Key gauges continue to trade in red in morning trade

Indian equity benchmarks continued to trade in red in morning trade on the back of persistent selling pressure in IT, Banking and TECK shares amid weakness across global markets. Traders also remained cautious with Rating agency Crisil’s statement that States' indebtedness will remain high this fiscal at 33 per cent, which is only a notch below the record high of 34 per cent of their gross domestic products in FY21, as tax buoyancy will be offset by higher revenue expenditure and capital outlays. Traders overlooked Rating agency Standard & Poor’s (S&P) latest outlook on Asia Pacific stating that high-frequency indicators suggest a strong rebound during the July-September quarter after a steep contraction in activity in the previous three months on the back of a severe Covid-19 wave. Meanwhile, the government has again extended the existing foreign trade policy (FTP) for another six months till March 31 next year. Earlier, it had extended the FTP (2015-20) until September 30 this year due to the COVID-19 crisis.

On the global front, Asian markets were trading mostly in red following the broadly negative cues overnight from Wall Street and the China power crisis that drastically hit Toyota's production and supply chain. Back home, on the sectoral front, stocks related to gems and jewellery sector remained in focus as the Gem and Jewellery Export Promotion Council (GJEPC) said gems and jewellery exports rose to a record Rs 24,239.81 crore in August on strong demand for the coming festive season and the removal of entry restrictions. The overall gems and jewellery exports stood at Rs 13,160.24 crore in August 2020 while in August 2019 the total shipments stood at Rs 20,793.80 crore.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 59220.45, down by 447.15 points or 0.75% after trading in a range of 59148.73 and 59419.01. There were 8 stocks advancing against 22 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index was up by 0.36%, while Small cap index up by 0.07%.

The gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Utilities up by 3.66%, Power up by 3.24%, PSU up by 2.26%, Oil & Gas up by 1.00%, Metal up by 0.95% while, IT down by 1.18%, Bankex down by 1.06%, TECK down by 1.03%, Auto down by 0.61%, Consumer Disc down by 0.36% were the losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were NTPC up by 7.81%, Power Grid Corp up by 3.48%, Dr. Reddy's Lab up by 0.78%, Bajaj Finance up by 0.39% and Mahindra & Mahindra up by 0.34%. On the flip side, Tech Mahindra down by 1.94%, ICICI Bank down by 1.89%, Ultratech Cement down by 1.59%, HDFC Bank down by 1.45% and Infosys down by 1.34% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal has said that all efforts and measures to reduce compliance burden by means of simplification, elimination and decriminalisation of several laws can have a transformative impact and multiplier effect on ease of doing business. He said reduction of compliance burden is about trust in every business, person and citizen.

Goyal has stated that in the last seven years, several such measures have been taken due to which there is an improvement in competitiveness, innovation, and ease of doing business. To reduce these burdens, he said that every ministry, department and states were asked to conduct a comprehensive review of compliances under their purview to understand their relevance and rationale and undertake a complete process re-engineering to eliminate burdensome compliances.

The objective set for this comprehensive exercise was to improve ease of living and ease of doing business by simplifying, rationalizing, digitizing and decriminalizing government to business and citizen interfaces across all ministries/departments and states/UTs. This is being done by a four-pronged strategy, including elimination of compliance burden, digitization: creation of online interfaces and decriminalisation of certain laws.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 17646.55, down by 102.05 points or 0.57% after trading in a range of 17608.15 and 17689.30. There were 19 stocks advancing against 31 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Coal India up by 10.00%, NTPC up by 7.77%, Indian Oil Corp. up by 3.25%, Power Grid Corporation up by 3.07% and ONGC up by 1.69%. On the flip side, ICICI Bank down by 1.90%, Ultratech Cement down by 1.69%, Tech Mahindra down by 1.68%, HDFC Bank down by 1.42% and Wipro down by 1.38% were the top losers.

Asian markets were trading mostly in red; Nikkei 225 slipped 638.99 points or 2.12% to 29,544.97, Taiwan Weighted dropped 307.07 points or 1.79% to 16,874.37, Hang Seng decreased 110.61 points or 0.45% to 24,389.78, Shanghai Composite declined 1.79 points or 3573.52% to 64.62 and KOSPI fell 1.53 points or 3055.5% to 47.26.

On the flip side, Jakarta Composite soared 0.31 points or 6100.83% to 19.19 and Straits Times advanced 1.37 points or 0.04% to 3,079.06.