Benchmarks trade jubilantly in early deals; Nifty surpasses 10,600 mark

Bulls have taken full control over Dalal Street with frontline gauges continuing to hit all time high levels, surpassing their crucial 34,300 (Sensex) and 10,600 (Nifty) levels in early deals on Monday. Sentiments remained up-beat with report that credit growth after a long gap grew in double digits to 10.65 per cent at Rs 80,96,727 crore in the fortnight ended December 22, 2017 due to the base effect. Traders completely ignored Central Statistics Office’s (CSO) first advance estimates of GDP growth for current financial year which highlighted that the Indian economy is expected to grow at a slower 6.5 percent in 2017-18 compared to the 7.1 percent in 2016-17. According to CSO, the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) at constant (2011-12) prices for 2017-18 is likely to attain a level of Rs 129.85 lakh crore.

Global cues too remained supportive with Asian markets trading mostly in green ahead of the start of the region’s earnings season this week, with investors betting that the outlook for economic growth and profits is strong enough to support record-high stock prices. The US markets made a positive closing in the last session, shrugging off the disappointing batch of U.S. economic data.

Back home, aviation stocks exhibiting mixed performance, as the government has said that if capping of airfares get implemented it would result in increased cost of air travel for 99 per cent of the passengers. In scrip specific development, L&T rises with arm bagging orders worth Rs 2,265 crore, while Sobha surges after Q3 sales bookings jump 92% to Rs 750.9 crore.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 34330.91, up by 177.06 points or 0.52% after trading in a range of 34216.33 and 34358.21. There were 25 stocks advancing against 6 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index gained 0.87%, while Small cap index was up by 0.71%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Healthcare up by 2.04%, Realty up by 1.14%, IT up by 0.82%, Oil & Gas up by 0.75% and Bankex was up by 0.75%, while Telecom down by 2.29% was the lone losing index on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Sun Pharma up by 3.90%, ICICI Bank up by 1.55%, Dr. Reddys Lab up by 1.53%, Infosys up by 1.27% and HDFC up by 0.80%. On the flip side, Bharti Airtel down by 3.73%, Asian Paints down by 0.64%, Bajaj Auto down by 0.12%, Hindustan Unilever down by 0.11% and Tata Motors - DVR down by 0.10% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, the Central Statistics Office (CSO), under Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation, in its First Advance Estimates of National Income, 2017-18, has stated that Indian economy is expected to grow at a four-year low of 6.5 percent in the current fiscal year 2017-18, as against 7.1 percent in the fiscal year 2016-17. It is even lower than the Reserve Bank’s lowered projection of 6.7 percent. Poor performance of agriculture, mining and construction sectors, along with the lingering impact of demonetisaiton and the Goods and Services Tax (GST), mainly pulled down the growth prospects of the Indian economy. Before this, the slowest expansion in GDP was in 2013-14, when it grew by 6.4 percent.

As per the CSO data, real Gross Domestic Product (GDP) at constant (2011-12) prices in the year 2017-18 is likely to be Rs 129.85 lakh crore, as against the Provisional Estimate of GDP for the year 2016-17 of Rs 121.90 lakh crore. The data also showed that the Gross Value Added (GVA) at basic constant prices (2011-12) is anticipated to increase from Rs 111.85 lakh crore in 2016-17 to Rs 118.71 lakh crore in 2017-18. Anticipated growth of real GVA at basic prices in 2017-18 is 6.1 percent as against 6.6 percent in 2016-17.

Among the sectors, ‘public administration , defence and other services’ is expected to register the sharpest growth of 9.4% this fiscal, followed by trade, hotels, transport, communication and services related to broadcasting, which is expected to expand by 8.7%. ‘Electricity, gas, water supply& other utility services’ and ‘Financial,  real estate  &  professional  services’ are expected to registered a growth of  7.5% and 7.3% respectively. On the other hand, growth in the ‘agriculture, forestry and fishing', ‘mining and quarrying', ‘manufacturing' and ‘construction' sectors are estimated to be 2.1%, 2.9%, 4.6% and 3.6%, respectively.

According to the First Advance Estimates of National Income, India's per capita income, a gauge for measuring living standard, is likely to witness a slower growth of 8.3 percent at Rs 1,11,782 in FY 2017-18. In 2016-17, per capita income of Indians had grown by 9.7 percent to Rs 1,03,219. The per capita income in real terms (at 2011-12 prices) during 2017-18 is likely to attain a level of Rs 86,660 as compared to Rs 82,269 for the year 2016-17. The growth rate in per capita income (real terms) is estimated at 5.3 percent during 2017-18, as against 5.7 percent in the previous year.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 10608.30, up by 49.45 points or 0.47% after trading in a range of 10588.55 and 10618.90. There were 40 stocks advancing against 10 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Sun Pharma up by 4.01%, Lupin up by 2.46%, BPCL up by 1.68%, UPL up by 1.56% and GAIL India up by 1.53%. On the flip side, Bharti Airtel down by 3.55%, Asian Paints down by 0.57%, Vedanta down by 0.46%, Eicher Motors down by 0.31% and Ambuja Cement down by 0.31% were the top losers.

Asian markets are trading mostly in green; KOSPI Index rose 4.62 points or 0.18% to 2,502.14, Jakarta Composite gained 6.54 points or 0.1% to 6,360.27, FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI increased 6.98 points or 0.38% to 1,824.95, Shanghai Composite jumped 11.71 points or 0.35% to 3,403.46 and Taiwan Weighted added 22.98 points or 0.21% to 10,902.78.

On the flip side, Hang Seng was down by 13.58 points or 0.04% to 30,801.06.