Markets to make a flat-to-soft start on mixed global cues

The Indian markets surged in last session with Nifty closing at a fresh record high. Today, the start is likely to be flat-to-cautious on mixed global cues, traders will however be looking ahead to the U.S. Federal Reserve and Bank of Japan's meetings later this week for clues on the direction of monetary policy. On the domestic front, all eyes will be on meeting of Prime Minister Narendra Modi with Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and other top officials to take stock of the situation and the discussion for remedial measures to bolster growth. PM will analyse the economic situation with Jaitley and secretaries of the finance ministry and explore options to stimulate the economy. There will be some concern in the market on report that the Centre could be forced to cut infrastructure spending, as GST glitches have hit revenue. Lower-than-expected tax collections and sluggish growth have upset the government`s budget calculations. The oil sector stocks will keep buzzing as the Oil Minister Dharmendra Pradhan  has said that he has requested the Ministry of Finance to bring petroleum products under the ambit of Goods and Services Tax (GST) in the interest of consumers.

The US markets extended their rally mood and major bourses surged to fresh record highs, amid hopes the worst of the North Korea crisis is over. Traders largely overlooked the National Association of Home Builders data, showing a bigger than expected drop in homebuilder confidence, as the data was impacted by recent hurricanes. The Asian markets have made a mixed start and some indices were in green as demand for safe-haven assets waned the past two trading days and investors seemed relaxed about the prospect of the Federal Reserve beginning to unwind stimulus.

Back home, bulls tightened their grip on Dalal Street on Monday with Nifty ending at record closing high of over 10,150 mark, while Sensex reclaimed 32,400 level. Markets made gap-up start and traded jubilantly throughout the session, as traders took some encouragement with foreign brokerage report that India is likely to overtake Japan and Germany to become the third largest economy in the next 10 years but needs to be consistent in reforms and focus more on the social sector. Markets continue to trade near higher levels taking support from report that the Modi government has sprung into action after the economy sent out some distress signals as GDP growth slipped to a three-year low, inflation shot up to a five-month high and current account deficit widened to a four-year peak. Adding to the optimism, Commerce and Industry minister Suresh Prabhu will soon meet the country’s top industrialists individually to seek an investment commitment from each of them for the next few years. The minister will hold one on one meeting with the heads of top 30 domestic companies, followed by group meetings, next month. The market participants shrugged off the report that trade deficit in the month of August widened to $11.64 billion from $7.7 billion during the same month a year ago. India’s exports rose 10.29 percent on a yearly basis to $23.81 billion in August on account of rise in shipments of engineering, petroleum, chemicals and pharmaceuticals products. Imports too increased 21.02 percent to $35.46 billion in August from $29.30 billion in the year-ago month due to rise in inward shipments of crude oil and gold. Finally, the BSE Sensex surged 151.15 points or 0.47% to 32,423.76, while the CNX Nifty was up by 67.70 points or 0.67% to 10,153.10.