Key gauges continue to trade flat in morning deals

Indian equity benchmarks continued to trade flat in morning deals amid a largely weak trend in other Asian markets and rising crude oil prices. Traders remained cautious as Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal said the ongoing global uncertainty and recessionary trends could have some implications on India's exports. However, traders took some support as the finance ministry in its latest report stated that India is well placed to grow at a ‘moderately brisk rate’ in the coming years on the back of macroeconomic stability, despite global monetary tightening. It further said inflationary pressures will ease in the coming months with the arrival of kharif crops and at the same time job opportunities will increase with improvement in business prospects. Meanwhile, exchange data showed Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) turned buyers as they bought shares worth Rs 1,231.98 crore on Thursday.

On the global front, Asian markets are trading mostly in red despite the broadly positive cues from European markets overnight, as traders largely refrained from making significant moves amid a lack of fresh triggers with the U.S. market remaining closed for Thanksgiving Day. Back home, stocks related to steel industry remained in focus as Union Minister Faggan Singh Kulaste said duty-related measures taken by the government will boost the business sentiments of the domestic steel industry. Six months after the imposition of the export duty on May 21, the government has removed the levy on steel items to nil with effect from November 19, 2022.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 62182.79, down by 89.89 points or 0.14% after trading in a range of 62123.84 and 62447.73. There were 11 stocks advancing against 19 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index rose 0.69%, while Small cap index was up by 0.63%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were PSU up by 0.97%, Realty up by 0.84%, Capital Goods up by 0.84%, Industrials up by 0.77% and Auto up by 0.47%, while FMCG down by 0.53%, Power down by 0.38%, TECK down by 0.38%, IT down by 0.32% and Utilities down by 0.29% were the top losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Larsen & Toubro up by 1.46%, Indusind Bank up by 1.37%, Axis Bank up by 0.90%, Ultratech Cement up by 0.88% and Maruti Suzuki up by 0.87%. On the flip side, Nestle down by 1.05%, Hindustan Unilever down by 0.90%, Power Grid Corporation down by 0.75%, Asian Paints down by 0.73% and Kotak Mahindra Bank down by 0.67% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, Chief Economic Advisor (CEA) V Anantha Nageswaran has expressed hope that the Indian economy will maintain the trend growth rate of 6.5 per cent and above for the rest of the years in the current decade. He said the economy will close the current fiscal logging in a growth of 6.5-7 per cent, citing the projections of private sector analysts, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and international agencies like OECD and the IMF.

He mentioned ‘This appears to be reasonable at this point in time although we will get the data on the fiscal second quarter in a few days, which will give more clarity on these numbers. By and large, the projections for FY24 coming from international agencies is converging around 6-6.2 per cent.’

Besides, citing the high credit growth which peaked at 18 per cent in October, he said the prospects for the capex cycle return is imminent in the medium term. He based his optimism on a slew of factors like rising capital formation by way of better and healthier balance-sheets of the banking sector, highly deleveraged corporate sector and the capacity utilisation levels reaching the levels which in the past had triggered capex. According to him, the private sector capex in the first half of the current fiscal has already crossed the Rs 3 lakh crore-mark and if the pace continues, 'we should be looking at Rs 6 lakh crore for this year'.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 18486.65, up by 2.55 points or 0.01% after trading in a range of 18445.10 and 18533.15. There were 23 stocks advancing against 26 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were HDFC Life Insurance up by 1.72%, Larsen & Toubro up by 1.65%, Indusind Bank up by 1.44%, BPCL up by 1.26% and Coal India up by 1.01%. On the flip side, Tata Consumer Product down by 1.10%, Hindustan Unilever down by 0.97%, Nestle down by 0.74%, Asian Paints down by 0.72% and ITC down by 0.65% were the top losers.

Asian markets are trading mostly in red; Nikkei 225 slipped 100.34 points or 0.35% to 28,282.75, Straits Times fell 15.95 points or 0.49% to 3,236.93, Hang Seng plunged 152.04 points or 0.86% to 17,508.86, KOSPI declined 0.59 points or 0.02% to 2,440.74, Jakarta Composite was down by 45.92 points or 0.65% to 7,034.60 and Taiwan Weighted added 1.38 points or 0.01% to 14,782.62. On the other hand, Shanghai Composite was up by 12.12 points or 0.39% to 3,101.43.