Markets remain in green in morning deals

Indian equity benchmarks continued to trade in green terrain in morning deals, backed by buying in Oil & Gas, PSU, Energy and Metal stocks. Sentiments remained positive as Union Minister for Minister of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) Nitin Gadkari said that India was a destination with huge potential for attractive investments and urged people to invest in MSMEs in the country. He also said that with the world moving production away from dealings in China, India was the next best alternative. Some support also came as the finance ministry has notified the Viability Gap Funding (VGF) scheme under which infrastructure projects would be selected for financial support to give a push to the sector. As per the scheme notified by the ministry, funding up to Rs 200 crore will be sanctioned by the Empowered Committee (EC) headed by the economic affairs secretary, while projects needing over Rs 200 crore would be approved by the EC with the approval of the finance minister. An appreciation in the rupee against the US dollar also supported the markets.

On the global front, Asian markets were trading mostly in red, as investors remained cautious amid lingering uncertainty about a new U.S. fiscal stimulus bill and surging coronavirus cases around the world. Back home, on the sectoral front, IT sector’s stocks were buzzing as ratings agency ICRA stated that the Indian IT services revenue are expected to be flat in US dollar terms in FY21 as against a previous estimate of a negative growth, helped by acceleration in demand for digital services.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 46266.28, up by 306.40 points or 0.67% after trading in a range of 46024.76 and 46278.61. There were 24 stocks advancing against 6 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index rose 0.48%, while Small cap index was up by 0.97%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Oil & Gas up by 2.51%, PSU up by 2.11%, Energy up by 1.76%, Metal up by 1.41% and Capital Goods up by 1.26%, while Realty down by 0.69% was the lone losing index on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were ONGC up by 8.62%, NTPC up by 2.52%, Larsen & Toubro up by 2.02%, ITC up by 1.74% and SBI up by 1.72%. On the flip side, Asian Paints down by 0.61%, Nestle down by 0.39%, Infosys down by 0.26%, Tech Mahindra down by 0.19% and Bharti Airtel down by 0.14% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, the finance ministry has notified the Viability Gap Funding (VGF) scheme under which infrastructure projects would be selected for financial support to give a push to the sector. As per the scheme notified by the ministry, funding up to Rs 200 crore will be sanctioned by the Empowered Committee (EC) headed by the economic affairs secretary, while projects needing over Rs 200 crore would be approved by the EC with the approval of the finance minister.

The other members of the EC would be NITI Aayog CEO, expenditure secretary, secretary of the line ministry dealing with the subject and joint secretary in the Department of Economic Affairs as member secretary. This scheme will be called the Scheme for Financial Support to Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) in infrastructure, it said, adding it will be a central sector scheme to be administered by the Ministry of Finance.

The scheme shall come into force with immediate effect. Regarding eligibility, it said the project shall be implemented by a private sector company to be selected by the government or a statutory entity through a process of open competitive bidding. For social sector projects, including water supply and solid waste management, the amount of VGF shall be equivalent to the lowest bid for capital grant subject to maximum of 30 per cent of the total project cost. For all other eligible sector projects, the amount of VGF shall be equivalent to the lowest bid for capital grant subject to maximum of 20 per cent of the total project cost.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 13565.55, up by 87.25 points or 0.65% after trading in a range of 13505.15 and 13571.90. There were 38 stocks advancing against 12 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were ONGC up by 9.11%, GAIL India up by 4.29%, UPL up by 3.55%, NTPC up by 2.93% and Indian Oil Corp. up by 2.38%. On the flip side, Divis Lab down by 1.30%, Eicher Motors down by 0.96%, Britannia Inds down by 0.77%, Adani Ports &SEZ down by 0.72% and Shree Cement down by 0.54% were the top losers.

Asian markets were trading mostly in red; Nikkei 225 slipped 94.46 points or 0.35% to 26,661.78, Taiwan Weighted dropped 82.34 points or 0.58% to 14,167.15, Shanghai Composite declined 34.59 points or 1.03% to 3,338.69 and Jakarta Composite lost 3.14 points or 0.05% to 5,930.56.

On the flip side, Straits Times advanced 11.00 points or 0.39% to 2,835.96, KOSPI rose 24.78 points or 0.9% to 2,771.24 and Hang Seng increased 74.64 points or 0.28% to 26,485.23.