Markets make a green start, move higher for the ninth straight session

Indian markets are not showing any signs of giving up and after making a mildly choppy start have extended their gains for the ninth straight session on Wednesday morning. The sanguine global cues was supporting the rally in the local equity markets with signs of Greece fiasco finally getting a conclusion, though investors worldwide are awaiting a meeting of euro-area finance ministers for progress on Greece’s debt crisis. On the domestic front, the markets were encouraged with Finance Minister Arun Jaitley’s statement that progress of monsoon in India has improved compared to the predictions, bettering prospects for agriculture and putting the economy on a stronger footing. Back on street, brisk buying was being seen in the bluechip stocks on the penultimate day of June F&O series expiry day, with Nifty reclaiming its 8400 level and Sensex trading close to 27900 mark. The sectors that were witnessing good buying interest included healthcare, FMCG and consumer durables. On the same time some somberness was being seen in the auto and capital goods stocks. 

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 27896.73, up by 92.36 points or 0.33% after trading in a range of 27784.44 and 27920.60. There were 19 stocks advancing against 11 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices too were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index was up by 0.25%, while Small cap index gained 0.45%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were FMCG up by 0.89%, Consumer Durables up by 0.52%, Metal up by 0.40%, Power up by 0.40%, IT up by 0.32%, while Auto down by 0.02% was the lone losing index on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Hindustan Unilever up by 1.81%, BHEL up by 1.62%, Lupin up by 1.51%, Sun Pharma Industries up by 1.35% and Coal India up by 1.22%. On the flip side, HDFC down by 0.63%, Hindalco down by 0.49%, Bajaj Auto down by 0.44%, Maruti Suzuki down by 0.38% and SBI down by 0.37% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, government in its initiative to encourage electronic payments and moving towards cashless economy and reduction in tax avoidance, has proposed tax benefits to merchants for accepting electronic payments and income tax rebates to consumers for paying a certain proportion of their expenditure through electronic means.

Finance ministry in a ‘Draft Proposals For Facilitating Electronic Transactions’ has said that an appropriate tax rebate can be extended to a merchant if at least say 50 per cent value of the transactions is through electronic means. Alternatively, 1-2 per cent reduction in value added tax could be considered on all electronic transactions by the merchants. The proposals said that tax benefits in terms of income tax rebates to be considered to consumers for paying a certain proportion of their expenditure through electronic means.

To enable policy for e-transactions in government collections, the draft proposals said the feasibility of removing the prevailing convenience fee/service charge/surcharge levied by government departments and PSUs for making e-transactions to essential commodities, utility services, petrol pumps and railway ticket counter/IRCTC.

The draft proposal also mandates settling of high value transactions of more than Rs 1 lakh, only by electronic means. In other measures to promote wider adoption of e-transactions, the ministry proposed reduction in the Merchant Discount Rate (MDR) and the rationalisation of the distribution of the MDR across different stakeholders. At present, there is an MDR of 0.75 per cent on debit card transactions up to Rs 2,000 and 1 per cent on all transactions above Rs 2,000.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 8408.80, up by 27.25 points or 0.33% after trading in a range of 8376.10 and 8414.30. There were 26 stocks advancing against 24 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Zee Entertainment up by 2.16%, Hindustan Unilever up by 1.75%, BHEL up by 1.72%, Lupin up by 1.67% and Ultratech Cement up by 1.52%. On the flip side, PNB down by 1.40%, Tech Mahindra down by 1.21%, Asian Paints down by 1.20%, Bank Of Baroda down by 1.00% and Bajaj Auto down by 0.59% were the top losers.

The Asian markets were trading mostly in green; Straits Times was up by 10.07 points or 0.3% to 3,349.85, Jakarta Composite was higher by 34.4 points or 0.7% to 4,972.05, Shanghai Composite gained 41.54 points or 0.91% to 4,618.04, Hang Seng was up by 47.74 points or 0.17% to 27,381.20 and Nikkei 225 increased by 88.45 points or 0.43% to 20,897.87.

On the other hand, Taiwan Weighted declined by 11.3 points or 0.12% to 9,379.84, FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI was down by 0.69 points or 0.04% to 1,726.17 and KOSPI Index was lower by 0.56 points or 0.03% to 2,080.64.