Benchmarks continue weak trade in morning session

Indian equity benchmarks continued their weak trade in the morning session tracking weak global trends. Unabated foreign fund outflows and selling in index majors Bajaj Finance, Bajaj Finserv and Wipro also played spoilsport. Sentiments remained down-beat with the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) Asia and Pacific Department’s Acting Director Anne-Marie Gulde-Wolf stating that the surge in oil prices due to the Ukrainian war has pushed up inflation in India, which needs monetary tightening and measures to address structural weaknesses to improve growth potential. Market participants overlooked Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman assured investors that the government will address any possible pain points to encourage investments in the country. Meanwhile, Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) has fixed the price band for its initial public offer (IPO) at Rs 902-949 a share. The issue, which will remain open for retail investors from May 4 to 9. On the global front, Asian markets are trading mostly in red echoing a broad decline on Wall Street and driven by worries about how the war in Ukraine may push prices for oil and other commodities higher.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 56946.40, down by 410.21 points or 0.72% after trading in a range of 56852.68 and 57079.03. There were 4 stocks advancing against 26 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in red; the BSE Mid cap index fell 0.99%, while Small cap index was down by 1.04%.

The top losing sectoral indices on the BSE were Metal down by 1.71%, IT down by 1.53%, Basic Materials down by 1.51%, TECK down by 1.37% and PSU down by 1.34%, while there were no gaining sectoral indices on the BSE.

The few gainers on the Sensex were Reliance Industries up by 1.36%, HDFC Bank up by 0.24%, HDFC up by 0.05% and Kotak Mahindra Bank up by 0.03%. On the flip side, Bajaj Finance down by 4.70%, Bajaj Finserv down by 2.73%, Wipro down by 2.24%, Titan Company down by 1.73% and Hindustan Unilever down by 1.70% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) Chairman J.B. Mohapatra has said the net direct tax collections (income tax and corporate tax) reached an all time high of Rs 14.09 lakh crore in financial year 2021-22 against Rs 9.45 lakh crore collections in FY 2020-21. He stated the net direct tax collection has increased by 49.02 per cent during financial year 2021-22, while it has registered a growth of 34.16 per cent in FY 2021-22 over the collections of 2019-20 when the net collection was Rs 10,50,680.56 crore, and a growth of 23.90 per cent over 2018-19 when the net collection was Rs 11,37,718.48 crore.

Further, he said the gross direct tax collection (before adjusting for refunds) for 2021-22 stood at Rs 16,34,454.95 crore compared to Rs 12,31,270.52 crore in 2020-21, thereby registering a growth of 32.75 per cent. He also said that the gross collection in 2021-22 has registered a growth of 32.42 per cent over the collections of 2019-20 when the gross collection was Rs 12,34,258.42 crore and a growth of 25.84 per cent over the collections of 2018-19 when the gross collection was Rs 12,98,797.32 crore.

During the last financial year, 2.43 crore refunds were issued compared to 2.37 crore in 2020-21 amounting to Rs 2,24,814 crore. This includes 2.01 crore refunds of AY 2021-22 itself due to faster processing of returns. More than 7.14 crore Income Tax Returns (ITRs) were filed for AY 2021-22 as on March 31, 2022 on the new e-filing portal, compared to 6.97 crore ITRs filed for AY 2020-21 till May 31, 2021 (extended last date of the preceding year) representing an increase of 2.4 per cent. Besides, he said that the tremendous growth in direct and indirect tax collections in the country indicates the strengthening of the Indian economy. He added a lot of reforms have been undertaken resulting in all these positive results.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 17056.70, down by 144.10 points or 0.84% after trading in a range of 17039.90 and 17110.70. There were 4 stocks advancing against 46 stocks declining on the index.

The few gainers on Nifty were Reliance Industries up by 1.39%, Hero MotoCorp up by 0.43%, HDFC Bank up by 0.10% and HDFC up by 0.03%. On the flip side, Bajaj Finance down by 4.70%, Hindalco down by 3.11%, Bajaj Finserv down by 2.84%, Wipro down by 2.35% and Coal India down by 2.12% were the top losers.

Asian markets are trading mostly in red; Nikkei 225 slipped 369.79 points or 1.38% to 26,330.32, Taiwan Weighted dropped 294.45 points or 1.77% to 16,350.34, Jakarta Composite lost 55.56 points or 0.77% to 7,176.59, KOSPI fell 34.94 points or 1.31% to 2,633.37 and Straits Times trembled 2.79 points or 0.08% to 3,319.26.

On the flip side, Shanghai Composite gained 10.98 points or 0.38% to 2,897.41 and Hang Seng increased 18.19 points or 0.09% to 19,952.90.