Indian bourses continue to trade in positive territory

Key benchmark indices continued to trade in positive territory in the afternoon session led by gains in frontline blue chip stocks. Sentiments remained up-beat after Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said that India now needs to move to a lower level of taxation to provide services more competitive in nature, as competition is not domestic, it is global. Further, the gains in Consumer Durables, FMCG, IT and Oil & Gas stocks also aided to optimistic milieu. However, there was some cautiousness too with global rating agency CARE Ratings reporting that the overall employment in the country grew by just 1.6 per cent in FY16, even though it marked a recovery compared to FY 2015. Market participants are eyeing the meeting of Prime Minister Narendra Modi with economists and senior government officials at NITI Aayog. The theme of a high-level meeting is 'Economic Policy Reform, Road Ahead' and it will be the first such meeting after government's surprise move to demonetise high value currency notes on November 8. In scrip specific development, Glenmark Pharmaceuticals rose after the company has received abbreviated new drug application approval for Tretinoin capsules.

On the global front, Asian markets were trading mostly in green amid low-volume holiday trading after China posted strong growth in November industrial profits, though investors awaited a board meeting for Japan's Toshiba after shares dropped sharply.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 25939.40, up by 132.30 points or 0.51% after trading in a range of 25803.19 and 25954.81. 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 0.93%, while Small cap index was up by 0.72%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Consumer Durables up by 1.83%, FMCG up by 1.31%, IT up by 0.96%, Oil & Gas up by 0.95% and Metal up by 0.85%, while Realty down by 0.71% was the sole losing index on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were ITC up by 2.02%, Adani Ports &Special up by 1.87%, Cipla up by 1.63%, Tata Steel up by 1.20% and TCS up by 1.07%. On the flip side, GAIL India down by 1.83%, Hero MotoCorp down by 0.60%, Bharti Airtel down by 0.52%, HDFC down by 0.41% and ONGC down by 0.08% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, Minister for Road Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari has said that demonetisation will help to increase government revenue and enable it to allocate more funds to welfare scheme for the people. He further said that India is moving towards a less cash economy like many other countries of the world. Therefore, if something big has to be achieved, then one has to face some difficulties in the beginning.

Asserting that the country is moving on the path of development, Gadkari has said that honesty and transparency is the necessity of the hour and the little difficulties being faced by the people would be reduced in the coming days. On the demonetization effect on people, he said 'the Prime Minister asked for 50 days, I can see the queues getting shorter and in days to come there will be relief'.

Meanwhile, Gadkari also said that government will try to implement projects worth over Rs 5 lakh crore under the ambitious Sagarmala initiative before completion of its tenure in May 2019. Of the Rs 12 lakh crore being planned for investment under the ambitious programme, he said around Rs 8 lakh crore will be pumped into industrial clusters, while the remaining Rs 4 lakh crore will go to port rail and port road connectivity, mechanisation and modernisation of ports. The minister added that under Sagarmala they have already started work on projects worth around Rs 1 lakh crore.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 7950.10, up by 41.85 points or 0.53% after trading in a range of 7903.70 and 7957.85. There were 40 stocks advancing against 11 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were ITC up by 2.04%, Tata Motors - DVR up by 1.82%, HCL Tech. up by 1.80%, Adani Ports &Special up by 1.69% and Eicher Motors up by 1.61%. On the flip side, GAIL India down by 1.21%, Hero MotoCorp down by 0.79%, Idea Cellular down by 0.72%, Tata Power down by 0.54% and Indusind Bank down by 0.43% were the top losers.

The Asian markets were trading mostly in green; FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI increased 1.42 points or 0.09% to 1,618.57, KOSPI Index added 4.42 points or 0.22% to 2,042.17, Nikkei 225 shed 6.42 points or 0.03% to 19,403.06 and Jakarta Composite was up by 49.86 points or 0.99% to 5,077.57. On the flip side, Shanghai Composite decreased 5.14 points or 0.16% to 3,117.43 and Taiwan Weighted was down by 1.27 points or 0.01% to 9,109.27.