Benchmarks pare gains; IT, TECk leads

Indian benchmark share indices gave up their early gains but were still trading up in the late morning session. On the global front the Asian equity indices were trading on mixed note. Back home, the traders were seen piling up position in IT, TECk and Health Care while selling was seen in Oil & Gas, PSU and Capital Goods sector. Shares of State Bank of India gained on reports that the government has approved fund infusion of 30.04 billion rupees for the state-run lender. Union Bank of India gained after the bank’s board approved raising additional capital funds not exceeding Rs 1,500 crore during the year 2012-13 by way of issue of Tier I and Tier II capital bonds as per eligibility. Shares of Glenmark Pharmaceuticals (GPL) touched 52-week high on reporting that Glenmark Pharmaceuticals S.A., a subsidiary of GPL, has signed a deal with Forest Laboratories Inc of the US to develop inhibitors to treat chronic inflammatory conditions, including pain. Lanco Infratech jumped after the company stated that the Supreme Court of Australia pronounced a judgment in favour of Griffin Coal Mining Company, a subsidiary of the company. NMDC was trading in green after the steel ministry stated that company has signed a memorandum of understanding with Indian Railways. The NSE Nifty and BSE Sensex were managing to hold their psychological 5,850 and 19200 levels respectively. The market breadth on BSE was positive, in the ratio of 1111:942.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 19283.13 up by 41.13 points or 0.21% after trading in a range of 19347.64 and 19261.66. There were 22 stocks advancing against 8 declines on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index was up by 0.17% and Small cap index was up by 0.36%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were, IT up by 0. 94%, TECk up by 0.86%, Health Care up by 0.62%, FMCG up by 0.44% and Realty up by 0.40%. While, Oil & Gas down by 0.56%, PSU down by 0.20%, Capital Goods down by 0.16% and Bankex down by 0.16% were the only losers on the index.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Sun Pharma up by 1.32%, Hindustan Unilever up by 1.22%, Infosys up by 1.20%, Bajaj Auto up by 1.09% and Sterlite Industries up by 0.98%.  On the flip side, ONGC was down by 1.88%, Maruti Suzuki was down by 1.26%, RIL was down by 0.60%, Tata Motors was down by 0.37% and Jindal Steel was down by 0.36% were the top losers on the Sensex.

Meanwhile, Chief Economic Advisor Raghuram Rajan has said that to achieve the revised fiscal deficit target of 5.3 percent of GDP, government needs to take more painful decisions and the diesel price hike and cut in subsidised LPG cylinders  are only the preliminary steps to keep the subsidy bill under check. Though he said that we are moving in the right direction with a cap of cylinders and increase in the diesel prices are in right direction but need to do more to bring the subsidy down to 2 percent of the GDP.

The government's subsidy bill is likely to go up substantially in the 2012-13 fiscal from the estimated at around Rs 1.80 lakh crore on the account of domestic and global factors. The government has already sought an additional Rs 28,500 crore from Parliament towards the fuel subsidy.

Rajan further stated that the government can check the subsidies target in a better way through the cash transfer schemes and India can achieve 6 percent GDP growth in the second half of the current fiscal. He added that the investments have slowed down across the economy and to push the economy, all the investments which are stalled need to be on track and keep going for new investments.

The S&P CNX Nifty is currently trading at 5,854.35 up by 6.65 points or 0.11% after trading in a range of 5,871.90 and 5,848.30. There were 29 stocks advancing against 21 declines on the index.

The top gainers of the Nifty were BPCL up by 2.04%, Sun Pharma up by 1.41%, HUL up by 1.15%, Bajaj Auto up by 1.02% and DLF up by 1.00%.

On the flip side, ONGC down by 1.91%, Ultra Cement down by 1.36%, Maruti Suzuki down by 1.35%, Reliance down by 0.83% and Bank of Baroda down by 0.75%, were the major losers on the index.

The Asian equity indices were trading on mixed note; Shanghai Composite surged 10.40 points or 0.48% to 2,163.71, Hang Seng rose 34.89 points or 0.16% to 22,541.18 and KOSPI Composite moved up 2.21 points or 0.11% to 1,982.63. 

On the flip side, KLSE Composite declined 2.87points or 0.17% to 1,667.73, Straits Times was down by 1.59 points or 0.05% to 3,161.97 and Taiwan Weighted was down 6.79 points or 0.09% to 7,533.35. .

Japanese and Indonesian markets remain closed on Monday for public holidays.