Sluggish trend continues on street

In line with Asian peers, Indian bourses continued to trade under pressure in noon session with Sensex and Nifty trading down by 561 and 144 points respectively. Sentiments were fragile as SBI Business Activity Index declined to 101 as on January 17 from 109 in the week ended January 10. The latest reading, even as the country is in the midst of the third wave of the pandemic, is the lowest since November 15. Selling further crept in as a top WHO official said that it is not possible to end the COVID-19 virus as such viruses never go away and end up becoming part of the ecosystem, but asserted that it is possible to end this year the public health emergency caused by COVID-19 with a collaborative approach to fix inherent inequities in the system.

On the global front, Asian markets were trading lower pressured by the negative cues from Wall Street overnight for the Omicron coronavirus infection world-wide is rising in an alarming rate. Back on street, the overall market breadth on BSE was in the favour of declines which thumped advances in the ratio of 1904:1404; while 97 shares remained unchanged.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 60193.21, down by 561.65 points or 0.92% after trading in a range of 60148.77 and 60870.17. There were 3 stocks advancing against 26 stocks declining, while 1 stock remain unchanged on the index.

The broader indices were trading in red; the BSE Mid cap index lost 0.60%, while Small cap index was down by 0.22%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Oil & Gas up by 0.51%, Metal up by 0.45%, Capital Goods up by 0.26%, Utilities up by 0.19% and PSU was up by 0.19%, while IT down by 1.62%, TECK down by 1.42%, Bankex down by 0.79%, Telecom down by 0.67% and Healthcare was down by 0.66% were the top losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Tata Steel up by 0.75%, Mahindra & Mahindra up by 0.29%, Nestle up by 0.14% and Reliance Industries was up by 0.00%. On the flip side, Asian Paints down by 2.75%, Ultratech Cement down by 2.36%, Infosys down by 1.89%, Hindustan Unilever down by 1.83% and Bajaj Finance was down by 1.82% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) has held a meeting with different stakeholders, including domestic and foreign companies, on the proposed e-commerce policy. Various participants called for a clear and exclusive definition of the e-commerce marketplace and distinction from web stores that are just electronic versions of retail stores in order to avoid any conflict of interest leading to discriminatory and anti-competitive business practices.

They also urged that the government should support companies to expand export using e-commerce. Issues like lack of level-playing field between online and offline retailers were also raised. On the other hand, E-commerce companies highlighted that they were running various programmes that are enabling lakhs of small businesses to go digital.

Some participants said marketplaces or their affiliated entities must not have economic participation, directly or indirectly, through equity or otherwise in any seller on the platform. They also urged that the marketplace entity must not provide any discriminatory treatment to seller, customer, logistic provider, or payment provider.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 17968.30, down by 144.75 points or 0.80% after trading in a range of 17941.70 and 18129.20. There were 14 stocks advancing against 36 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were ONGC up by 2.75%, Coal India up by 2.11%, Tata Motors up by 1.18%, Hero MotoCorp up by 1.09% and UPL was up by 1.09%. On the flip side, Asian Paints down by 2.78%, Shree Cement down by 2.45%, Ultratech Cement down by 2.33%, Adani Ports down by 2.23% and Grasim Industries was down by 2.02% were the top losers.

All Asian markets were trading lower; KOSPI fell 21.36 points or 0.75% to 2,842.88, Hang Seng decreased 86.97 points or 0.36% to 24,025.81, Nikkei 225 slipped 790.02 points or 2.8% to 27,467.23, Taiwan Weighted dropped 151.18 points or 0.82% to 18,227.46, Jakarta Composite lost 4.43 points or 0.07% to 6,609.63, Shanghai Composite declined 22.86 points or 0.64% to 3,547.05 and Straits Times was down by 0.65 points or 0.02% to 3,279.39.