Key gauges continue lacklustre trade in morning deals

Fluctuating between gains and losses, Indian equity benchmarks were now trading with minor cut in Friday's morning deals despite a positive trend in global market. Traders remain worried as India reported on Thursday 54,069 new Covid-19 infections over the past 24 hours, data from the health ministry showed. It had 1,321 new fatalities, taking the total death toll to 39,1981. However, losses remain capped as traders found some solace with Crisil’s report that States' revenues is set to cross the Pre-Covid pandemic level in the current fiscal (FY22), driven by higher tax buoyancy, rise in sales tax collections from petroleum products coupled with increase in grants following 15th Finance Commission recommendations. It noted that revenue of the top 10 states had plunged 600 basis points (bps) last fiscal. Meanwhile, asserting that continuous reforms make India a great place to do business, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman invited global investors to take advantage of the recent FDI reforms, the privatisation policy and the performance linked incentive (PLI) scheme.

On the global front, Asian markets were trading in green tracking gains on Wall Street overnight that lifted the NASDAQ and the S&P 500 indexes to record highs after US President Joe Biden embraced a bipartisan Senate infrastructure deal. Investors have been looking to an infrastructure agreement to extend the recovery in the world's largest economy after massive fiscal stimulus helped the US economy grow at a 6.4 percent annualised rate in the first quarter.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 52677.32, down by 21.68 points or 0.04% after trading in a range of 52614.95 and 52899.47. 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 0.64%, while Small cap index was up by 0.33%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Metal up by 1.93%, Basic Materials up by 1.08%, Auto up by 1.00%, Industrials up by 0.77% and PSU up by 0.68%, while Energy down by 1.85%, Oil & Gas down by 0.84%, Utilities down by 0.76%, Power down by 0.61% and Consumer Durables down by 0.28% were the top losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Tata Steel up by 3.42%, Tech Mahindra up by 1.62%, ICICI Bank up by 1.33%, SBI up by 1.19% and Sun Pharma up by 1.17%. On the flip side, Reliance Industries down by 2.48%, Asian Paints down by 1.28%, Hindustan Unilever down by 1.22%, NTPC down by 0.72% and Kotak Mahindra Bank down by 0.70% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, Crisil in its latest report has said that States' revenues is set to cross the Pre-Covid pandemic level in the current fiscal (FY22), driven by higher tax buoyancy, rise in sales tax collections from petroleum products coupled with increase in grants following 15th Finance Commission recommendations. It noted that revenue of the top 10 states had plunged 600 basis points (bps) last fiscal.

According to the report, given the higher prices of fuels, revenue from this segment is set to grow 50 percent to 30 percent in the current financial year from 20 percent it clipped last fiscal, even though the overall volume will fall. The tax on fuels constitute 10 per cent of the revenues of states. It can be noted that despite petrol crossing the Rs 100 mark in many states and also diesel in some places, the Centre and the states have not lowered the taxes on these fuels. In fact, almost 65 per cent of the retail prices of these fuels are made up of VAT as petroleum products are not under the GST.

The report further said aggregate Goods and Services Tax (GST) collections, which account for a fifth of the states' revenues, have recovered well in the fourth quarter of FY21 as economic activity sprung back. The momentum continues this fiscal, with April and May collections averaging Rs 0.93 lakh crore (April being the highest ever at Rs 1.41 lakh crore), marking an 11 per cent growth over fiscal 2020 so far. While the second wave of the pandemic may moderate GST collections in June and July, it expects a recovery in GST mop up to the pre-pandemic levels by August.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 15788.15, down by 2.30 points or 0.01% after trading in a range of 15772.30 and 15844.45. There were 31 stocks advancing against 19 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Tata Steel up by 3.50%, Tata Motors up by 1.87%, Tech Mahindra up by 1.62%, JSW Steel up by 1.55% and Hero MotoCorp up by 1.30%. On the flip side, Reliance Industries down by 2.46%, Asian Paints down by 1.23%, Hindustan Unilever down by 1.19%, Nestle down by 0.81% and Wipro down by 0.71% were the top losers.

Asian markets were trading in green; Taiwan Weighted strengthened 110.76 points or 0.64% to 17,518.72, Hang Seng increased 347.54 points or 1.2% to 29,230.00, KOSPI rose 16.92 points or 0.51% to 3,303.02, Straits Times advanced 2.23 points or 0.07% to 3,121.85, Shanghai Composite gained 34.89 points or 0.98% to 3,601.54, Jakarta Composite soared 44.74 points or 0.74% to 6,056.80 and Nikkei 225 surged 199.40 points or 0.69% to 29,074.63.