Benchmarks continue to trade in green in late morning session

After getting a positive start, Indian benchmarks continue to trade in green in late morning session as investors indulged in enlarging positions driven by positive domestic as well global cues. Sentiment on the street improved 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. Besides, covering up pending short positions by speculators in view of tomorrow's June month expiry in the derivatives segment too influenced sentiment. Some support also came with Union Minister of State for Power and Coal, Piyush Goyal’s statement that all the coal blocks in the country will become operational in the next couple of months. However, gains remained capped on report that foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) sold shares worth a net Rs 375 crore on June 23, 2015.

On global front, most of the Asian shares rose, with the Japan's benchmark hitting an 18-year high, amid optimism about a bailout deal between Greece and its creditors. Investors also remained focused on when the US Federal Reserve might increase its key interest rate for the first time in nearly a decade. Back home, Indian rupee depreciated by eight paise to 63.67 against the dollar in early trade due to rise in greenback against other currencies overseas.

Back on street, stocks from FMCG, IT and Consumer Durables counters were supporting the markets’ uptrend, while those from Infrastructure, Auto and Capital Goods counters were adding to the underlying cautious undertone. In scrip specific development, shares of Infinite Computer Solutions (India) have surged after the company’s board approved the buyback of shares at a maximum price of Rs 220 per share from the open market through stock exchanges. On the flip side, shares of Persistent Systems declined after the company said that the revenue growth in dollar terms is expected to be marginally lower in the current quarter (April-June 2015), due to weakness in the product engineering business coupled with the quarterly variability associated with the company’s IP business.

The market breadth on BSE was positive, out of 2089 stocks traded, 1152 stocks advanced, while 859 stocks declined on the BSE. 

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 27858.34, up by 53.97 points or 0.19% after trading in a range of 27784.44 and 27920.60. There were 15 stocks advancing against 15 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index was up by 0.02%, while Small cap index was higher by 0.20%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were FMCG up by 0.80%, IT up by 0.33%, Consumer Durables up by 0.24%, TECK up by 0.19% and Power up by 0.10%, while Infrastructure down by 0.34%, Auto down by 0.33%, Capital Goods down by 0.22%, Bankex down by 0.09% and PSU down by 0.04% were the top losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Hindustan Unilever up by 2.01%, BHEL up by 1.80%, Sun Pharma Inds. up by 1.39%, Lupin up by 1.29% and ITC up by 1.00%. On the flip side, Hindalco down by 1.19%, Tata Steel down by 1.04%, Bajaj Auto down by 0.66%, SBI down by 0.62% and HDFC down by 0.60% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley during his visit to US has applauded the better than expected monsoon development and said that progress of monsoon in India has improved compared to the predictions, bettering prospects for agriculture and putting the economy on a stronger footing. The southwest monsoon in the country has advanced rapidly after Indian Meteorological Department had lowered its monsoon forecast from 93 percent to 88 percent of the Long Period Average.

Jaitley in a high level meeting with top US multinationals with investments and operations in India, alluded to the much stronger economic fundamentals that exist now in India, and mentioned that the monsoon prediction is improving, and with it, the prospects of the agriculture sector doing better.

The finance minister adding that benign inflation situation could further allow softening of interest rates, alluding to the fact that the manufacturing sector had started to do much better after a protracted period of slowdown and mentioned that micro attention was being paid to stalled projects and a pickup in that area would be helping demand for industrial products.

The meeting which was organised by CII in partnership with US-India Business Council, was attended by the companies including Microsoft, Applied Materials, Amazon, Oracle, Hewlett Packard, Visa, Franklin Templeton, Google, Cisco, First Solar, Aemetis, Ebay, Qualcomm, Blackberry and San Disk.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 8396.35, up by 14.80 points or 0.18% after trading in a range of 8376.10 and 8414.30. There were 23 stocks advancing against 27 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Zee Entertainment up by 2.10%, Hindustan Unilever up by 2.09%, BHEL up by 1.85%, Lupin up by 1.41% and Sun Pharma up by 1.38%. On the flip side, PNB down by 1.89%, Bank of Baroda down by 1.40%, Asian Paints down by 1.27%, Tech Mahindra down by 1.27% and Hindalco down by 1.11% were the top losers.

The Asian markets were trading mostly in green; Straits Times was up by 0.3%, Jakarta Composite was higher by 0.63%, Shanghai Composite gained 0.91%, Hang Seng was up by 0.17% and Nikkei 225 increased by 0.49%. On the other hand, Taiwan Weighted declined by 0.07%, FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI was down by 0.04% and KOSPI Index was lower by 0.09%.