Bourses continue to trade flat in early noon session

Indian stock markets continued to trade flat with a positive bias in the early noon session due to some buying in Energy, Oil & Gas and Power stocks. Traders took some solace with the Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) payroll data suggesting that as many as 47.13 lakh jobs were created during September 2017 to June this year. Besides, broader indices were outperforming their larger peers. However, markets were not able to see a major upside due to selling in Realty, Bankex and Consumer Durables stocks. Investors were a bit anxious with a private report stating that the credit to micro and small enterprises in June decelerated by 2.4% from March 2018 and it also said that MSME exports appear to be affected more by GST implementation. 

On the global front, all the Asian counters were trading in green. China stocks extended rebound aided by strong gains in consumer and healthcare firms, as investors hunted for bargains after recent losses. Back home, Lupin jumped on receiving USFDA's nod for generic Hydrocortisone Butyrate Lotion and Magma Fincorp surged on reporting 75% rise in Q1 consolidated net profit.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 38285.36, up by 6.61 points or 0.02% after trading in a range of 38233.22 and 38402.96. There were 14 stocks advancing against 16 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index rose 0.45%, while Small cap index up by 0.29%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Energy up by 0.88%, Oil & Gas up by 0.56%, Power up by 0.48%, Industrials up by 0.36% and Basic Materials up by 0.34% while, Realty down by 0.95%, Consumer Durables down by 0.36%, Bankex down by 0.31%, FMCG down by 0.22% and Telecom down by 0.09% were the top losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Wipro up by 2.99%, Coal India up by 2.46%, Tata Motors - DVR up by 2.23%, Tata Motors up by 1.17% and Reliance Industries up by 1.03%. On the flip side, Tata Steel down by 1.08%, Hindustan Unilever down by 1.00%, ICICI Bank down by 0.87%, SBI down by 0.86% and Vedanta down by 0.83% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO), a retirement fund body, in its latest data has showed that as many as 47.13 lakh jobs were created in the ten-month period between September 2017 and June 2018. Though, it has lowered its previous estimate of new members enrolment by 12.38%, from 44.74 lakh to 39.20 lakh for September 2017- May this year.

According to the payroll data, as many as 44.74 lakh jobs were created from September 2017 to May 2018 for its social security schemes to provide benefits, including provident fund, insurance and pension. It noted that in the last 10 month, the number of enrollments was the highest in June at 7,93,308. It also mentioned that in June, the maximum number of enrolment of 2,53,466 were recorded in the age bracket of 18 to 21 years followed by 2,05,177 in 22 to 25 age group.

The data released by EPFO is provisional as updation of employees records is a continuous process and gets updated in subsequent months. The body has said that the estimates may include temporary employees, whose contributions may not be continuous for the entire year. It also noted that for each age-wise band, the estimates are net of the members enrolled and ceased during the month as per the EPFO records.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 11559.80, up by 8.05 points or 0.07% after trading in a range of 11542.50 and 11581.75. There were 25 stocks advancing against 25 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Tech Mahindra up by 3.12%, Wipro up by 3.07%, Coal India up by 2.78%, UPL up by 2.76% and HCL Tech. up by 1.64%. On the flip side, Hindustan Unilever down by 1.24%, BPCL down by 1.05%, Tata Steel down by 0.97%, SBI down by 0.93% and ICICI Bank down by 0.92% were the top losers.

All the Asian counters were trading in green; Straits Times increased 0.55 points or 0.02% to 3,205.26, Hang Seng surged 147.49 points or 0.53% to 27,745.51, KOSPI advanced 23.13 points or 1.02% to 2,271.01, Taiwan Weighted soared 93.15 points or 0.86% to 10,792.20, Jakarta Composite jumped 41.77 points or 0.7% to 5,933.96, Nikkei 225 rose 20.73 points or 0.09% to 22,219.73 and Shanghai Composite was up 30.88 points or 1.13% to 2,729.35.