Markets exhibit jubilant trade in early deals; Sensex hits 19K

Key domestic bourses, coming out of their consolidation phase, have made a confident start with BSE’s Sensex and NSE’s Nifty surpassing their crucial 19,000 and 5,750 levels in early trade respectively on Thursday by rising over 200 points on sustained buying by participants, as government is expected to announce further economic reforms. Global cues too remained supportive as the US markets made a modest bounce back overnight on stronger-than-expected US labor and service-sector data. While, most of the Asian equities were trading in the green terrain at this point of time with Japanese car makers extending gains as the dollar rose against the yen, countering losses for energy firms.

Back home, the key gauges rallied on hopes that the cabinet may approve bills that would raise the cap on foreign direct investment in insurance firms and open the pension sector to foreign investors. The Cabinet will also consider the Forward Contract Regulation Act (Amendment) Bill to empower commodity markets regulator FMC with greater financial autonomy. Appreciation in Indian rupee too boosted the sentiments. The Indian rupee continued to appreciate ahead of this Cabinet meeting, rising by 23 paise to 51.93 against the US dollar.

Meanwhile, telecom stocks like Idea Cellular, Bharti Airtel and Reliance Communication all edged higher after the Empowered Group of Ministers (EGoM) ratified department of telecommunications (DoT) decision on 100% foreign companies’ eligibility, now they can bid on their own without a partner. On the sectoral front, banking segment drove the markets, rising nearly 2 percent on the BSE followed by realty and capital goods space. The broader indices too were trading on a firm note and market breadth on the BSE was strong; there were 1,246 shares on the gaining side against 449 shares on the losing side while 75 shares remain unchanged.

The BSE Sensex opened at 18939.75; about 70 points higher compared to its previous closing of 18869.69, and has touched a high of 19086.27 while low remain its opening.

The index is currently trading at 19083.63, up by 213.94 points or 1.13%. There were 26 stocks advancing against only 4 declines on the index.

The overall market breadth has made a strong start with 70.40% stocks advancing against 25.37% declines. The broader indices too were trading on a firm note; the BSE Mid cap and Small cap indices rose 0.87% and 0.70% respectively.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were, Bankex up by 1.87%, Realty up by 1.75%, CG up by 1.40%, Oil and Gas up by 1.25% and Power up by 1.23%. While, there were no losers on the index.

The top gainers on the Sensex were BHEL up by 2.94%, ICICI Bank up by 2.36%, Bharti Airtel up by 2.35%, HDFC up by 1.58% and HDFC Bank up by 1.52%. While, Cipla down by 1.10%, TCS down by 0.61%, Hero Honda down by 0.32% and Hero MotoCorp down by 0.32% remained the only losers on the Sensex.

Meanwhile, with an aim to meet the gap between high demand and peak deficit, the Planning Commission of India has targeted a power generation capacity of 88,425 MW during the 12th five year plan, 2012-17, while the commission had previously projected additional power generation capacity of 75,785 MW in the next five years.

The panel has estimated that the private sector has to share about 52% in the extra capacity, compared to the 19% in the 11th five year plan. It also affirmed the importance of developing a policy framework to trigger more investments in private sector. The 11th Plan had set a target addition of 78,577 MW capacity, but achieved about 52,000 MW capacity in the period. However, the renewable power share is declining, and this has to be enhanced to ensure low carbon growth strategy.

The commission has projected capacity addition in the non-fossil fuel plants including hydro capacity addition of 11,897 MW and nuclear capacity addition of 5,300 MW. It has considered importing of about 1,200 MW of hydro power from Bhutan. 30,000 MW grid interactive renewable capacity additions is also under consideration, constituting 15,000 MW wind, 10,000 MW solar, 2,100 small hydro and remaining from bio mass.

The S&P CNX Nifty opened at 5,751.55; about 20 points higher compared to its previous closing of 5,731.25, and has touched a high and a low of 5,798.60 and 5,751.35 respectively.

The index is currently trading at 5,788.75, higher by 57.50 points or 1.00%. There were 45 stocks advancing against just 5 declines on the index.

The top gainers of the Nifty were BHEL up by 2.72%, DLF up by 2.58%, Bharti Airtel up by 2.56%, Axis Bank up by 2.51% and ICICI Bank up by 2.31%.

On the flip side, Lupin down by 1.15%, Cipla down by 1.12%, HCL Tech down by 1.06%, TCS down by 0.73% and Ranbaxy down by 0.64% remained the only losers on the index.

Most of the Asian equity indices were trading in the green; Hang Seng was up by 43.88 points or 0.21% to 20,932.16, Jakarta Composite gained 2.46 points or 0.06% to 4,253.97, Straits Times was higher by 0.25 points or 0.01% to 3,077.39, KLSE Composite was up by 10.48 points or 0.64% to 1,660.23, Nikkei 225 gained 53.89 points or 0.62% to 8,800.76.

Kospi Composite declined by 0.56 points or 0.03% to 1,995.47 and Taiwan Weighted plunged by 1.30 points or 0.02% to 7,683.33.

Markets in China remained closed today for holiday.