Benchmarks trade lower in early deals on profit booking

Indian equity benchmarks have made a weak start and are trading lower with a cut of around a quarter percent as traders booked some profits after two days of rally. However, losses remained capped with SBI’s Monthly Composite Index, a leading indicator for manufacturing activity in Indian Economy, inching up from 46.8 in April 2015 to 53.8 in May 2015. Meanwhile, Finance Ministry is expecting a rating upgrade by credit agencies by the year-end on the back of policy initiatives, moderating inflation and improvement in the fiscal position of the government.

On the global front, the US markets ended modestly higher in last session with the Dow and the S&P 500 reaching new record closing highs, on views the Federal Reserve will hold off on raising interest rates, although the dollar rebounded from four-month lows on Monday and traders largely overlooked the report showing an unexpected drop in homebuilder confidence in the month of May. The Asian markets were trading mostly in the green at this point of time tailing the positive global cues; Japanese shares were boosted by weakening yen.

Back home, on the sectoral front, realty, technology and infrastructure witnessed the maximum gain in trade, while healthcare, banking and oil and gas remained the top losers on the BSE sectoral space. The broader indices, however, were outperforming benchmarks, while the market breadth on the BSE was positive; there were 1081 shares on the gaining side against 666 shares on the losing side while 79 shares remain unchanged.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 27615.88, down by 71.42 points or 0.26% after trading in a range of 27577.67 and 27680.85. There were 15 stocks advancing against 14 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index was up by 0.51%, while Small cap index gained 0.56%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Realty up by 0.73%, TECK up by 0.44%, INFRA up by 0.42%, Capital Goods up by 0.27% and IT up by 0.27% while, Healthcare down by 0.37%, Bankex down by 0.33%, Oil & Gas down by 0.25% and PSU down by 0.17% were the losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Hero MotoCorp up by 2.74%, Bharti Airtel up by 1.08%, Tata Power up by 1.06%, Cipla up by 0.95% and Infosys up by 0.90%. On the flip side, HDFC down by 1.69%, Tata Motors down by 1.31%, ONGC down by 1.29%, GAIL India down by 1.09% and HDFC Bank down by 0.90% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, outlining the economic road map of the Modi led government for its second year, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, unveiled that reasonable taxation environment and improving the ease of doing business were among top priorities of his government going ahead. He also asserted that his government would strive hard to eliminate discretions and maintain the speed of reforms.

The government, which came to power in May last year plans to roll out a common goods and services tax (GST) by April 1, 2015, and bring down corporate tax rate to 25% from 30% over a period of four years. It also intends to eliminate the exemptions while reducing the rate of corporate tax, though these would be retained for the individual taxpayers.

Finance Minister also asserted that in order to boost private investments and improve execution of projects, the government’s effort would be to replace the practice of giving permissions and push pending legislations such as GST and land acquisition bill.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 8350.35, down by 23.30 points or 0.28% after trading in a range of 8335.20 and 8375.15. There were 22 stocks advancing against 27 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Hero MotoCorp up by 2.82%, Zee Entertainment up by 2.66%, Ultratech Cement up by 1.43%, Bharti Airtel up by 1.22% and Cipla up by 0.96%. On the flip side, HDFC down by 1.92%, GAIL India down by 1.56%, NMDC down by 1.54%, Tata Motors down by 1.42% and ONGC down by 1.38% were the top losers.

Most of the Asian equity indices were trading in geen; KOSPI Index increased 9.21 points or 0.44% to 2,122.93, Taiwan Weighted surged 92.98 points or 0.97% to 9,699.08, Hang Seng rose 115.62 points or 0.42% to 27,706.87, Shanghai Composite soared 116.71 points or 2.72% to 4,400.20 and Nikkei 225 was up by 133.17 points or 0.67% to 20,023.44.

On the flip side, Jakarta Composite decreased 8.5 points or 0.16% to 5,229.31, FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI shed 8.24 points or 0.45% to 1,815.26 and Straits Times was down by 6.34 points or 0.18% to 3,453.23.