Bourses continue to trade in positive territory

Key benchmark indices continued to trade in positive territory in early afternoon session, on buying by investors amid firm trend in Asian markets. The sentiments remained on positive note with data showing that India’s annual wholesale price inflation (WPI) eased to 2.60% in September from the provisional 3.24% in the previous month. Some strength also came with Niti Aayog Vice Chairman Rajiv Kumar’s statement that slowdown in India's economic growth that began in 2013-14 has bottomed out and Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is likely to grow 6.9 to 7 percent in the fiscal 2017-18 and 7.5 percent in 2018-19. In the currency front, the rupee gained for a sixth consecutive session, partly as inflows into debt markets remained strong, rising to as much as 64.75 per dollar, its strongest since September 21. In scrip specific development, Jain Irrigation Systems was up by around a percent after bagging order of Rs 178.39 crore for supplying, installing and testing of UGPL System of sub minor for Irrigation through Kundies in Chak area for Sardar Sarovar Project command.

On the global front, Asian markets were trading mostly in green as investors turned their focus on a big week in Beijing where the twice-in-a-decade Communist Party Congress is scheduled for later this week. Back home, the BSE Sensex is currently trading at 32570.00, up by 137.31 points or 0.42% after trading in a range of 32445.43 and 32687.32. There were 23 stocks advancing against 8 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index was up by 0.14%, while Small cap index was up by 0.24%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Telecom up by 3.23%, Metal up by 1.68%, Basic Materials up by 0.96%, TECK up by 0.92% and Auto up by 0.91%, while Bankex down by 0.19% was the only losing index on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Bharti Airtel up by 3.88%, Cipla up by 2.31%, Tata Motors - DVR up by 2.08%, Hindustan Unilever up by 1.96% and Tata Motors up by 1.86%. On the flip side, Axis Bank down by 1.78%, Reliance Industries down by 0.58%, Wipro down by 0.51%, NTPC down by 0.40% and SBI down by 0.30% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, Niti Aayog Vice Chairman Rajiv Kumar has said that slowdown in India's economic growth that began in 2013-14 has bottomed out and Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is likely to grow 6.9 to 7 percent in the fiscal 2017-18 and 7.5 percent in 2018-19. He indicated that the country’s GDP growth rate slumped to 7.1 percent in FY17, the year in which 87 percent of the currency was demonetised, despite a very good show by the agricultural sector. He also noted that on a quarterly basis the growth rate slipped to a three-year low of 5.7 percent in the Q1 (April-June) 2017-18.

Kumar said 'I think by the time you come to the first quarter of 2018, you will see a stronger recovery, and fiscal 2018-19 will be the much better year than fiscal 2017-18. And that will then continue because it will on much more sustained basis.' He also pointed out that the country did very well from 2007-13 and the downward cycle started in 2013-14, largely due to spurge in lending to undeserving projects since 2007.

Niti Aayog Vice Chairman further observed that the high economic growth between 2007-13 was on the basis of huge increase in loans and spurge in private debt for which there was zero control and that was given by the banking sector to the most undeserving cases (projects) and on completely false assumptions. Noting that growth stalled after 2013 because of policy stance, he said that as soon as that happened, all the debt began to becoming bad and therefore downward spiral started.
The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 10212.10, up by 44.65 points or 0.44% after trading in a range of 10175.10 and 10242.95. There were 33 stocks advancing against 17 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Bharti Airtel up by 3.97%, Vedanta up by 2.91%, Bharti Infratel up by 2.90%, Cipla up by 2.18% and BPCL up by 2.04%. On the flip side, Indusind Bank down by 1.85%, Axis Bank down by 1.78%, Wipro down by 0.55%, Reliance Industries down by 0.54% and Adani Ports & SEZ down by 0.54% were the top losers.

The Asian markets were trading mostly in green; KOSPI Index increased 6.43 points or 0.26% to 2,480.05, Jakarta Composite rose 26.36 points or 0.44% to 5,950.48, Taiwan Weighted was up by 50.12 points or 0.47% to 10,774.21, Nikkei 225 added 100.38 points or 0.47% to 21,255.56 and Hang Seng surged 269.95 points or 0.95% to 28,746.38.

On the flip side, Shanghai Composite decreased 4.14 points or 0.12% to 3,386.38 and FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI was down by 3.72 points or 0.21% to 1,751.60.