Sensex, Nifty remain in positive territory

Key Indian benchmarks remained in positive territory in late morning session, on the back of persistent buying in PSU and Oil & Gas stocks coupled with positive macro-economic data. India’s industrial output surged to 7.5% in the month of January 2018, as compared to 3.5% in the same month of the previous year and 7.1% in December 2017. Meanwhile, retail inflation cooled down to a 4-month low of 4.44% in the month of February 2018, as compared to 5.07% in January. The investors also took some support with Minister of state for commerce and industry C.R. Chaudhary’s statement that the inflow of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) into India has reached to $208.99 billion during April 2014 to December 2017 period. He further indicated that the main sectors that received maximum FDI equity inflows include services, computer software and hardware, telecommunications, construction, trading and automobile. Traders also took some encouragement with Minister of State for Labour Santosh Kumar Gangwar’s statement that his ministry is working on national policy in order to protect interests of domestic workers which has been pending for almost three years, as the policy was to be presented before the Cabinet in 2015. However, some gains got trimmed, as anxiety spread among the investors with a report stating that India's monsoon rains are expected to be slightly below normal this year.

On the global front, Asian markets were trading mixed, following the lackluster cues overnight from Wall Street and lower commodity prices. Investors now look ahead to the closely-watched US consumer price data due later in the day to gauge the outlook for future interest rate hikes by the Federal Reserve. Analysts expect the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates four times this year if inflation picks up. Back home, in scrip specific development, Future Enterprises gained as the company raised Rs 50 crore on private placement basis.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 33975.75, up by 57.81 points or 0.17% after trading in a range of 33790.09 and 34077.32. There were 21 stocks advancing against 9 stocks declining on the index, while 1 stock remained unchanged.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index was up by 0.84%, while Small cap index was up by 1.04%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were PSU up by 1.41%, Oil & Gas up by 1.38%, Telecom up by 1.25%, Consumer Durables up by 1.04% and Bankex up by 0.90%, while IT down by 1.23% and TECK down by 0.91% were the only losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were SBI up by 1.98%, Axis Bank up by 1.83%, Sun Pharma up by 1.82%, Wipro up by 1.58% and Dr. Reddy’s Lab up by 1.44%. On the flip side, TCS down by 4.73%, Coal India down by 1.61%, NTPC down by 1.52%, Maruti Suzuki down by 0.77% and Mahindra & Mahindra down by 0.58% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, the Minister of state for commerce and industry C.R. Chaudhary has said that the inflow of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) into India has reached to $208.99 billion during April 2014 to December 2017 period. He indicated that the main sectors that received maximum FDI equity inflows include services, computer software and hardware, telecommunications, construction, trading and automobile.

The minister has indicated that the number of functional export oriented units (EOU) has reduced to 2,197 so far in 2017-18 from 2,239 in 2016-17. He added that the number of functional units in 2015-16 was 2,269 and 2,293 in the previous fiscal.

Chaudhary further said that on the recommendations of the Public Accounts Committee, a committee under the development commissioner Kandla SEZ (special economic zone) has been constituted to identify the shortcomings in the EOU scheme. He also said that the committee would also conduct a comparative study of the benefits accrued to SEZ units and EOUs to find out the reasons for shifting of export oriented units to special economic zone sector and suggest remedial actions.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 10446.95, up by 25.55 points or 0.25% after trading in a range of 10381.95 and 10478.60. There were 34 stocks advancing against 16 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were HPCL up by 4.59%, BPCL up by 3.42%, SBI up by 1.92%, Axis Bank up by 1.88% and Bharti Infratel up by 1.78%. On the flip side, TCS down by 4.99%, NTPC down by 1.61%, Coal India down by 1.44%, Maruti Suzuki down by 0.79% and Mahindra & Mahindra down by 0.63% were the top losers.

Asian markets were trading mixed; KOSPI Index increased 5.33 points or 0.21% to 2,489.45, Taiwan Weighted increased 93.53 points or 0.85% to 11,095.63 and Nikkei 225 increased 107.98 points or 0.49% to 21,932.01.

On the flip side, Jakarta Composite decreased 49.03 points or 0.75% to 6,451.66, Hang Seng decreased 14.9 points or 0.05% to 31,579.43, Shanghai Composite decreased 5.39 points or 0.16% to 3,321.31 and FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI decreased 1.12 points or 0.06% to 1,860.10.