Local equities continue lackluster trade

Local equity benchmarks continued their lackluster trade in morning session, with losses of around quarter a percent, dragged down by a spike in global oil prices. Traders remain concerned with think-tank Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy's (CMIE) report that India's unemployment rate increased to 7.7% in December, slightly higher than 7.48% reported in the previous month. However, downside remain capped with Reserve Bank data’s report that Banks' credit and deposits grew by 7.10 per cent and 10.09 per cent to Rs 99.47 lakh crore and Rs 130.08 lakh crore in the fortnight ended December 20. In the year-ago fortnight, banks' advances stood at Rs 92.87 lakh crore, while deposits were at Rs 118.16 lakh crore. Traders took note of a report that the Reserve Bank on January 06 will carry a special simultaneous open market operation to buy and sell government bonds of Rs 10,000 crore each. Besides, a report stated that India can explore an annual $82-billion export potential in twenty products, including electrical equipment and ferro alloys, in the world's second largest economy China.

On the global front, Asian markets are trading mostly in red, with some of the markets paring early gains as risk appetite waned on the prospects of heightened geopolitical tensions. Back home, the non-food credit growth continued its declining trend during the fortnight ended December 20, hitting another two-year-low of 7.08% year-on-year (y-o-y). This marks the slowest rate of growth since October 2017, when it had come in at 6.4%. on the sectoral front, Sugar stocks were in focus as a report showed that the country’s sugar production has fallen sharply by 30.22 per cent to 7.79 million tonne in the first three months of current marketing year ending September, but ex-mill prices have remained stable so far, helping mills clear cane payment to farmers on time.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 41543.54, down by 83.10 points or 0.20% after trading in a range of 41474.91 and 41636.18. There were 10 stocks advancing against 20 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index gained 0.04%, while Small cap index was up by 0.43%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were IT up by 1.40%, TECK up by 1.12%, Healthcare up by 0.43%, Telecom up by 0.24% and Oil & Gas was up by 0.18% while BANKEX down by 0.74%, Power down by 0.54%, PSU down by 0.46%, FMCG down by 0.38%, Metal down by 0.32% were the top losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were ONGC up by 2.03%, TCS up by 1.81%, HCL Tech. up by 1.67%, Tech Mahindra up by 1.36% and Sun Pharma was up by 1.30%. On the flip side, Asian Paints down by 1.33%, HDFC Bank down by 1.29%, Power Grid down by 0.97%, SBI down by 0.93% and Kotak Mahindra Bank was down by 0.71% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) in its latest data has showed that Banks' credit and deposits grew by 7.10 per cent and 10.09 per cent to Rs 99.47 trillion and Rs 130.08 trillion in the fortnight ended December 20, 2019. In the year-ago fortnight, banks' advances stood at Rs 92.87 trillion, while deposits were at Rs 118.16 trillion.

In the previous fortnight ended December 6, 2019, credit had grown by 7.91 per cent to Rs 99.34 trillion and deposits had increased by 10.27 per cent to Rs 131.05 trillion. On a year-on-year basis, banks' credit growth slowed to 7.2 per cent to Rs 86.73 trillion in November 2019 from 13.8 per cent increase to Rs 80.93 trillion in the year-ago period.

Besides, it mentioned that loans to industry growth fell to 2.4 per cent to Rs 27.72 trillion in November from 4 per cent in the corresponding month of 2018. During the month, credit to agriculture and allied activities slowed to 6.5 per cent from 7.7 per cent last year. Advances to the services sector decelerated sharply to 4.8 per cent from 28.1 per cent last year. Personal loans grew at a marginally lower rate of 16.4 per cent in November 2019 as compared to 17.2 per cent earlier.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 12242.60, down by 39.60 points or 0.32% after trading in a range of 12228.00 and 12265.60. There were 13 stocks advancing against 37 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were GAIL India up by 2.39%, ONGC up by 1.99%, HCL Tech. up by 1.81%, TCS up by 1.65% and Sun Pharma was up by 1.62%. On the flip side, Zee Entertainment down by 3.75%, BPCL down by 1.87%, Eicher Motors down by 1.51%, Asian Paints down by 1.49% and HDFC Bank was down by 1.24% were the top losers.

Asian markets are trading mostly in red, Hang Seng decreased 67.32 points or 0.24% to 28,476.20, Straits Times trembled 16.74 points or 0.51% to 3,235.26, Taiwan Weighted dropped 13.50 points or 0.11% to 12,086.98 and Shanghai Composite was down by 9.19 points or 0.3% to 3,076.01.

On the other side, KOSPI rose 1.71 points or 0.08% to 2,176.88 and Jakarta Composite was up by 20.61 points or 0.33% to 6,304.19.