Indian equities trim gains; trade continues in green

Indian equities trimmed gains in the late afternoon session on account of profit booking in front line counters. However, the trade continued in green above neutral line taking clues from European counterparts. The sentiments on the street were buoyant from the morning after provisional data showed that foreign institutional investors (FIIs) remained net buyers of Indian stocks on Wednesday i.e. August 22, 2012. Traders were seen piling up position in IT, TECk and Health Care sector while selling was witnessed in Oil & Gas, Auto and Realty sector. On the global front, the Asian markets were trading in green barring KLSE Composite and Jakarta Composite while the European markets were trading on optimistic note. Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras reiterated that the country is willing to implement the austerity measures laid out by the troika but the country needs some more time. He stressed that the country was not looking for additional bailout money. Separately, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Francois Hollande will meet to talk about the euro-area debt crisis, with both planning to meet later in the week with Greece’s prime minister. On the home turf, the NSE Nifty and BSE Sensex were trading above their psychological 5,400 and 17,800 levels respectively. The market breadth on BSE was negative in the ratio of 1260:1395 while 157 scrips remained unchanged.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 17,862.55, up by 15.69 points or 0.09% and touched a high and low of 17,972.54 and 17,845.64 respectively. There were 17 stocks advancing against 13 declining ones on the index.

The broader indices were trading on a mixed note; the BSE Mid cap was down 0.04% while Small cap indices inched up 0.02%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were, Information Technology (IT) up by 1.50%, TECk up by 1.16%, Health Care (HC) up by 0.61%, Metal up by 0.60% and FMCG up by 0.52% while, Oil & Gas down by 0.95%, Auto down by 0.57%, Realty down by 0.57%, Power down 0.49% and Capital Goods down by 0.36% were the top losers on the index.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Wipro up by 3.08%, TCS up by 1.68%, Tata Steel up by 1.63%, HUL up by 1.26% and Infosys up by 1.25%.

On the flip side, ONGC down by 1.57%, Mahindra & Mahindra down by 1.25%, RIL down by 1.18%, Tata Motors down by 0.99%, and L&T down by 0.81% were the top losers on the Sensex.

Meanwhile, after the recent announcements in annual supplement of the Foreign Trade Policy (FTP), the Centre has revised the apparel exports target to $18 billion, about Rs 99,000 crore from $17 billion, about Rs 93,500 crore for the fiscal 2012-13. The market-linked focus product scheme for apparel exports to US and European Union also has been extended till the end of the current fiscal. Also, the sops included interest subvention on pre-shipment credit.

The US and Europe together account for over 65 per cent of the country's total textiles exports. During 2011-12, India’s apparel exports grew about 18% year-on-year to $13.6 billion, while the government has fixed a $40 billion target for the entire textiles sector in the current fiscal.

Minister of State for Textiles Panabaaka Lakshmi has confirmed that the government has recommended continuation of the Technology Upgradation Fund Scheme (TUFS) with an allocation of Rs 15,886 crore for the entire 12th Plan (2012-17), which is applicable for all the sectors including power-loom small scale industry.

The S&P CNX Nifty is currently trading at 5,415.90, higher by 3.05 points or 0.06% and touched a high and a low of 5,448.60 and 5,409.95 respectively. There were 23 stocks advancing against 26 declines while 1 stock remained unchanged on the index.

The top gainers of the Nifty were Wipro up by 3.03%, Ranbaxy Laboratories up by 2.32%, Tata Steel up by 1.80%, TCS up by 1.79% and Cairn India up by 1.68%.

On the flip side, Reliance Infrastructure down by 1.66%, Ambuja Cement down by 1.63%, ONGC down by 1.61%, Power Grid down by 1.43% and Mahindra & Mahindra down by 1.34% were the major losers on the index.

Most of the Asian markets were trading in the green; Shanghai Composite was up 0.25%, Hang Seng surged 1.23%, Nikkei 225 shot higher by 0.51%, Straits Times advanced 0.49%, Kospi Composite jumped by 0.38% and Taiwan Weighted rose 0.11%.

On the other hand, KLSE Composite down by 0.01% and Jakarta Composite dropped 0.22%.

The European markets were trading in green with, France’s CAC 40 ascending 0.18%, Germany’s DAX added 0.15% and the United Kingdom’s FTSE 100 gained 0.20%.