Sensex, Nifty continue to trade in green

Indian benchmarks- Sensex, Nifty extended gain in the late morning session on sustained buying on optimism of RBI easing monetary policy next month amid a firming global trend. On the global most of the Asian counters were trading in the green at this point of time led by Nikkei which topping 10,000 points for the first time since April amid hopes that Bank of Japan will resort to additional monetary easing. Back home, the traders were seen piling up position in Auto, Consumer Durables and Metal, while selling was seen in Capital Goods sector. Eros International Media surged after the promoter, Eros Worldwide FZ LLC, has announced an Offer for Sale of 25.73 lakh equity shares of the company. ONGC soared after the oil minister stated that Rosneft has invited ONGC Videsh to participate jointly in the exploration of two blocks in Russia. Mahindra & Mahindra Financial Services was trading in green after the company stated its board will meet on Friday, 21 December 2012, to consider a proposal for sub-division of equity shares. The NSE Nifty and BSE Sensex were managing to hold their psychological 5,900 and 19400 levels respectively. The market breadth on BSE was positive, in the ratio of 1386:818.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 19467.17 up by 102.42 points or 0.53% after trading in a range of 19516.02 and 19429.08. There were 24 stocks advancing against 6 declines on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index was up by 0.57% and Small cap index was up by 0.46%. The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were, Auto up by 1.70%, Consumer Durables up by 1.35%, Metal up by 1.13%, Realty up by 1.11%, and Oil & Gas up by 1.01%. While, Capital Goods down by 0.06% was lone loser on the index.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Tata Motors up by 2.57%, Bajaj Auto up by 2.18%, Maruti Suzuki up by 2.18%, ONGC up by 1.85%, and Sun Pharma up by 1.77%.

On the flip side, HDFC was down by 1.33%, ICICI Bank was down by 0.86%, NTPC was down by 0.48% , L&T was down by 0.42%  and Hindustan Unilever was down by 0.24% were the top losers on the Sensex.

Meanwhile, Commenting on Reserve Bank’s mid-quarter monetary policy review, Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia has emphasized on lowering of interest rates to boost economic growth which is beginning to look up after moderating to 5.4 per cent in the first half of the current fiscal. However, during March 2012, Finance Ministry had projected a growth rate of 7.6 per cent for the current fiscal.

As the fiscal deficit declines, the resources which are flowing into the financing of fiscal deficit, will flow back into the economy. Further, Ahluwalia added that deceleration in growth has bottomed out and the second half would be better and as the RBI has chosen to keep all the key rates and ratios unchanged in its policy review unveiled, but have decided not to take any action. By adding further the Deputy Chairman said that the government is taking steps to promote infrastructure sector projects.

The S&P CNX Nifty is currently trading at 5,924.80 up by 28.00 points or 0.47% after trading in a range of 5,939.40 and 5,917.00. There were 39 stocks advancing against 11 declines on the index.

The top gainers of the Nifty were Bajaj-Auto up by 2.53%, Tata Motors up by 2.45%, Maruti Suzuki up by 2.37%, IDFC up by 2.30% and ONGC up by 1.97%.

On the flip side, HDFC down by 1.67%, ICICI Bank down by 1.01%, Power Grid down by 0.56%, NTPC down by 0.55%, and Cairn down by 0.47%, were the major losers on the index.

Most of the Asian equity indices were trading in green; Hang Seng rose 143.36 points or 0.64% to 22,638.09, KLSE Composite added 2.61 points or 0.16% to 1,662.05, Straits Times was up by 5.73 points or 0.18% to 3,163.99, Nikkei 225 surged 178.45 points or 1.80% to 10,100.75, and Taiwan Weighted was up by 13.59 points or 0.18% to 7,657.52.

On the flip side, Shanghai Composite declined 3.82 points or 0.18% to 2,158.65 and Jakarta Composite slipped 21.15 points or 0.49% to 4,280.29.

KOSPI Composite remained closed today.