Bulls take control on Dalal Street; Nifty reclaims 10,350 mark

Bulls took full control on Dalal Street with Indian equity benchmarks extending northward journey to trade near intraday highs in late afternoon session, as fresh buying by investors and foreign funds amid a firm trend in other Asian bourses improved market sentiments. Positive opening in European markets too aiding sentiments. Adding to the optimism, foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) bought shares worth Rs 550.36 crore, while domestic institutional investors (DIIs) sold shares worth Rs 65.00 crore on Friday. Traders continued to take encouragement with report that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has said that Indian economy is on its path to recovering from the negative impact of demonetisation and disruption caused by roll out of goods and services tax (GST). It further pointed out that in recent years, India’s economy has expanded strongly, due to macroeconomic policies that emphasise stability and efforts to tackle supply-side bottlenecks and structural reforms. The Commerce and Industry Minister Suresh Prabhu’s statement that India will become a $5 trillion economy in the next seven years and after that in next 7-10 years’ time may be a $10 trillion economy, too supported the rally.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 33771.96, up by 464.82 points or 1.40% after trading in a range of 33468.16 and 33790.19. There were 28 stocks advancing against 3 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index gained 0.25%, while Small cap index was up by 0.12%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Telecom up by 2.37%, FMCG up by 1.94%, TECK up by 1.53%, Oil & Gas up by 1.51% and IT was up by 1.45%, while PSU down by 0.15% was the lone losing index on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Bharti Airtel up by 4.22%, ITC up by 4.01%, Tata Motors up by 2.41%, Hero MotoCorp up by 2.21% and NTPC up by 2.20%. On the flip side, Coal India down by 2.23%, SBI down by 1.64% and Power Grid Corporation down by 0.10% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, the Goods and Services (GST) Council at its 26th meeting, has decided to extend the available tax exemptions on imported goods for a further 6 months beyond March 31. Thus, exporters presently availing various export promotion schemes can now continue to avail such exemptions on their imports up to October 1, 2018, by which time an e-Wallet scheme is expected to be in place to continue the benefits in future.

Besides, the Council, chaired by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and comprising his state counterparts, has reviewed the progress in grant of refunds to exports of both IGST and Input Tax Credit. It has appreciated that the pace of grant of IGST refund has picked up. Thereafter, it has directed GSTN to expeditiously forward the balance refund claims to the central GST or state GST authorities, for their immediate sanction and disbursal.

In its meeting on October 6, 2017 the Council had taken up the issues faced by exporters due to cash blockage on account of having to upfront pay GST or IGST on the inputs, raw materials etc. and finished goods imported or procured for purposes of exports. As an interim solution, the Council had decided to re-introduce the pre-GST tax exemptions on such imports till March 31. Additionally, for merchant exporters, a special scheme of payment of GST at 0.1 per cent on their procured goods was introduced.

The permanent solution agreed to by the Council was to introduce an e-Wallet scheme with effect from April 1, 2018. The e-Wallet scheme is basically the creation of electronic e-Wallets, which would be credited with notional or virtual currency by the DGFT. This notional or virtual currency would be used by the exporters to make the payment of GST or IGST on the goods imported or procured by them so their funds are not blocked. 

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 10367.75, up by 140.90 points or 1.38% after trading in a range of 10295.45 and 10377.30. There were 44 stocks advancing against 5 stocks declining, while 1 stock remained unchanged on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Bharti Airtel up by 4.07%, ITC up by 3.99%, Vedanta up by 3.11%, HCL Tech up by 2.64% and Tata Motors up by 2.53%. On the flip side, Coal India down by 2.29%, Aurobindo Pharma down by 2.05%, SBI down by 1.66%, Bosch down by 0.28% and Ambuja Cement down by 0.02% were the top losers.

All the Asian markets are trading in green; FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI surged 17.3 points or 0.94% to 1,861.22, Shanghai Composite increased 19.53 points or 0.59% to 3,326.70, KOSPI Index jumped 24.67 points or 1% to 2,484.12, Jakarta Composite advanced 54.41 points or 0.85% to 6,487.73, Taiwan Weighted soared 137.28 points or 1.26% to 11,002.10, Nikkei 225 added 354.83 points or 1.65% to 21,824.03 and Hang Seng was up by 598.12 points or 1.93% to 31,594.33.

European markets are trading mostly in green; France’s CAC increased 9.16 points or 0.17% to 5,283.56 and Germany’s DAX was up by 73.94 points or 0.6% to 12,420.62, while UK’s FTSE 100 was down by 5.58 points or 0.08% to 7,218.93.