Bulls tighten grip on D-Street

Key Indian benchmarks were trading near record highs in late morning session, as bulls tightened their grip on the stock markets, on the back of positive cues from other Asian markets. The traders were optimistic with Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister (EAC-PM), Bibek Debroy’s statement that India's advance GDP growth estimate of 6.5 percent for this fiscal shows reform measures taken by the government is yielding results and growth will accelerate to over 7 per cent in 2018-19. Some support also came with the report that bank’s credit has registered a double digit growth of 10.65 percent to Rs 80.96 lakh crore as on December 22, 2017, mainly because of the base effect. Investors also took some encouragement from report that the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has relaxed norms for levy of Minimum Alternate Tax (MAT) from the current financial year 2017-18, in major respite to companies facing corporate insolvency proceedings. Besides, the broader markets too rallied with the gains of more than 0.80 per cent each. Meanwhile, overseas investors poured in a staggering Rs 1.5 lakh crore in the Indian debt markets in 2017 on the back of higher bond yields and stable currency, after pulling out massive funds in the preceding year.

On the global front, Asian markets were trading mostly in green, after US equity indexes set fresh record highs last week, as signs of improving global economic growth stoked investors’ risk appetite. Back home, in scrip specific development, IndusInd Bank was trading higher after the bank entered into tie-up with Paytm Payments Bank for fixed deposit facility.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 34364.32, up by 210.47 points or 0.62% after trading in a range of 34216.33 and 34372.95. There were 24 stocks advancing against 7 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index was up by 0.84%, while Small cap index was up by 0.86%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Healthcare up by 1.66%, Realty up by 1.35%, IT up by 1.24%, Capital Goods up by 0.86% and Oil & Gas up by 0.77%, while Telecom down by 2.09% was the lone losing index on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Sun Pharma up by 3.07%, Infosys up by 1.67%, ICICI Bank up by 1.38%, ITC up by 1.35% and Hero MotoCorp up by 1.29%. On the flip side, Bharti Airtel down by 3.40%, Asian Paints down by 0.65%, Adani Ports & SEZ down by 0.45%, Tata Motors - DVR down by 0.37% and NTPC down by 0.20% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, after a long gap, bank’s credit has registered a double digit growth of 10.65 percent to Rs 80.96 lakh crore as on December 22, 2017, mainly because of the base effect. According to the RBI data, advances had stood at Rs 73.17 lakh crore in the year-ago period. In the recently released financial stability report, RBI has indicated that credit growth of scheduled commercial banks (SCBs), on a Y-o-Y basis, surged to 6.2 percent from 4.4 percent between March and September 2017.

The data further highlighted that the public sector banks’ (PSBs) credit growth increased from 0.7 percent to 2.2 percent during the same period reversing the declining trend observed during past two years. It showed that in the previous fortnight, the banks' advances had grown by 9.77 percent to Rs 80.26 lakh crore from Rs 73.12 lakh crore in the year ago period. Besides, in the reporting fortnight, banks' deposits had risen by 3.96 percent to Rs 108.85 lakh crore as against Rs 104.69 lakh crore in the period ended December 23, 2016.

As per the report, deposits in the previous fortnight ended December 8, 2017 had grown by 3.32 percent to Rs 109.01 lakh crore as against Rs 105.50 lakh crore in the period ended December 9, 2016. It also pointed that the FSR had said deposit growth of scheduled commercial banks, on a Y-o-Y basis, decelerated from 11.1 per cent to 7.8 percent between March and September 2017. It added that the decline in deposit growth is observed across all bank groups.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 10620.85, up by 62.00 points or 0.59% after trading in a range of 10588.55 and 10622.40. There were 38 stocks advancing against 12 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Sun Pharma up by 2.98%, Tech Mahindra up by 2.81%, Lupin up by 2.43%, BPCL up by 2.06% and Infosys up by 1.53%. On the flip side, Bharti Airtel down by 3.62%, Asian Paints down by 0.78%, Hindalco down by 0.65%, Vedanta down by 0.65% and NTPC down by 0.25% were the top losers.

Asian markets were trading mostly in green; FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI increased 6.29 points or 0.35% to 1,824.26, Jakarta Composite increased 8.28 points or 0.13% to 6,362.02, KOSPI Index increased 12.32 points or 0.49% to 2,509.84, Shanghai Composite increased 20.71 points or 0.61% to 3,412.46 and Taiwan Weighted increased 35.95 points or 0.33% to 10,915.75.

On the flip side, Hang Seng decreased 28.4 points or 0.09% to 30,786.24.