Benchmarks pares their initial gains after a firm start

The Indian equity markets have come off from their high after witnessing a great start in initial trade as most of the Asian equity pared their initial gains; moreover, on the domestic front, traders remained on the safer side eyeing the IIP data to be announced today. Though, the US markets witnessed wild moves and went for a massive rally overnight after witnessing a severe plunge in day ago, supported by unexpected drop in jobless claims and higher-than-estimated earnings coupled with trade deficit, which was smaller than expected while, most of the Asian counterparts were trading in the green at this point of time. Back home, sustained buying in most of the key heavyweights along with broader indices supported BSE’s Sensex and NSE’s Nifty to regain their crucial 17,100 and 5,600 mark respectively. Consumer Durables witnessed the maximum gain in trade followed by realty and metal while, technology remained the lone loser on the BSE sectoral space. Moreover, L&T Finance Holdings, a new listing today is trading with a cut of about two percent at this point of time. The broader indices were outperforming benchmarks. The market breadth on the BSE was positive; there were 1,187 shares on the gaining side against 383 shares on the losing side while 69 shares remained unchanged.

The BSE Sensex opened at 17,246.88 about 187 points higher compared to its previous closing of 17,059.40, and has touched a low of 17,078.23 while high remained its opening.

The index is currently trading at 17,111.90, up by 52.50 points or 0.31%. There were 18 stocks advancing against 12 declines on the index.

The overall market breadth has made a strong start with 72.42% stocks advancing against 23.37% declines. The broader indices were outperforming benchmarks; the BSE Mid cap and Small cap indices rose 0.89% and 1.04% respectively.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were, CD up by 1.12%, Realty up by 0.80%, Metal up by 0.76%, Power up by 0.71% and HC was up by 0.70%. While, TECk down by 0.02% remained the lone loser on the index.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Jindal Steel up by 1.88%, Sterlite Industries up by 1.62%, M&M up by 1.53%, ICICI Bank up by 1.42% and Coal India was up by 1.37%.

On the flip side, Tata Motors was down by 1.67%, Bharti Airtel was down by 1.03%, Wipro was down by 0.99%, Hindalco was down by 0.95% and NTPC was down by 0.59% were the top losers on the Sensex.

Meanwhile, on the back of improved Plant Load Factor (PLF) and efficiency in operations, electricity generation in India achieved double-digit growth of 12.49 percent to 74,104 million units (MUs) in July, compared to 4.09 percent (65,874 MUs) in the year-ago period. As per the Central Electricity Authority’s (CEA) report the cumulative electricity generation in the country during April-July was 291,139 MUs with a growth rate of 9.29 percent, against 5.28 percent during the same period last year.

Coal-based plants have achieved an impressive growth rate of 10.68 percent over same period last year. Cumulative generation of coal-based plants during April-July recorded 9.49 percent growth over the same period last year. Nearly 23 coal-based power plants with generation capacity of 26,805 Mw recorded more than 90 percent plant load factor. The PLF of Simhadri plant with capacity 1500 Mw was the highest at 104.05. This increase in electricity generation from the coal-based plants is on the back of 100 percent availability of coal for the month. During July, 31.5 million tonnes of coal was used for power generation.

Nuclear power generation attained a growth rate of 62.70 percent, against 16.10 percent during the corresponding month last year on the back of improved availability of nuclear fuel and commissioning of the new unit at Kaiga. Electricity generation in actual terms from nuclear plants was 22.33 percent in July. Cumulative electricity generation from nuclear plants during April-July continued to attain high growth rate of over 50 percent. Growth rate in power generation from nuclear plants during April-July was 53.27 percent, compared to 22.87 percent during the same period last year.

Cumulative generation from hydro power plants during the period too showed double-digit growth at 19.60 percent, compared to 6.34 percent in the year-ago period. Energy generation from hydro electric stations (excluding import from Bhutan) during the month exceeded its target by 17.06 percent. Generation from hydro power plants rose by 28.47 per cent to 13,850 MUs, compared to 10,781 MUs last year. For April-July, the cumulative hydro generation was 46,052 MUs against the target of 37,743 MU - up 122.02 percent.

The gas-based generation remained flat; this was largely due to supply limitation and increased generation from hydro, nuclear and coal-based plants. During April-July, gas-based generation was up by 1.43 percent from the corresponding month last year, while liquid fuel-based stations had negative growth 48.33 percent. Average PLF achieved by gas /liquid fuel-based plants during July reduced to 61.51 percent, against PLF of 63.50 percent during the same period last year. Average PLF for the northern region (NR) gas plants was the lowest during July at 59.20 percent, against PLF of 69.58 percent by NR gas plants during the same month last year. According to CEA, only six gas-based power stations having an aggregated installed capacity of 2008 MW operated at a PLF above 80 percent in July.

The S&P CNX Nifty opened at 5,194.40; about 56 points higher compared to its previous closing of 5,138.30, and has touched a high and a low of 5,194.45 and 5,144.85 respectively.

The index is currently trading at 5,150.20 higher by 11.90 points or 0.23%. There were 39 stocks advancing against 11 declines on the index.

The top gainers of the Nifty were Reliance Infra up by 2.16%, Jindal Steel up by 2.03%, Sterlite Industries up by 1.54%, M&M up by 1.49% and ICICI Bank up by 1.42%.

On the flip side, Tata Motors down by 2.15%, Bharti Airtel down by 1.33%, Hindalco down by 1.11%, Wipro down by 0.86% and HDFC Bank down by 0.74%, were the major losers on the index.

Most of the Asian markets were trading in the green; Shanghai Composite was up 13.53 points or 0.52% to 2,595.04, Hang Seng was up 216.88 points or 1.11% to 19,812.02, Jakarta Composite was up 34.27 points or 0.89% to 3,903.63, KLSE Composite was up 7.81 points or 0.53% to 1,484.27and Straits Times was up by 40.26 points or 1.44% to 2,836.48.

On the flip side, Nikkei 225 was down 22.02 points or 0.25% to 8,959.92, Seoul Composite was down 3.25 points or 0.18% to 1,814.19 and Taiwan Weighted was down 25.30 points or 0.33% to 7,693.79.