After opening higher, Indian equity markets gave up all morning gains and slipped into negative territory in the late morning session due to some profit-booking. Meanwhile, government's decision to increase railway fares after a decade has improved market sentiments in the early morning trade, which was short-lived with Nifty sliding below the psychological 6,000 mark. The positive cues from Asian markets, on the back of China's better-than-expected December exports numbers was also not able to impact investors. In currency markets, rupee continued its upward journey against dollar on Thursday amid increasing capital inflows. On sectoral front, capital goods, power, healthcare and realty sectors added pressure on the markets, though gains in heavy weights like auto and oil and gas shares supported the market. In global markets, Asian stocks were trading mostly positive, with key indices in China, Hong Kong, Japan trading higher on better than expected Chinese economic data. Back home, the market breadth favoring negative trend; there were 1,169 shares on the gaining side against 1,331 shares on the losing side while 129 shares remain unchanged.
The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 19,653.87 down by 12.72 points or 0.06% after trading in a range of 19,783.75 and 19,653.64. There were 14 stocks advancing against 15 declines on the index and one remains unchanged.
The broader indices were also trading lower; the BSE Mid cap index was down by 0.23% and Small cap index was down by 0.22%.
The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were, Auto up by 0.80%, Oil & Gas up by 0.54%, PSU up by 0.50%, Consumer Durables up by 0.23% and Bankex up by 0.02% while, Capital Goods down by 0.94%, Power down by 0.44%, Health Care down by 0.36%, Realty down by 0.34% and FMCG down by 0.22% were the only losers on the index.
The top gainers on the Sensex were Tata Motors up by 2.72%, ONGC up by 2.02%, Coal India up by 1.43%, HDFC Bank up by 0.88%, Maruti Suzuki up by 0.75%.
On the flip side, BHEL was down by 1.88%, ICICI Bank was down by 1.32%, L&T was down by 1.21%, Sterlite Industries was down by 1.20% and HUL was down by 1.03% were the top losers on the Sensex.
Meanwhile, the government is expected to get over Rs 23,000 crore from levy of one-time spectrum fee on existing operators for holding radiowaves beyond a prescribed limit. The government in this regard has issued notices to telecom companies including Bharti Airtel, Vodafone and BSNL, MTNL, Aircel and Reliance Communications for the excess spectrum they hold beyond the prescribed limit.
To be more precise, the government is expected to get Rs 4,251.83 crore from retrospective charges, Rs 18,925.82 crore from prospective charges. In all Rs 23,977.65 crore is expected from levy of one-time spectrum fee.
State-owned BSNL will have to pay around Rs 6,912 crore, Bharti Airtel - Rs 5,201 crore, Vodafone - Rs 3,599 crore, MTNL - Rs 3,205 crore, Idea Cellular - Rs 2,113 crore (includes Rs 231.5 crore of Spice), Aircel - Rs 1,365 crore (includes Rs 14 crore of Dishnet), Loop Mobile - Rs 606 crore and Reliance Communications - Rs 173 crore.
Earlier, for pan-India operations, telecom firms were given 4.4 MHz spectrum with license for Rs 1,658 crore and later were permitted to get another 1.8 MHz on fulfillment of certain subscriber-base criteria. However, in November, the government decided that the telecom operators will have to pay charges for holding spectrum above 6.2 MHz retrospectively, for the period of July 2008 to January 1, 2013. For spectrum above 4.4 MHz, they would have to pay for the remaining period of their licences starting January 1, 2013.
The S&P CNX Nifty is currently trading at 5,968.35 up by 3.15 points or 0.05% after trading in a range of 6,005.15 and 5,968.05. There were 25 stocks advancing against 25 declines on the index.
The top gainers of the Nifty were Tata Motors up by 2.52%, HCL Tech up by 2.23%, ONGC up by 1.95%, Coal India up by 1.47% and Kotak Bank up by 1.36%.
On the flip side, BHEL down by 1.92%, ICICI Bank down by 1.35%, Ambuja Cements down by 1.12%, L&T down by 1.12% and Hindalco down by 1.06% were the major losers on the index.
Most of the Asian equity indices were trading in the green; Shanghai Composite rose 0.08%, Hang Seng surged 0.76%, Nikkei 225 soared 0.70%, Straits Times increased 0.16%, KOSPI Composite added 0.75% and Taiwan Weighted was up by 0.94%, while Jakarta Composite declined 0.39% and KLSE Composite was down by 0.05%.
