Bourses continue to show sluggish trend in morning deals

Mirroring weak global cues, Indian equity benchmarks continued to show a sluggish trend in morning session, with Sensex and Nifty trading below their psychological levels of 59,350 and 17,700, respectively. The mood on the street remained cautious as India Ratings has cuts India's FY23 GDP growth forecast to 6.9 per cent from 7 per cent, joining other institutions who have cut their projections to below 7 per cent since the release of the April-June quarter GDP data. Despite private final consumption expenditure (PFCE) and gross fixed capital formation (GFCF) growth coming in better than its expectations in Q1, the agency expects the slowdown in the growth of government final consumption expenditure (GFCE) and worsening of net exports to weigh on the FY23 GDP growth. Some concern also came as Global Rating agency Moody’s said India’s rated infrastructure firms can largely withstand further depreciation in the value of rupee against US dollar due to financial hedges and other mitigants. Traders overlooked Union Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas Hardeep Singh Puri’s statement that the country is on the path to becoming a 10 trillion-dollar economy in 2030 and the third largest economy in the world by 2047.

On the global front, Asian markets are trading in red as investors braced for a U.S. rate hike next week amid growing concerns of a global recession following warnings from the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. Back home, telecom stocks remained in watch as Union Minister for Communications, Electronics and Information Technology, Ashwini Vaishnaw said telecom Sector in the country will witness more reforms in coming years and the industry too will have to do its bit and reciprocate by improving the quality of service significantly.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 59311.99, down by 622.02 points or 1.04% after trading in a range of 59154.73 and 59720.56. There were 3 stocks advancing against 27 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 0.69%.

The top losing sectoral indices on the BSE were IT down by 1.76%, TECK down by 1.64%, Auto down by 1.55%, Basic Materials down by 1.21% and Metal down by 1.16%, while there were no gaining sectoral indices on the BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Indusind Bank up by 2.37%, Sun Pharma up by 0.84% and Titan Company up by 0.32%. On the flip side, Tech Mahindra down by 2.90%, Mahindra & Mahindra down by 2.41%, TCS down by 2.08%, Ultratech Cement down by 1.96% and Wipro down by 1.87% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, Union Minister for Communications, Electronics and Information Technology, Ashwini Vaishnaw has said telecom Sector in the country will witness more reforms in coming years and the industry too will have to do its bit and reciprocate by improving the quality of service significantly.

He stated ‘Service quality parameters have to be significantly increased, and the Telecom Department should approach the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) in this regard. Telecom Department should send a new consultation paper to TRAI for significantly increasing the quality-of-service parameters almost making it 3X or 4X of what it is today.’

Further, he said that the journey of 5G is going to be very exciting and noted that many countries took multiple years to reach 40 per cent to 50 per cent coverage adding that the government is targeting a very aggressive timeline and has given a target of 80 per cent coverage in the short time frame.
He added the industry including Telecom Operators and Infrastructure Providers to move full steam ahead on improving quality of services in the country, now that a slew of reforms had been announced and more were lined up. Initiatives cannot be one-sided, and the equation has to be reciprocal.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 17683.45, down by 193.95 points or 1.08% after trading in a range of 17642.80 and 17820.05. There were 5 stocks advancing against 45 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Indusind Bank up by 2.43%, Cipla up by 1.65%, Sun Pharma up by 0.85%, Titan Co up by 0.30% and SBI Life Insurance up by 0.08%. On the flip side, Tata Consumer Product down by 3.57%, Hero MotoCorp down by 3.04%, Tech Mahindra down by 2.98%, Mahindra & Mahindra down by 2.44% and Tata Motors down by 2.26% were the top losers.

All the Asian markets are trading in red; Hang Seng decreased 80.25 points or 0.42% to 18,850.13, Jakarta Composite lost 122.75 points or 1.68% to 7,182.85, Nikkei 225 slipped 287.66 points or 1.03% to 27,588.25, Taiwan Weighted dropped 117.75 points or 0.8% to 14,552.29, Straits Times trembled 1.78 points or 0.05% to 3,266.20, KOSPI fell 22.79 points or 0.95% to 2,379.04 and Shanghai Composite declined 30.78 points or 0.96% to 3,169.14.