Benchmark indices trade firm in early deals; Realty, Auto lead

Extending their previous session’s northward journey, Indian equity benchmarks made gap-up opening on Tuesday, following overnight rally on Wall Street coupled with positive trend in Asian peers. Markets are trading firm in early deals with notable gains, aided by buying in Realty, Auto and Consumer discretionary stocks. Sentiments got a boost with Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal’s statement Indian exports will automatically increase if the products are good and competitively priced and that products are entrepreneurs should not think that subsidies are the only solution. Some support also came in with report that India on Monday registered a sharp drop of 59,773 in the number of new Covid-19 cases, taking the tally to 6,681,953. Traders took note of report that the government appointed Ashima Goyal, Jayanth R Varma and Shashanka Bhide as members of the rate-setting Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). The monetary policy review scheduled last week was cancelled as term of previous members of MPC had expired. Meanwhile, the government has extended deadlines for applicability of new emission norms for construction equipment vehicles and tractors to next year.

On the global front, Asian markets were trading higher following reports that US President Donald Trump has returned to the White House after being discharged from hospital. Optimism about a US stimulus package also lifted the markets. The markets in China are closed for the National Day holiday. Back home, aviation stocks were in focus with ICRA’s report that recovery in domestic air passenger traffic continued in September with a sequential growth about 37-39 per cent in passenger volume in the previous month over August. In scrip specific development, Tata Motors catches speed after Jaguar Land Rover reported a 50 per cent growth in September quarter sales at 1.13 lakh vehicles on a sequential basis. The sales, however, fell 11.9 per cent on a year-on-year basis.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 39302.22, up by 328.52 points or 0.84% after trading in a range of 39191.10 and 39374.57. There were 22 stocks advancing against 7 stocks declining, while 1 stock remain unchanged on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index gained 0.61%, while Small cap index was up by 0.54%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Realty up by 1.61%, Auto up by 1.44%, Consumer discretionary up by 1.03%, Bankex up by 0.98%, Industrials up by 0.81%, while IT down by 0.60%, TECK down by 0.46%, Metal down by 0.40%, Power down by 0.21% were the few losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were HDFC up by 4.36%, Asian Paints up by 2.91%, Mahindra & Mahindra up by 2.37%, Indusind Bank up by 1.79% and HDFC Bank up by 1.57%. On the flip side, TCS down by 1.31%, Infosys down by 0.64%, NTPC down by 0.53%, Tata Steel down by 0.33% and Sun Pharma down by 0.31% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal has said that Indian exports will automatically increase if the products are good and competitively priced and that entrepreneurs should not think that subsidies are the only solution. He asserted that the country has the capability to become a global player in many sectors, and underscored the need for bolstering manufacturing.

Goyal has stated that sectors having the potential to become globally competitive needed to be identified. He said there is no need to segregate between products for exports and domestic sector. He also said ‘we require quality, good technology and scale, though some support may be needed at times’.

Underscoring the need for ‘bolder ideas’ for signing Free Trade Agreements (FTA), the minister said India could leverage the lower labour cost to promote its products. He also said ‘we need to penetrate the developed world where we can leverage on the lower labour cost or our skills. When we are going to try and export to Africa and Chile, we'll be competing with people who are already very low-cost & low quality.  He said India can surely be part of the global supply chain and also a reliable partner, and added that building capabilities, scale and good manufacturing practices are the need of the hour.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 11584.20, up by 80.85 points or 0.70% after trading in a range of 11564.30 and 11615.30. There were 36 stocks advancing against 14 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Tata Motors up by 5.97%, HDFC up by 4.62%, Asian Paints up by 2.70%, Mahindra & Mahindra up by 2.63% and Adani Ports & SEZ up by 2.28%. On the flip side, Wipro down by 1.57%, TCS down by 1.26%, Grasim Industries down by 0.89%, Coal India down by 0.89% and Infosys down by 0.86% were the top losers.

Asian markets were trading higher; Nikkei 225 surged 95.60 points or 0.41% to 23,407.74, Straits Times rose 15.71 points or 0.62% to 2,532.94, Hang Seng jumped 179.19 points or 0.75% to 23,946.97, Taiwan Weighted gained 132.42 points or 1.06% to 12,680.70, KOSPI soared 12.49 points or 0.53% to 2,370.49 and Jakarta Composite was up by 43.86 points or 0.88% to 5,002.63.