Benchmarks continue to trade in green in late morning session

After getting a gap-up start, benchmark equity indices continued to trade in fine fettle in late morning deals on emergence of buying by funds and retail investors in select stocks ahead of monetary policy review of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Tuesday. Snapping its two-day losing streak, Sensex and Nifty were now trading above the crucial 25,550 and 7,600 levels respectively, with gains of over 0.80%.  Apart from blue chips, broader indices too equally participated in the rally with both mid cap and small cap indices were trading up by 0.61% and 1.05% respectively. Besides, a firming trend in other Asian markets buoyed the trading sentiments here. Meanwhile, overseas investors have invested in $6 billion into the Indian securities market in July 2014 taking their overall net inflows since the beginning of 2014 to more than $26 billion, driven by an investment-friendly government at the Centre.

Traders were seen piling up positions in Consumer Durables, Realty and FMCG while selling was witnessed in Healthcare sector stocks. In scrip specific development, shares of TVS Motor Company have surged as much as 5% after reporting 32% year-on-year growth in vehicle sales at 203,902 units during the month of July 2014, driven by scooters, which rose by 64%. shares of Godfrey Phillips India rose after it reported an over three-fold jump in its net profit at Rs 80.19 crore in the June quarter as compared to Rs 23.35 crore in the same quarter last year. On the other hand, shares of Syndicate Bank have tanked as much as 6% after the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has arrested S K Jain, chairman and managing director (CMD) of the bank, for allegedly accepting bribes from private companies to extend credit facilities.

On global front, Asian stocks traded higher on the back of Chinese data showing a recovery in the world’s second-largest economy, and value-buying by funds and retail investors after recent sell-off. On the flip side, Wall Street indices ended lower on Friday following mixed signals about the US economy and mounting speculation that the Federal Reserve might raise interest rates sooner than expected. Back home, the Indian rupee recovered from over four-month low, strengthening by 29 paise to 60.89 against the US dollar in early trade at the Interbank Foreign Exchange market. The market breadth on BSE was positive, out of 2222 stocks traded, 1501 stocks advanced, while 628 stocks declined on the BSE.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 25567.56 up by 86.72 points or 0.34% after trading in a range of 25645.43 and 25531.38. There were 23 stocks advancing against 7 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index was up by 0.61%, while Small cap index gained 1.05%.

The gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Consumer Durables up by 2.60%, Realty up by 1.05%, FMCG up by 1.04%, Capital Goods up by 0.98% and Bankex up by 0.82%. On the flip side, Healthcare down by 0.06% was the only losing Index on BSE.    

The top gainers on the Sensex were Hindalco up by 1.82%, Axis Bank up by 1.55%, Hindustan Unilever up by 1.46%, Tata Motors up by 1.40% and  ICICI Bank up by 1.18%. On the flip side, HDFC down by 2.02%, Bharti Airtel down by 1.20%, Sun Pharma down by 0.85%, TCS down by 0.81% and Coal India down by 0.74% were the top losers on the BSE.

Meanwhile, in the wake of opposition by Congress and other major opposition parties, the government has deferred its plan to table the Insurance Bill in Parliament on Monday. Going by the latest move, the government apparently wants to build consensus before tabling its first major economic reform legislation for the consideration in Parliament. It is in lieu of this Parliamentary Affairs Minister M. Venkaiah Naidu said he and Finance Minister Arun Jaitley would hold talks with leaders of Congress and opposition parties to discuss various aspects of the bill that seeks to raise the FDI cap in the Insurance sector from 26% to 49%.

In preparation for what is expected to be a showdown, opposition parties, including the Congress, had signed a letter on Friday asking the chairman of the Rajya Sabha to refer 'the Insurance Laws (Amendment) Bill' to an all-party parliamentary panel called the select committee. Though, the BJP led government is not so apprehensive about the passage of bill in Lok Sabha, where it has a brute majority, it would need to do a lot of convincing for the bill to pass through the Rajya Sabha, where it needs the support of other parties.

The BJP and its partners have 64 members in the 250-member Upper House. The Congress has 69. Together the parties that have signed the resolution demanding that the bill be sent to a select committee have strength of 136 in the Rajya Sabha.

The opposition parties have alleged substantive changes in the Modi government's version of the Insurance Bill, which should be reviewed by the all-party parliamentary panel, however the government asserts this to remain as in fact a 'UPA bill' since it includes only 11 amendments proposed by the present government and 86 proposed by the previous Congress-led UPA government.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 7,636.25 up by 33.65 points or 0.44% after trading in a range of 7,654.15 and 7,622.05. There were 40 stocks advancing against 10 declining on the index.

The top gainers of the Nifty were HCL Tech up by 2.14%, Hindalco up by 1.82%, MCDOWELL-N up by 1.77%, Axis Bank up by 1.65% and BPCL up by 1.58%. On the flip side, HDFC down by 1.94%, Bharti Airtel down by 1.39%, Sun Pharma down by 0.99%, TCS down by 0.83% and Coal India down by 0.77% were the top losers on the index.

Asian markets were trading mostly in the green; Hang Seng gained 0.35%, KOSPI Index increased by 0.04%, Jakarta Composite added 0.04%, Shanghai Composite improved by 1.32%, FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI spurted by 0.38% and Taiwan Weighted was up by 0.62%. On the flip side, Nikkei 225 tumbled by 0.10% and Straits Times was down by 0.54%.