Benchmarks erase losses to trade flat in morning deals

Indian equity benchmarks erased initial losses to trade flat in morning deals, as traders await more of financial results from India Inc for domestic cues. Traders remained cautious as the finance ministry in its Monthly Economic Review for March said that India’s economy continues to be robust, but downside risks such as rising crude oil prices, adverse weather conditions, and the global banking crisis outweigh the upside potential in gross domestic product (GDP) growth in the current financial year (FY24). However, losses remain capped as traders took some support with Deepak Sood, Secretary General at ASSOCHAM stating that private investment is picking up in sectors like infrastructure, green energy and electronics. He also said quicker execution of the projects in the railways, ports, airports and highways, as was witnessed in 2022-23, would make a difference in creating a positive spiral for the private investment to crowd in.

On the global front, Asian markets are trading mostly in red following the broadly negative cues from Wall Street overnight amid renewed concerns about turmoil in the banking sector. Back home, tea industry stocks remained in watch as leading planters' body, Indian Tea Association (ITA), is making a fresh pitch for a floor price for tea in the wake of an adverse impact of unfavourable weather conditions on the crop and stagnating auction prices.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 60123.78, down by 6.93 points or 0.01% after trading in a range of 59954.91 and 60187.28. There were 19 stocks advancing against 11 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index was up by 0.06%, while Small cap index up by 0.36%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Realty up by 0.89%, Telecom up by 0.73%, Capital Goods up by 0.48%, IT up by 0.43% and Industrials up by 0.36%, while Metal down by 0.95%, Oil & Gas down by 0.53%, Energy down by 0.38%, Bankex down by 0.13% and PSU down by 0.09% were the top losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Power Grid Corporation up by 1.07%, Axis Bank up by 0.76%, TCS up by 0.71%, Tata Motors up by 0.64% and Larsen & Toubro up by 0.61%. On the flip side, Bajaj Finance down by 0.82%, Kotak Mahindra Bank down by 0.70%, Reliance Industries down by 0.65%, Bajaj Finserv down by 0.64% and NTPC down by 0.44% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, the finance ministry has said personal income tax as a percentage of Gross domestic product (GDP) has gone up from 2.11 per cent in 2014-15 to 2.94 per cent in 2021-22 fiscal, indicating that taxpayer base is widening as a result of the steps taken by the present government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.  The personal income tax collection (including Securities Transaction Tax) increased to over Rs 6.96 lakh crore, from over Rs 2.65 lakh crore in 2014-15.

The ministry said Introduction of new data sources in Statement of Financial Transactions (SFT) like dividend and interest; securities; mutual funds and information from GSTN in recent years has led to 1,118 per cent increase in reported information. This has resulted in addition of information of about 3 crore persons.

Moreover, it said introduction of new tax deducted at source (TDS) codes, which have almost doubled from 36 to 65 in last eight years, led to increase in total reported transaction in FY 2021-22 to 144 crore as compared to the number of reported transactions in FY 2015-16 of 70 crore. This has resulted in doubling of the number of unique deductees from 4.8 crore (in 2015-16) to 9.2 crore (in 2021-22).

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 17764.90, down by 4.35 points or 0.02% after trading in a range of 17711.20 and 17776.00. There were 28 stocks advancing against 22 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Eicher Motors up by 1.56%, Adani Enterprises up by 1.18%, Power Grid Corporation up by 1.09%, Larsen & Toubro up by 0.87% and Axis Bank up by 0.75%. On the flip side, Hindalco down by 1.43%, JSW Steel down by 0.99%, Adani Ports &SEZ down by 0.93%, Kotak Mahindra Bank down by 0.77% and Coal India down by 0.69% were the top losers.

Asian markets are trading mostly in red; Taiwan Weighted lost 26.08 points or 0.17% to 15,344.65, Shanghai Composite weakened 10.18 points or 0.31% to 3,254.69, KOSPI dropped 2.61 points or 0.1% to 2,486.41, Straits Times fell 3.17 points or 0.1% to 3,293.39 and Nikkei 225 slipped 192.97 points or 0.67% to 28,427.10.

On the flip side, Hang Seng advanced 116.07 points or 0.59% to 19,733.95 and Jakarta Composite gained 38.95 points or 0.57% to 6,860.76.