Markets trade with minor gains in morning deals

Indian equity benchmarks erased all of their initial losses and traded with marginal gains in morning deals, as Realty, Metal, Oil & Gas and Consumer Durable stocks witnessed buying. Some support also came with Former chief economic adviser Arvind Virmani’s statement that India’s Gross domestic product (GDP) is likely to contract 7.5 percent in the current fiscal (FY21) but will see a double-digit growth in 2021-22. He noted that the central government has come up with some noteworthy reforms, including Goods and Services Tax (GST), Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC) and setting up of the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC). However, gains remain capped as some concern came with the WTO's latest Trade Monitoring Report on G20 stating that there is a slowdown in the number of trade restrictive as well as facilitative measures on goods implemented by G-20 member countries between mid-May and mid-October, due to the sharp decline in overall global trade since the COVID-19 outbreak. Meanwhile, the government has garnered Rs 72,480 crore so far through the direct tax dispute resolution scheme Vivad Se Vishwas.

On the global front, Asian markets were trading mostly in red, following the weak cues overnight from Wall Street as concerns about new lockdowns due to the surge in coronavirus cases offset upbeat news regarding a coronavirus vaccine candidate being developed by Pfizer and BioNTech. Back home, on the sectoral front, textile sector remained in focus with Indian Chamber of Commerce (ICC) stating that it will launch a web store to showcase an exquisite collection of Indian textiles by MSMEs during a global event. It will be a three-day global online L2G (local to global) exhibition for Indian products under Atma Nirbhar Bharat Campaign, scheduled from December 14, 2020.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 44188.32, up by 8.27 points or 0.02% after trading in a range of 43821.39 and 44222.99. There were 18 stocks advancing against 12 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index rose 0.47%, while Small cap index was up by 0.84%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Realty up by 2.59%, Metal up by 1.24%, Oil & Gas up by 1.24%, Consumer Durables up by 1.14% and Auto up by 1.05%, while Bankex down by 0.56% and Telecom down by 0.27% were the few losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Bajaj Finserv up by 4.69%, Tata Steel up by 2.95%, Mahindra & Mahindra up by 2.30%, Bajaj Finance up by 2.20% and ONGC up by 2.02%. On the flip side, ICICI Bank down by 1.18%, HDFC Bank down by 1.13%, Asian Paints down by 1.02%, Ultratech Cement down by 1.00% and Axis Bank down by 0.94% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, data from industry regulator DGCA has showed that Domestic air traffic jumped by 33.67 percent month-on-month in October 2020, continuing on a gradual but steady rebound after flights resumed in May after the lockdown. It showed that 52.71 lakh people took to the air in October, compared to 39.43 lakh in September. The growth rate in September was a tad higher at 39 percent.

However, Year-on-year the numbers are still lower and were down 57.2 percent from October 2019. At the same time, the drop was less steep. In September, year-on-year traffic declined by 65.82 percent. For the year till October, the industry saw a total of 4.93 crore passengers, a drop of 58.27 percent from the same period a year ago.

Domestic flights had resumed on May 25, after they had been suspended in end-March owing to the COVID-19 pandemic. Since then, the latest data from the Ministry of Civil Aviation shows that flights have reached 60 percent of their pre-COVID-19 levels. Passenger traffic is now about half of the earlier level.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 12949.75, up by 11.50 points or 0.09% after trading in a range of 12835.60 and 12959.90. There were 33 stocks advancing against 16 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Bajaj Finserv up by 5.07%, Hero MotoCorp up by 3.81%, BPCL up by 2.86%, Tata Steel up by 2.85% and Hindalco up by 2.71%. On the flip side, Coal India down by 3.63%, UPL down by 1.60%, ICICI Bank down by 1.39%, HDFC down by 1.28% and HDFC Bank down by 1.15% were the top losers.

Asian markets were trading mostly in red; Nikkei 225 slipped 229.23 points or 0.89% to 25,498.91, Hang Seng decreased 150.03 points or 0.57% to 26,394.26, Taiwan Weighted dropped 48.13 points or 0.35% to 13,725.16, KOSPI fell 11.66 points or 0.46% to 2,533.98 and Straits Times trembled 6.55 points or 0.23% to 2,782.04.

On the flip side, Shanghai Composite gained 3.79 points or 0.11% to 3,351.09 and Jakarta Composite soared 28.74 points or 0.52% to 5,586.26.