Bourses soar to day’s high on sustained buying activities

Extending their early gains, the local equity markets reached at their intra-day high levels in afternoon session, on account of strong domestic cues like sharp decline in oil prices and hope of rate cut in RBI's monetary policy that began today, for which outcome is to be announced on Thursday. Sentiments on the street improved further with a monthly survey showing that the country's manufacturing sector performance gained momentum in May as companies lifted output amid strengthening demand conditions, leading to further job creation in the sector. The Nikkei India Manufacturing Purchasing Managers' Index, improved to 52.7 in May from 51.8 in April, pointing to the strongest improvement in the health of the sector in three months. Markets also drew some solace with data report showing that Goods and Services Tax (GST) collections touched Rs 1 lakh crore in May 2019 as compared to Rs 94,016 crore in the year ago period. The total gross GST revenue collected in the month of May, 2019 was Rs 1,00,289 crore of which CGST  (Central GST) was Rs 17,811 crore, SGST (State GST) was Rs 24,462 crore, IGST (Integrated GST) was Rs 49,891 crore and Cess was Rs 8,125 crore. Rupee also is on the winning stride, gaining as much as 26 paise to trade at 69.44 against US Dollar.

On the global front, Asian markets were trading mostly in red in the wake of trade-war jitters from the US tariffs looming against Mexico and China’s retaliation against American measures. Back home, the BSE Sensex is currently trading at 40046.31, up by 332.11 points or 0.84% after trading in a range of 39711.02 and 40049.08. There were 28 stocks advancing against 3 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index rose 0.77%, while Small cap index was up by 0.33%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Auto up by 1.59%, Metal up by 1.31%, Consumer Disc up by 1.29%, Consumer Durables up by 0.92% and Energy up by 0.85%, while there were no losing sectoral indices on the BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Hero MotoCorp up by 5.36%, Bajaj Auto up by 4.24%, Asian Paints up by 3.48%, Tata Steel up by 2.38% and Sun Pharma up by 1.95%. On the flip side, ONGC down by 1.37%, ITC down by 0.88% and Larsen & Toubro down by 0.26% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, the industry chamber, Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) has welcomed the government’s move to extend Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-KISAN) scheme to all the farming households in India as a historic decision. It also claimed that no other central government has taken such a huge step for prosperity of farmers in the country.

FICCI also informed that the government has announced over Rs 10,000 crore pension scheme for five crore farmers, thereby fulfilling the BJP's poll promise. It believes that Indian agriculture is yet to realise its full potential and welcomes the government’s resolve to address challenges in the sector in a comprehensive manner. It added that direct income transfer is recognised as one of the most effective ways of targeting support to the farm sector.

The industry chamber supports a gradual shift from loosely targeted input subsidies to direct benefits transfer to enable farmers to make choices in expenditure based on local priorities and exigencies. He also said 'we urge the Prime Minister to follow up this excellent decision with further reform measures in a time bound manner to kick start a virtuous cycle of growth and value addition in the agriculture sector.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 12017.90, up by 95.10 points or 0.80% after trading in a range of 11920.10 and 12018.95. There were 44 stocks advancing against 6 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Hero MotoCorp up by 5.40%, Bajaj Auto up by 4.20%, Asian Paints up by 3.53%, Britannia Industries up by 2.34% and Tata Steel up by 2.28%. On the flip side, ONGC down by 1.54%, Eicher Motors down by 1.39%, ITC down by 0.81%, Tech Mahindra down by 0.34% and Larsen & Toubro down by 0.23% were the top losers.

Asian markets were trading mostly in red; Straits Times trembled 0.48 points or 0.02% to 3,117.28, Shanghai Composite declined 8.10 points or 0.28% to 2,890.60, Hang Seng decreased 29.36 points or 0.11% to 26,871.73 and Nikkei 225 slipped 190.31 points or 0.92% to 20,410.88.

On the flip side, KOSPI rose 26.11 points or 1.28% to 2,067.85 and Taiwan Weighted strengthened 1.58 points or 0.02% to 10,500.07.