Markets hold gains; Metal, Oil & Gas lead

Indian bourses held their earlier gains in late morning session, with Sensex rallying more than 250 points and Nifty inching towards 9,900 level, on positive lead from Asian markets and Wall Street. Traders remained optimistic with Finance Minister Arun Jaitley’s statement that Goods and Services Tax (GST) collections have exceeded estimates in the first month of the landmark levy’s rollout, despite a significant number of assessees not having filed returns yet. Jaitley added that the total collection under GST for July is pegged at Rs 92,283 crore. Besides, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s statement that Goods and Services Tax changed the tax procedure overnight in the country and helped reduce transport cost and increase the earning of drivers of trucks and tractor trolleys, also aided the sentiments. Meanwhile, Moody’s Investors Service kept its forecast for G20 economic growth at just over 3 percent for this year and next, but warned of geopolitical risks, U.S. protectionism and spillovers from global monetary tightening and China’s deleveraging measures.

On the global front, Asian markets were trading mostly in green, taking cues from Wall Street’s higher close, as concern about North Korea’s firing of a missile over Japan ebbed. Back home, in scrip specific development, Yes Bank was trading higher after the bank partnered with BonusHub to enable acceptance of UPI, BHIM and multiple mobile wallets including YES Pay, Idea Money, Jio Money, mPesa, Ola Money, Citrus, Airtel Money, Freecharge and Oxigen on its Point-Of-Sale Terminals across its the network of merchants to facilitate cashless payments for consumers.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 31651.02, up by 262.63 points or 0.84% after trading in a range of 31533.02 and 31657.53. There were 29 stocks advancing against 2 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index was up by 1.35%, while Small cap index was up by 1.48%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Metal up by 2.34%, Oil & Gas up by 1.94%, Energy up by 1.80%, Basic Materials up by 1.80% and Realty up by 1.42%, while there were no losers on BSE sectoral front.

The top gainers on the Sensex were HDFC up by 1.76%, Reliance Industries up by 1.65%, Adani Ports & SEZ up by 1.61%, Hero MotoCorp up by 1.30% and Tata Steel up by 1.13%. On the flip side, TCS down by 0.40% and Power Grid Corporation down by 0.19% were the only losers.

Meanwhile, the Finance Ministry has expressed its confidence of meeting the 3.2% fiscal deficit target for the financial year 2017-18, despite the low dividends from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and muted proceeds from stake sales in public sector enterprises till now. The RBI paid just Rs 30,659 crore to the government as dividend for 2016-17, which was much below the estimated Rs 58,000 crore.

Finance Ministry is upbeat about its revenue projections and believes that gains from demonetisation and curbs on black money will boost direct tax collections in the latter half of the year. Similarly, while it has not made fresh estimates for collections under GST, the Finance Ministry is hopeful that these too will be robust. Also, though just Rs 9,302.31 crore have been raised from disinvestment till now as against a target of Rs 72,500 crore, the government expects higher proceeds in the second half of the fiscal, from stake sales in PSU insurers as well as exchange traded funds.

The Centre has targeted a fiscal deficit of 3.2 per cent of the gross domestic product in 2017-18. With the advancement of the Budget, the government managed to frontload its expenditure and start spending from April that led its fiscal deficit rising to Rs 4,41,685 crore or 80.8 per cent of the full year target by June 30.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 9884.35, up by 88.30 points or 0.90% after trading in a range of 9850.80 and 9887.25. There were 46 stocks advancing against 5 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Indian Oil Corporation up by 4.13%, Hindalco up by 3.87%, Vedanta up by 2.26%, BPCL up by 2.16% and Ambuja Cement up by 2.04%. On the flip side, Tech Mahindra down by 0.96%, HCL Tech down by 0.84%, Zee Entertainment down by 0.30%, TCS down by 0.28% and Power Grid Corporation down by 0.05% were the top losers.

Asian markets were trading mostly in green; KOSPI Index increased 1.61 points or 0.07% to 2,366.35, Taiwan Weighted increased 72.83 points or 0.69% to 10,569.40, Nikkei 225 increased 143.63 points or 0.74% to 19,506.18 and Hang Seng increased 256.09 points or 0.92% to 28,021.10.

On the flip side, Jakarta Composite decreased 3.72 points or 0.06% to 5,884.49, Shanghai Composite decreased 2.6 points or 0.08% to 3,362.63 and FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI decreased 0.27 points or 0.02% to 1,760.87.