Markets trade tad higher in early deals; Metal index shines

Indian equity benchmarks made cautious start and are struggling for direction altering between gains and losses due to overnight fall on Wall Street and rise in crude oil prices. Now, markets are trading higher with marginal gains on account of value buying in stocks such as Hindalco, Tata Steel, HDFC Bank, Wipro. Foreign fund inflows aided the domestic sentiments. Foreign institutional investors (FII) turned net buyers for the first time in last 18 straight sessions, to the tune of Rs 211.06 crore worth shares on January 17, as per provisional data available on the NSE. Though, some cautiousness came in amid mixed cues from Asian peers with traders cautiously assessing recent economic data from across the globe and speculating about the policy stance of the Bank of Japan, which is expected to further shift away from its decade-long ultra-loose monetary policy. Besides, Taiwan market was shut for the Lunar New Year holiday. Meanwhile, Indian rupee opened lower against dollar in forex market. Indian rupee opened at 81.76 against dollar from its previous close of 81.69 on Tuesday, currently rupee is trading at 81.77 vs dollar.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 60727.26, up by 71.54 points or 0.12% after trading in a range of 60569.19 and 60763.00. There were 22 stocks advancing against 8 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index rose 0.10%, while Small cap index was up by 0.27%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Metal up by 1.58%, Industrials up by 0.48%, Telecom up by 0.35%, IT up by 0.30%, Capital Goods up by 0.28%, while Realty down by 0.67%, Utilities down by 0.20%, Auto down by 0.15%, Power down by 0.09% were the few losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Tata Steel up by 1.84%, Wipro up by 1.11%, HCL Technologies up by 1.00%, HDFC Bank up by 0.75% and Kotak Mahindra Bank up by 0.63%. On the flip side, Ultratech Cement down by 0.97%, Tata Motors down by 0.66%, Reliance Industries down by 0.64%, Mahindra & Mahindra down by 0.52% and ICICI Bank down by 0.50% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, SBI Research in its latest Ecowrap report has said that the upcoming Indian budget for 2023-24 will be a challenging one for the government to follow the roadmap for fiscal consolidation amidst a global environment of declining inflation. It said for India, this could make things difficult to set a nominal gross domestic product (GDP) number significantly higher than 10 per cent, with a deflator about 3.5 per cent. But this could also mean a higher GDP growth than anticipated at about 6.2 per cent. It added that fiscal deficit for FY24 is estimated at around Rs 17.95 lakh crore or 6.0% of GDP in FY24, thereby resulting in fiscal consolidation of 40 bps from the current fiscal.

As per the report, for FY23, total receipts of the Government would be higher than BE by around Rs 2.3 lakh crore, on account of higher direct tax receipts (around Rs 2.2 lakh crore), higher GST receipts (Rs 95,000 crore) but lower dividends (around Rs 40,000 crore), lower fuel tax net of cess (Rs 30,000 crore) and lower disinvestment receipts (around Rs 15000-20,000 crore). Meanwhile, expenditure is likely to be on the higher side of the BE by around Rs 3 lakh crore on account of higher subsidy bill and additional spending announced by the Government. Taking this into account, fiscal deficit of the Government in FY23 is expected to come at Rs 17.5 lakh crore. However, higher nominal GDP growth (15.4%) estimates will help in keeping the fiscal deficit at 6.4% of the GDP.

In FY24, it assumes the Government expenditure is likely to increase by around 8.2% over FY23 estimates to Rs 46.0 lakh crore. Subsidy bill which increased significantly in FY23 is estimated to be reduced in FY24 to around Rs 3.8-4.0 lakh crore and capital expenditure is expected to grow by 12%. Meanwhile, receipts (minus borrowing and other liabilities) are expected to grow by ~12.1% with tax revenue receipts growth likely at 11.0%. With nominal GDP growth at 10%, tax buoyancy is thus expected at close to 1.1 compared to expected tax buoyancy of 1.5 in FY23. It said as far as borrowing is concerned, it expects net market borrowing of the Centre in FY24 will be around Rs 11.7 lakh crore and with repayments of Rs 4.4 lakh crore, gross borrowing are expected at Rs 16.1 lakh crore.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 18079.45, up by 26.15 points or 0.14% after trading in a range of 18032.45 and 18090.55. There were 35 stocks advancing against 14 stocks declining, while 1 stock remain unchanged on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Hindalco up by 2.01%, Tata Steel up by 1.89%, SBI Life Insurance up by 1.24%, Wipro up by 1.08% and UPL up by 1.07%. On the flip side, HDFC Life Insurance down by 1.07%, Ultratech Cement down by 1.03%, Tata Motors down by 0.66%, Reliance Industries down by 0.65% and Eicher Motors down by 0.63% were the top losers.

Asian markets are trading mixed; Nikkei 225 surged 575.95 points or 2.2% to 26,714.63, Straits Times rose 14.19 points or 0.43% to 3,294.70. On the other hand, Jakarta Composite plunged 38.47 points or 0.57% to 6,728.87, Hang Seng declined 32.49 points or 0.15% to 21,545.15 KOSPI dropped 18.3 points or 0.77% to 2,361.09 and Shanghai Composite was down by 0.62 points or 0.02% to 3,223.62.