Bourses trade at day’s low points in late afternoon session

Local equity benchmarks widened their losses and traded at day’s low points in late afternoon session. The broader indices, the BSE Mid cap index and Small cap index were also trading lower. Selling in IT stocks dragged the markets lower. Traders paid no heed towards Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal’ statement that India is on the path to become a $30 trillion economy in the next 30 years on the back strong GDP growth. Sector wise, defence sector remain in focused after minister of State for Defence Ajay Bhatt has said that India has received around Rs 494 crore of foreign direct investment (FDI) in the defence sector since revising the policy relating to it in September 2020. In the last few years, the government has taken a series of measures to boost domestic defence manufacturing.

On the global front, Asian markets were trading mostly in green amid investors braced for a busy week of earnings and economic data in the United States. European markets were trading mostly in red dragged down by disappointing earnings from Swiss banking giant UBS and wariness over an upcoming Federal Reserve policy decision.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 55,304.34, down by 461.88 points or 0.83% after trading in a range of 55295.90 and 55834.38. There were 9 stocks advancing against 21 stocks declining on the index, while 1 stock remain unchanged.

The broader indices were trading in red; the BSE Mid cap index declined 0.87%, while Small cap index was down by 0.80%.

The only gaining sectoral indices on the BSE was Energy up by 0.14%, while IT down by 2.31%, TECK down by 1.87%, Capital Goods down by 1.32%, Healthcare down by 0.94% and FMCG was down by 0.94% were the top losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Bajaj Finserv up by 5.70%, Bajaj Finance up by 1.16%, Ultratech Cement up by 0.79%, Asian Paints up by 0.78% and Reliance Industries up by 0.57%. On the flip side, Infosys down by 3.14%, Dr. Reddy's Lab down by 2.87%, Axis Bank down by 2.73%, Hindustan Unilever down by 2.11% and Larsen & Toubro down by 1.94% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, Minister of State for Finance Pankaj Chaudhary has said that the government’s interest payment increased to 3.1 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) to Rs 7.31 lakh crore in 2021-22. Earlier, interest paid on public debt during 2014-15 stood at 3.27 lakh crore or 2.6 per cent of the GDP. During 2014-15, the total central government liabilities stood at Rs 62.44 lakh crore or 50.1 per cent of GDP. He added that this increased to Rs 138.88 lakh crore or 58.7 per cent of GDP at the end of 2021-22.

He further said the Centre's debt is projected to hit 60.2 per cent of the GDP in the current fiscal to Rs 155.33 lakh crore. The combined state and central government liabilities increased from Rs 76.27 lakh crore (61.2 per cent of GDP) in 2014-15 to Rs 195.49 lakh crore (82.6 per cent of GDP).  As per the revised Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management (FRBM) Act the government would endeavour to ensure that the general government debt does not exceed 60 per cent of GDP and the Central Government debt does not exceed 40 per cent of GDP by the end of the financial year 2024-25.

He said in 2020-21, the Central Government debt increased by more than 9 percentage points of GDP over the previous year's debt mainly on account of the COVID-19 global pandemic, which hugely disrupted projections of the Government's public finances, including a contraction in GDP/denominator. The Government has announced its commitment to reduce the fiscal deficit to a level below 4.5 per cent of GDP by FY 2025-26. He noted that increasing the buoyancy of tax revenue through improved compliance, monetisation of assets, improving efficiency and effectiveness of public expenditure etc. are the important measures initiated by Government to control the fiscal deficit and the debt.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 16,490.95, down by 140.05 points or 0.84% after trading in a range of 16495.55 and 16636.10. There were 14 stocks advancing against 36 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Bajaj Finserv up by 5.63%, Asian Paints up by 1.41%, JSW Steel up by 1.40%, Bajaj Finance up by 1.25% and Ultratech Cement up by 0.96%. On the flip side, Infosys down by 3.27%, Dr. Reddy's Lab down by 2.87%, Axis Bank down by 2.66%, Hindustan Unilever down by 2.24% and Larsen & Toubro down by 2.00% were the top losers.

Asian markets were trading mostly in green, Hang Seng increased 342.94 points or 1.67% to 20,905.88, Shanghai Composite gained 27.05 points or 0.83% to 3,277.44, Jakarta Composite soared 13.13 points or 0.19% to 6,871.54, Straits Times advanced 10.90 points or 0.34% to 3,191.37, KOSPI rose 9.27 points or 0.39% to 2,412.96 and Nikkei 225 was down by 44.04 points or 0.16% to 27,655.21. On the flip side, Taiwan Weighted was down by 129.55 points or 0.87% to 14,806.78.

European markets were trading mostly in red, France’s CAC decreased 6.65 points or 0.11% to 6,230.90 and Germany’s DAX was down by 51.54 points or 0.39% to 13,158.78. On the flip side, UK’s FTSE 100 was up by 51.01 points or 0.7% to 7,357.31.