Indian equity benchmarks made optimistic start on Wednesday. Markets are trading higher with notable gains in early deals on the back of buying in Energy, PSU and Industrials stocks. Sentiments got a boost with a private report that India's GDP may turn positive at 1.3 percent in the third quarter of 2020-21, having witnessed contraction in the previous two quarters due to the coronavirus pandemic, as the number of cases is falling and public spending has started rising. Some support also came in as Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar said that the government's decision to increase the agriculture credit target to Rs 16.5 lakh crore for the next fiscal will help in easing the liquidity crunch of farmers. Traders took note of report that India's count of active cases has dropped to 148,579. On Tuesday, the country registered 13,074 fresh Covid-19 cases, taking its the caseload tally to 11,028,937.
On the global front, most of the Asian markets were trading lower amid mixed cues overnight from Wall Street. There are also continuing concerns over an uptick in bond yields and worries over higher inflation affecting valuations. Back home, telecom stocks were in focus as the sector regulator may consider lowering the minimum price for 5G spectrum if the government directs it to do so because of concerns that the pricing set for the airwaves could hurt the rollout of the latest wireless technology. In scrip specific development, Bharti Airtel gained after it partnered with Qualcomm Technologies for accelerating 5G services in India.
The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 49952.42, up by 201.01 points or 0.40% after trading in a range of 49736.97 and 50014.04. There were 21 stocks advancing against 9 stocks declining on the index.
The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index rose 0.58%, while Small cap index was up by 0.85%.
The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Energy up by 1.36%, PSU up by 1.28%, Industrials up by 1.16%, Auto up by 1.06%, Metal up by 1.01%, while IT down by 0.66%, TECK down by 0.41%, Utilities down by 0.13% were the few losing indices on BSE.
The top gainers on the Sensex were Bajaj Finance up by 1.99%, Mahindra & Mahindra up by 1.61%, Axis Bank up by 1.56%, SBI up by 1.55% and Ultratech Cement up by 1.45%. On the flip side, TCS down by 1.45%, Power Grid down by 0.71%, Infosys down by 0.64%, Dr. Reddy’s Lab down by 0.55% and Hindustan Unilever down by 0.50% were the top losers.
Meanwhile, ratings agency Crisil has said Indian media and entertainment (M&E) sector is expected to witness a strong 27 per cent growth in revenue to around Rs 1.37 lakh crore in 2021-22, after contracting 26 per cent this fiscal. Segments such as digital and television (TV) will have relatively shorter time to bounce-back to pre-pandemic levels while print, films, outdoor, and radio would take longer.
Crisil Ratings’ Director Nitesh Jain said advertisement and subscription revenues contribute nearly equally to the overall M&E sector's topline, but since the former correlates strongly with economic growth, the pandemic has had a bigger impact on it. Jain added next fiscal, with strong economic rebound on the cards, ad revenue should grow 31 per cent on-year and subscription revenue around 24 per cent.
Besides, the agency said the TV segment contributing around half of the sector's topline has recovered fully and will report healthy growth next fiscal. And revenue saw a sharp contraction initially, but recovered swiftly thereafter, aided by airing of new content, sports events such as the Indian Premier League and a buoyant festive season. It added as for subscriptions, TV was resilient even during the peak of pandemic as people remained indoors. It also said the print segment, which contributes a fifth of the M&E sector topline, is recovering, though at a much slower pace, and should be able to rebound fully only by the end of next fiscal.
The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 14764.05, up by 56.25 points or 0.38% after trading in a range of 14723.05 and 14793.80. There were 38 stocks advancing against 12 stocks declining on the index.
The top gainers on Nifty were Coal India up by 4.64%, Bajaj Finance up by 1.94%, IOC up by 1.84%, JSW Steel up by 1.67% and Mahindra & Mahindra up by 1.62%. On the flip side, UPL down by 2.31%, TCS down by 1.45%, GAIL India down by 0.95%, Power Grid down by 0.93% and Kotak Mahindra Bank down by 0.89% were the top losers.
Asian markets were trading mostly in red; Nikkei 225 slipped 285.45 points or 0.95% to 29,870.58, Hang Seng declined 602.05 points or 1.97% to 30,030.59, Taiwan Weighted fell 146.89 points or 0.89% to 16,296.51, KOSPI lost 20.65 points or 0.67% to 3,049.44, Jakarta Composite dropped 6.84 points or 0.11% to 6,265.97, and Shanghai Composite was down by 56.41 points or 1.55% to 3,579.95, while Straits Times surged 37.16 points or 1.29% to 2,927.86.
