Benchmarks make a gap-up start; economic survey eyed

Benchmarks after making a gap up start although have withered mild gains, the trend remains to be positive after the previous session’s drubbing, on account of bargain buying, with firm overseas cues too aiding the trading sentiment back at D-street. After an optimistic start, Sensex and Nifty both seem to be nearing the 19,100 and 5,800 mark. Taking overnight cues from Wall Street, Asian shares have rebounded as the Federal Reserve reassured markets of its commitment to strong monetary stimulus, although bit of caution is witnessed on account of political gridlock in Italy. Back home, Realty, Capital Goods and Fast Moving Consumer Goods sector stocks have led the recovery. However, going further in the day, the markets will take cues from the economic survey to be tabled in Parliament, which is likely to have pointers to tomorrow’s much awaited Union Budget.

Meanwhile, in stock-specific action, most of the stocks, such as ONGC, Reliance Industries and L&T that pummeled yesterday, were up about 1 percent today. However, railway-related stocks, such as Kalindee Rail Nirman, Texmaco and Titagarh wagons, extended their somber run after the Railway Budget. The broader indices too were trading with some traction while, the market breadth on the BSE was positive; there were 1,013 shares on the gaining side against 650 shares on the losing side while 63 shares remain unchanged.

The BSE Sensex opened at 19,090.32; about 75 points higher compared to its previous closing of 19,015.14, and has touched a high and a low of 19,137.39 and 19,077.53 respectively.

The index is currently trading at 19,081.03, up by 65.89 points or 0.35%. There were 18 stocks advancing against 12 declines on the index.

The overall market breadth has made a strong start with 58.69% stocks advancing against 37.66% declines. The broader indices were trading in-line with benchmarks; the BSE Mid cap and Small cap indices rose by 0.31% and 0.32% respectively.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were, Realty up by 1.45%, Capital Goods up by 1.37%, FMCG up by 0.91%, Power up by 0.58% and Bankex up by 0.56% while, IT down by 0.79%, Auto down by 0.70%, Health Care down by 0.36% and TECk down by 0.19% were the losers on the index.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Bharti Airtel up by 3.61%, L&T up by 1.81%, HDFC up by 1.78%, BHEL up by 1.43% and RIL up by 1.16%.

On the flip side, Tata Motors was down by 2.02%, Gail India was down by 1.43%, ONGC was down by 1.34%, Dr Reddys Lab was down by 1.18% and Infosys was down by 1.17% were the top losers on the Sensex.

Meanwhile, the second round of the 2G spectrum auction sale is expected to set up a flop show as there is no applicant for GSM band of radiowaves. While, for CDMA band, Russian Sistema's Indian joint venture, Sistema Shyam Teleservices (SSTL) is the only firm at close of deadline on Monday for applying to take part in the auction. 

The government has planned to conduct auction for spectrum unsold in November auction along with spectrum that is held by operators whose licences are due for renewal in 2014. It will auction 15 MHz of radio waves each in Delhi and Mumbai in the 1800 Mhz band, currently used for 2G GSM services, as against 4.4 Mhz and 13.2 Mhz respectively released in these circles through quashed permits.

However, in the second round of auctions in March, the government is expected to get around Rs 25,316 crore from the auction in the premium 900 Mhz band, and Rs 14,579 crore from auction of unsold spectrum in the 1800 Mhz band, while for CDMA, it is expected to get over Rs 6463 crore.

The CNX Nifty opened at 5,784.90; about 23 points higher as compared to its previous closing of 5,761.35, and has touched a high and a low of 5,796.50 and 5,775.70 respectively.

The index is currently trading at 5,778.20, up by 16.85 points or 0.23%. There were 30 stocks advancing against 20 declines on the index.

The top gainers of the Nifty were Bharti Airtel up by 3.13%, HDFC up by 2.05%, L&T up by 1.96%, JP Associate up by 1.90% and DLF up by 1.71%.

On the flip side, Ranbaxy down by 3.65%, Tata Motors down by 1.92%, GAIL down by 1.60%, HCL Tech down by 1.53% and ONGC down by 1.34%, were the major losers on the index.

Most of the Asian equity indices were trading in the green; Shanghai Composite rose 7.81 points or 0.34% to 2,301.15, Hang Seng surged 104.40 points or 0.46% to 22,624.09, Jakarta Composite strengthened 26.59 points or 0.57% to 4,689.62, KLSE Composite added 1.65 points or 0.10% to 1,625.83, Straits Times jumped 7.39 points or 0.23% to 3,261.65, KOSPI Composite increased 4.94 points or 0.25% to 2,004.95 and Taiwan Weighted was up by 19.62 points or 0.25% to 7,900.52.

On the flip side, Nikkei 225 was down by 57.47 points or 0.51% to 11,341.20.