will temporarily get a sense of relief as the ‘New TelecomPolicy’, which is likely to have no roaming charges for subscribers within the country and will allow for mobile numbers to be ported to any part of the country, is expected to be delayed till June 2012. The draft of the policy was released by Minister of Communications Kapil Sibal in October and was expected to be released by December earlier.
 
After individual industry and corporate houses, a survey, conducted by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (Ficci), has showed an increasing apprehension among corporates that the current global meltdown might snowball into a full-blown crisis - and last at least till end-2012.
 
The US markets went into festivity mood on the final day of the last week, investors rejoiced with slew of good economic reports. Rise in the orders for long-lasting goods in November and new-home sales to a seven-month high gave enough reason to the marketmen to cheer. The Asian indices that are trading today, have made a positive start; Japanese exporters have surged in early trade on good earnings outlook from US.
 
Back home, Indian benchmarkindices failed to keep the momentum going for the third session on the lasttrading day of the week as the relief rally finally petered out ahead ofChristmas. The psychological 4,750 (Nifty) and 15,900 (Sensex) levels proved asfirm resistance levels for the benchmarks as they witnessed a sharp intradaytrend reversal and plunged over a percentage point from around those levels tolowest levels in the session. Investors chose to take profits off the tablefrom Oil & Gas and rate sensitive Banking counters in particular. TheIndian bourses not only halted the two session gaining streak but also resumedtheir streak of underperformance against their global peers as they wereoutclassed by all the Asian as well as the European counterparts. Sentimentsalso got dampened by reports that RBI may revise the growth forecast for Asia’sthird largest economy downward in its third quarter monetary policy reviewscheduled on January 24, 2012. Meanwhile, an influential brokerage firm CLSAslashed India’s GDP growth forecast to 6.7% for the current fiscal year endingMarch, 2012 from its earlier projection of 7.3%, owing to cyclical decelerationcaused by high interest rates, policy inertia and the adverse impact of globalheadwinds. Domestic investors also shrugged off growing evidence of a reboundin the US economy as reports showed US initial jobless claims fell last week totheir lowest in more than 3-1/2 years while consumer sentiment there improvedin December to its highest level in six months. Meanwhile, shares of aircarriers like SpiceJet and Jet airways spurted on reports that the governmentmay allow the financially stressed segment to import fuel directly. Earlier onDalal Street, the benchmark got off to an optimistic start following supportiveleads from Asian markets and sentiments got bolstered in thin pre-Christmastrade triggered by a slew of encouraging economic reports from the US. Thefrontline indices kept oscillating in a narrow range through the morningtrades. The key gauges showed signs of recovery in early afternoon trades asthey gradually crawled towards intraday highs but the indices witnessed suddenbouts of profit booking which dragged the indices to intraday lows by the endof trade and settled with moderate losses. On the BSE sectoral space, thebeaten down Capital Goods counter remained the top gainer in the space withover half a percent gains while the rate sensitive Auto and Realty pocketsclosed with marginal gains. On the flipside, the Consumer Durables and Oil& Gas counters remained the top laggards as they settled over a percentloss each. Finally, the BSE Sensex lost 74.66 points or 0.47% to settle at15738.70, while the S&P CNX Nifty declined by 19.85 points or 0.42% toclose 4,714.00.
 
 
 

 

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