Markets remain rangebound pressured by realty and auto

Indian markets coming off the early euphoria of Moody’s outlook upgrade, continue to remain in tight range in the noon trade. Though, there is no frenzied selling but some profit booking was being witnessed in the defensive healthcare and FMCG sectors that have kept the markets in tight range, pulling slightly in red. Though, a firming trend at some of the Asian markets was helping the domestic markets to some extent. Meanwhile, the finance ministry’s chief economic adviser Arvind Subramanian welcoming the upgrade in India’s investment outlook to “positive” has said that it validates the government’s reform agenda. He also said that India's summer monsoon rains which are vital for India’s farm sector; accounting for 14 percent of the $2 trillion economy is expected to be normal this year. Back on street, the broader indices are holding their gains, while on the sectoral front, the banking stocks were in most jubilant mood aided by the Moody’s outlook upgrade, however the rate sensitives realty and auto were witnessing profit booking and were down by close to half a percent.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 28693.33, down by 14.42 points or 0.05% after trading in a range of 28622.44 and 28875.08. There were 13 stocks advancing against 17 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were outperforming the benchmarks; the BSE Mid cap index was up by 0.41%, while Small cap index gained 0.59%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Bankex up by 1.57%, PSU up by 0.21%, Consumer Durables up by 0.16%, INFRA up by 0.15%, Oil & Gas up by 0.03% while, Realty down by 0.61%, Capital Goods down by 0.34%, Auto down by 0.31%, FMCG down by 0.25%, TECK down by 0.20% were the losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Reliance Industries up by 2.02%, Axis Bank up by 1.91%, ICICI Bank up by 1.40%, Tata Steel up by 1.35% and HDFC Bank up by 0.99%. On the flip side, Sun Pharma Inds down by 2.71%, Bharti Airtel down by 2.44%, GAIL India down by 1.94%, Cipla down by 1.85% and Dr. Reddys Lab down by 1.73% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, putting emphasis on government’s ambitious plan to provide 24×7 power to all in the country by 2019, Power Minister Piyush Goyal has said that the transmission and distribution (T&D) sector can expect private sector investments of nearly Rs 300,000 crore over the next four years. He also said that the Rs 300,000 crore investment from the private sector will be supported by over Rs 100,000 crore from the government through schemes such as the Deen Dayal Upadhyay Gram Jyoti Yojana and the Integrated Power Development Scheme. He highlighted that in 2014-15, 20,000 km of transmission lines were added in the country, which is the highest ever.

Goyal pointed out that if we get transmission and sub-transmission, the missing link right, there is no reason why the promise of 24x7 power can’t be met. The minister also urged the department, supported by all stakeholders, to prepare a plan for the short term, medium term and the long term, on how to provide the poor with power at affordable rates2

The power minister has envisaged 2019 to be the year when power production from thermal plants will have doubled to two trillion units that from renewable sources will have risen five times to 300 billion units, and coal output will have increased 1.5 times to 150 billion tonnes.

India’s transmission and distribution network is one of the largest and complicated in the world. The minister acknowledged that distribution was the primary challenge for the power sector and a onesize-fits-all policy to financially restructure state distribution companies would not work.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 8718.35, up by 3.95 points or 0.05% after trading in a range of 8682.45 and 8759.90. There were 21 stocks advancing against 29 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Kotak Mahindra Bank up by 3.58%, PNB up by 3.40%, Zee Entertainment up by 3.23%, Indusind Bank up by 2.99% and IDFC up by 2.12%. On the flip side, Lupin down by 3.41%, Sun Pharma Inds down by 2.73%, GAIL India down by 2.44%, Idea Cellular down by 2.34% and Bharti Airtel down by 2.18% were the top losers.

The Asian markets were showing mixed trend with some of the indices paring their early gains, Nikkei 225 was up by 147.91 points or 0.75% to 19,937.72 and Hang Seng surged by 798.8 points or 3.04% to 27,035.66.

On the other hand, Shanghai Composite lost 45.97 points or 1.15% to 3,948.84, Straits Times was down by 6.36 points or 0.18% to 3,454.32, Jakarta Composite declined by 5.08 points or 0.09% to 5,481.50, Taiwan Weighted was lower by 3.93 points or 0.04% to 9,568.04, FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI declined by 3.66 points or 0.2% to 1,846.65 and KOSPI Index was tad lower by 0.39 points or 0.02% to 2,058.87.