Benchmarks continue firm trade in early afternoon session

Indian equity markets continued to trade firm in early afternoon session on the back of sustained buying activities by both funds and retail investors. Sentiments remained up-beat with the report that government’s revenue collection in the period April to October of the current fiscal year has shown a strong growth, indirect tax collection surged by 26.7 percent to 4.85 lakh crore on the back of robust collection in excise duty mop-up, while direct tax collection rose by 10.6 percent to Rs 3.77 lakh crore led by increase in personal income tax. Besides, firm trade in regional market coupled with appreciation in Indian rupee against dollars also supported upside. Investors got some confidence with Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley’s statement that the government’s decision to withdraw Rs 500 and Rs 1000 notes will move the country towards a cashless economy. He also said that deposits of now-defunct old Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 currency notes in bank accounts will not enjoy immunity from tax and law will apply on source of such money. In scrip specific development, Tata Steel was up by over 9 percent on reports that it is looking to close its U.K. final salary fund to future contributions.

On the global front, Asian markets were trading in green, as traders reassessed the economic impact of Donald Trump's victory in the U.S. presidential election. Further US markets recovering from the early slide posted strong gains in last session on speculation that Donald Trump will pursue business-friendly policies.

Back home, the BSE Sensex is currently trading at 27695.07, up by 442.54 points or 1.62% after trading in a range of 27491.93 and 27743.46. There were 24 stocks advancing against 6 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index was up by 2.43%, while Small cap index was up by 2.60%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Metal up by 5.85%, PSU up by 3.95%, Bankex up by 3.87%, Realty up by 3.54% and Oil & Gas up by 2.26%, while there were no losing indices on BSE sectoral front.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Tata Steel up by 9.03%, SBI up by 8.32%, Cipla up by 6.53%, ICICI Bank up by 4.71% and Adani Ports &Special up by 4.39%. On the flip side, Asian Paints down by 1.64%, Lupin down by 0.76%, Hero MotoCorp down by 0.70%, Infosys down by 0.66% and Wipro down by 0.64% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, in order to transform India's port sector, Union Minister of Shipping, Road Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari  has said that the government will use IT-based technology for the ongoing projects operation worth Rs 1 lakh crore  to increase efficiency, speed and delivery in the sector. He called upon port authorities to catch up with new trends in port strategies around the world.

Gadkari pointed out that efforts by the government have resulted in improved efficiency of ports over the last two years and that performance of government ports were better as compared to those of private sector this year. He also highlighted that Ministry has taken various steps to improve the efficiency of ports such as old rules have been cleared out, port mechanisation and modernisation is being done on war footing and projects for improving connectivity of ports are being implemented in right earnest. He further stressed upon the importance of e-governance for ensuring good governance.

The Minister has released the report titled - ‘Next Generation Port Infrastructure - Technology Transformation for Integrated Port Operations’. The report has included recommendations of a task force constituted by the Ministry to prepare a robust Information Technology (IT) transformation document for them, clearly defining a long-term strategic roadmap and implementation plans. The main focus of the IT task force has been to provide a structure for developing and implementing Intelligent Transportation System (ITS) technologies in India. The report also noted that there are many developed countries in today's world whose applications of ITS technologies for solving transportation problems have reached a fairly advanced level. Therefore, Gadkari is hopeful that the recommendations of the task force will pave the way for modernizing port systems for better efficiency, speed and delivery. 

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 8586.50, up by 154.50 points or 1.83% after trading in a range of 8512.90 and 8598.45. There were 45 stocks advancing against 6 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Tata Steel up by 9.13%, Bank of Baroda up by 8.50%, SBI up by 8.12%, Hindalco up by 7.13% and Yes Bank up by 6.90%. On the flip side, Asian Paints down by 1.98%, Infosys down by 0.94%, HDFC down by 0.80%, Lupin down by 0.80% and Hero MotoCorp down by 0.71% were the top losers.

All the Asian markets were trading in green; FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI gained 11.82 points or 0.72% to 1,659.44, Shanghai Composite soared 42.16 points or 1.35% to 3,170.53, KOSPI Index increased 44.22 points or 2.26% to 2,002.60, Jakarta Composite was up by 59.25 points or 1.09% to 5,473.57, Taiwan Weighted increased 208.98 points or 2.34% to 9,152.18, Hang Seng added 460.21 points or 2.05% to 22,875.40 and Nikkei 225 increased 1092.88 points or 6.72% to 17,344.42.