Markets continue weak trade; Sensex falls over 100 points

Following a positive start and subsequent retreat, Indian equity markets continued trading lower in the late morning session. The Sensex was down 109.01 points, while Nifty fell by 36.55 points. Investors remained hassled ahead of upcoming earnings report from domestically focused companies, despite of a good start to earnings season, as upcoming results for Indian companies such as top automaker Maruti Suzuki are likely to be uneven. Markets were waiting for some optimism from anticipated interest rate cuts, which is expected to revive an ailing economy. In currency markets, rupee depreciated against US currency on Thursday, due to month-end demand for dollar from oil importers. On sectoral front, FMCG, IT and TECk stocks were trading in green, while auto, realty and capital goods were trading in red. In global markets, most Asian shares traded lower, as investors were cautious ahead of manufacturing data from China, while a sharp slide in Apple Inc shares following its earnings report also capped demand. Back home, the market breadth favoring negative trend; there were 1,842 shares on the losing side against 596 shares on the gaining side while 99 shares remain unchanged.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 19,917.60 down by 109.01 points or 0.54% after trading in a range of 20,072.28 and 19,884.20. There were 9 stocks advancing against 21 declines on the index.

The broader indices were trading in red; the BSE Mid cap index was down by 1.77% and Small cap index was down by 1.64%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were FMCG up by 0.78%, IT up by 0.72% and TECk up by 0.05%. While, Realty down by 3.38%, Auto down by 3.04%, Capital Goods down by 1.58%, Power down by 1.21% and Health Care down by 1.06% were the top losers on the index.

The top gainers on the Sensex were ONGC up by 1.64%, TCS up by 1.30%, Hindustan Unilever up by 1.24% ITC up by 1.16%, and Wipro up by 1.05%.

On the flip side, Tata Motors was down by 7.29%, Gail India was down by 3.58%, Cipla was down by 2.28%, Mahindra & Mahindra was down by 2.20% and L&T was down by 2.19% were the top losers on the Sensex.

Meanwhile, to restructure the debt of the state power distribution companies, the Power Ministry will seek a budgetary financial support of Rs 1,200 crore from the Ministry of Finance, for 2013-14. In this regard, Power Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia will be meeting the state energy ministers on February 5, to bring them on board with the Centre's financial restructuring package plan to bailout the discoms.

Though the Power Ministry has now extended the last date for the states to apply for restructuring the loans of their respective electricity boards to March 31. The earlier date was December 31, 2012. The accumulated losses of discoms are estimated to be whopping Rs 2.46 lakh crore as on March 2012 and the same was pegged at around Rs 1.9 lakh crore till March 2011.

Back on, in September last year, the government had approved the scheme for restructuring of Rs 1.9 lakh crore (till March 2011) debt of State Electricity Boards, in which 50 percent of the short-term outstanding liabilities would be taken over by the state governments. While, the balance 50 percent loans would be restructured by providing moratorium on principle and best possible terms for repayments.

The S&P CNX Nifty is currently trading at 6,017.75 down by 36.55 points or 0.60% after trading in a range of 6,065.30 and 6,007.85. There were 14 stocks advancing against 36 declines on the index.

The top gainers of the Nifty were ONGC up by 1.61%, TCS up by 1.39%, HUL up by 1.30%, ITC up by 1.11% and Wipro up by 0.81%.

On the flip side, Tata Motors down by 7.63%, JP Associate down by 4.22%, GAIL down by 3.58%, IDFC down by 2.79% and Sesa Goa down by 2.25%, were the major losers on the index.

Most of the Asian equity indices were trading in the red; Shanghai Composite slipped 0.37%, Hang Seng dipped 0.26%, KOSPI Composite declined 0.84% and Taiwan Weighted was down by 0.62%.

On the flip side, Nikkei 225 surged 1.32% and Straits Times was up by 0.53%.

Stock markets in Indonesia and Malaysia remained close for the trade today.