Weak trade persists on D-Street; Telecom, PSU stocks down

Key Indian benchmarks remained sluggish in late morning session, with Sensex and Nifty registering losses of around 0.15 per cent, amid selling in Telecom, PSU and Oil & Gas stocks. Weak Asian cues along with a slip in the government’s GST collection, too continued to weigh on the sentiments. The government’s revenue collection under the Goods and Services Tax (GST) slipped to Rs 83,346 crore in the month of October, from more than Rs 92,000 crore in the previous month, primarily because taxes on most commodities have come down. Traders failed to get any sense of relief with FICCI’s latest Survey that India's GDP growth rate is expected to rise to 6.2 percent in the second quarter of the current fiscal as the adverse impact of demonetisation and GST appears to be bottoming out. Besides, the private report stating that the economy is likely to clip at 8 percent next fiscal as the massive bank recapitalisation will help revive the long-stalled credit demand and private investments, also failed to support the markets. However, the broader markets managed to trade in green territory with notable gains.

On the global front, Asian markets were trading mostly in red, following the mixed cues overnight from Wall Street, the fall in crude oil prices and rising bond yields in China. Investors were also treading cautiously ahead of key events this week. This includes congressional testimony from US Federal Reserve Chair nominee Jerome Powell on Tuesday and current Fed Chair Janet Yellen on Wednesday, in addition to a possible US Senate vote on proposed tax changes on Thursday. Back home, in scrip specific development Thomas Cook India was trading higher after the company’s subsidiary - Quess Corp completed the acquisition of 51% equity stake in Tata Business Support Services (TBSS) on November 27, 2017.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 33677.48, down by 46.96 points or 0.14% after trading in a range of 33639.32 and 33742.04. There were 13 stocks advancing against 18 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index was up by 0.33%, while Small cap index was up by 0.46%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Metal up by 0.63%, Basic Materials up by 0.53%, Consumer Disc up by 0.28%, Healthcare up by 0.17% and Auto up by 0.08%, while Telecom down by 0.62%, PSU down by 0.53%, Oil & Gas down by 0.52%, Energy down by 0.52% and Consumer Durables down by 0.46% were the top losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Asian Paints up by 1.21%, HDFC up by 1.06%, Maruti Suzuki up by 0.96%, Tata Steel up by 0.89% and Coal India up by 0.88%. On the flip side, Power Grid Corporation down by 1.50%, ONGC down by 1.25%, NTPC down by 1.13%, ICICI Bank down by 0.88% and Infosys down by 0.88% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, the government’s revenue collection under the Goods and Services Tax (GST) slipped to Rs 83,346 crore in the month of October, from more than Rs 92,000 crore in the previous month, primarily because taxes on most commodities have come down. Till now, 95.9 lakh taxpayers have been registered under GST, out of which 15.1 lakh are composition dealers who are required to file returns every quarter. As many as 50.1 lakh returns were filed for October till November 26.

As per the data, GST collection in July was over Rs 95,000 crore while in August, the figure was over Rs 91,000 crore. Besides, the finance ministry has noted that a compensation of Rs 10,806 crore has been released to the states for the month of July and August 2017 and Rs 13,695 crore for September and October. Therefore, it said that the states’ revenues have been fully protected taking base year revenue as 2015-16 and providing a projected revenue growth rate of 14%.

Explaining the downward trend in GST revenue, the finance ministry stated that initially, Integrated GST (IGST) was paid on transfer of goods from one state to another. It also said that as and when the final transaction of these goods takes place, the credit for IGST is being utilized for payment of SGST and CGST and therefore, the inflow of new taxes is low. Further, it explained that since the overall incidence of taxes on most of the commodities has come down under GST, it would naturally have some implication on the revenues of the government. 

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 10382.20, down by 17.35 points or 0.17% after trading in a range of 10372.25 and 10401.25. There were 27 stocks advancing against 23 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Indusind Bank up by 1.41%, UPL up by 1.14%, Indiabulls Housing Finance up by 1.14%, HDFC up by 1.01% and Coal India up by 0.99%. On the flip side, ONGC down by 1.71%, Power Grid Corporation down by 1.45%, BPCL down by 1.27%, NTPC down by 1.26% and Aurobindo Pharma down by 1.17% were the top losers.

Asian markets were trading mostly in red; Hang Seng decreased 209.04 points or 0.7% to 29,477.15, Jakarta Composite decreased 45.95 points or 0.76% to 6,018.63, Taiwan Weighted decreased 43.86 points or 0.41% to 10,707.07, Nikkei 225 decreased 36.39 points or 0.16% to 22,459.60, FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI decreased 4.65 points or 0.27% to 1,715.21 and Shanghai Composite decreased 0.6 points or 0.02% to 3,321.63.

On the flip side, KOSPI Index increased 6.32 points or 0.25% to 2,514.13.