Sensex, Nifty falters after modest recovery

Indian equity benchmarks falters after modest recovery and currently trading near day’s low on renewed concerns about the global economy. In currency market Indian rupee continued its losing streak against dollar on Monday on the back of weak US jobs data and figures showing falling core machinery orders in Japan. On sectoral front, few blue chips from information technology and FMCG sectors edged higher on modest support, the market faltered subsequently due to fairly heavy selling in metal, power, capital goods and realty stocks. In global markets, Asian shares were trading in red on US jobs data exacerbated worries about flagging global economic growth, with investors not particularly hopeful that a European meeting later in the day would bring further progress for the region's banks. Back home, the market breadth favoring negative trend; there were 998 shares on the gaining side against 1,436 shares on the losing side while 98 shares remained unchanged.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 17,387.20 down by 133.92 points or 0.76% after trading as high as 17,485.79 and as low as 17,381.48. There were 6 stocks advancing against 24 declines on the index.

The broader indices were trading on a negative note; the BSE Mid cap index dropped 1.01% while Small cap index was down 0.77%.

On the BSE sectoral space, IT up by 0.18% and FMCG up by 0.03% were top gainers. While, Metal down by 1.85%, Power down by 1.61%, CG down by 1.52%, Realty down by 1.49% and CD down by 1.17% were the top losers on the index.

TCS up by 1.06%, Tata Motors up by 0.42%, Mahindra & Mahindra up by 0.19%, ITC up by 0.18% and Infosys up by 0.17% were the major gainers on the Sensex, while Jindal Steel down by 2.86%, Bajaj Auto down by 2.24%, Bharti Airtel down by 2.21%, Maruti Suzuki down by 2.01% and Tata Steel down by 1.94% were the major losers in the index.

Meanwhile, security market regulator, Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) is mulling to set up an independent self-regulatory organization (SRO) for stock exchanges, though the regulator prefers to keep the day-to-day trading regulations and surveillance actions with bourses themselves. It’s of the view that an independent SRO could take over member regulation functions of stock exchanges in the long run.

As per the present regulatory framework, the stock exchanges act as the frontline regulators for the market while, the SEBI is the ultimate oversight and regulatory authority. The SEBI’s board has already approved a proposal for providing the seed fund for setting up the SRO, whenever deemed appropriate. However, it is also looking at ways to minimise any possible conflict of interest in the regulatory and business interests and a dual-reporting structure could be introduced to tackle conflict of interest. The head of regulatory department would report to the MD or CEO of the bourse, as well as to an independent committee of the exchange’s board.

The S&P CNX Nifty is currently trading at 5,273.15, lower by 43.80 points or 0.82% after trading as high as 5,300.60 and as low as 5,268.05. There were 7 stocks advancing against 43 declines on the index.

The top gainers on the Nifty were TCS up by 1.01%, Tata Motors up by 0.44%, ITC up by 0.34%, M&M by 0.15% and Infosys up by 0.08%. JP Associates down by 3.69%, Reliance Infra down by 3.41%, Jindal Steel down by 2.94%, Bajaj Auto down by 2.52% and Tata Power down by 2.32% were the major losers on the index.

All the Asian equity indices were trading in red; Shanghai Composite was down 1.15%, Hang Seng index down by 1.70%, Jakarta Composite down 1.38%, KLSE Composite down 0.04%, Nikkei down 1.36%, Strait Times down 1.10%, Kospi Composite Index down 1.25%, and Taiwan Weighted down 0.80%.