Markets continue to trade in red on profit booking, weak Asian cues

After a sluggish opening, Indian bourses continued to trade in red in the afternoon session as selling momentum in the equities persisted. Profit-booking by funds and retail investors at higher levels amid weak Asian cues dragged the major indices down and most of the sectoral indices were trading in red with FMCG as the major losing index on BSE trading down by around 1.24%. Further, depreciation in rupee value against the dollar and weak global cues amid concerns that China’s growth is slowing and speculation that US interest rates will rise sooner than estimated dampened the markets’ sentiments. However, gains in realty and power stocks provided some support to domestic equity benchmarks. Shares of companies engaged in shipbuilding business have rallied by up to 13% amid reports that the government is considering several options to boost ship building in the country. Furthermore, broader indices were outperforming the benchmarks with high margin as both mid cap and small cap indices were trading up by over 0.30%.

Venus Remedies extending its 13% rally in past two days, has surged 5% to Rs 327, after the company said it tied up with Mylan for marketing meropenem in three European countries. Sasken Communication Technologies has rallied 6% to Rs 347 in otherwise weak market after the company said that Spreadtrum has remitted an additional amount of $21.49 million.

On global front, Asian markets were trading in red with Hang Seng down 1.76% and Taiwan Weighted down 0.82%. Back home, the NSE Nifty and BSE Sensex were trading above their psychological 8,100 and 27,000 levels respectively. The market breadth on BSE was positive, out of 2,676 stocks traded, 1,564 stocks advanced, while 998 stocks declined on the BSE.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 27128.19, down by 137.13 points or 0.50% after trading in a range of 27107.42 and 27251.44. There were 12 stocks advancing against 18 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index was up by 0.32%, while Small cap index up by 0.58%.

The gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Realty up by 0.67%, Power up by 0.26% and Metal up by 0.21%. On the other hand, FMCG down by 1.24%, Oil & Gas down by 0.88%, Capital Goods down by 0.71%, IT down by 0.56% and PSU down by 0.45% were the losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Tata Power up by 1.86%, Sesa Sterlite up by 1.30%, ICICI Bank up by 1.16%, Bajaj Auto up by 1.13% and Bharti Airtel up by 1.03%. On the flip side, Infosys down by 1.79%, ITC down by 1.62%, Reliance Industries down by 1.42%, SBI down by 1.26% and Mahindra & Mahindra down by 1.21% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, to better reflect the changes in Indian economy, the government has initiated the process to change the base year to 2011-12 from current 2004-05 for computing the country's gross domestic product (GDP).  Prices of the base year allows statisticians or economists to examine and compute the performance of the economy in real terms through the macroeconomic aggregates like GDP, national income, consumption expenditure and capital formation.

Ministry of Statistics has highlighted that with the passage of time, new products are manufactured and new data is added, expressing the need to change the base year. However, there will not be change in methodology for computing the GDP.

The government periodically revises the base year for computing the GDP to take into account the structural changes which take place in the economy and to depict a true picture of the economy through macro aggregates. The first official estimates of national income were prepared by the Central Statistical Organisation (CSO) for the estimates at constant prices. The base years of the National Accounts Statistics series have been shifted from 1948-49 to 1960-61 in August 1967; from 1960-61 to 1970-71 in January 1978; from 1970-71 to 1980-81 in February 1988; and from 1980-81 to 1993-94 in February 1999. After that it was changed to 2004-05 in the year of 2006.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 8111.85, down by 41.10 points or 0.50% after trading in a range of 8105.75 and 8135.75. There were 18 stocks advancing against 32 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Tata Power up by 1.80%, DLF up by 1.64%, Sesa Sterlite up by 1.49%, Bajaj Auto up by 1.26% and ICICI Bank up by 1.25%. On the flip side, Infosys down by 1.83%, ITC down by 1.74%, Indusind Bank down by 1.68%, Reliance Industries down by 1.36% and Mahindra & Mahindra down by 1.33% were the top losers.

Asian markets were trading in red, Nikkei 225 up by32.72 points or 0.21% to 15,781.87. On the other hand, Hang Seng down 442.34 points or 1.76% to 24,748.11, Taiwan Weighted down 77.16 points or 0.82% to 9,357.61,Jakarta Composite down 48.05 points or 0.92% to 5,149.07, Shanghai Composite down 14.15 points or 0.61% to 2,312.38 and Straits Times down 0.82 points or 0.02% to 3,342.14