Benchmarks gain for fourth straight day; Nifty recaptures 5,900 mark

 The enthusiasm in Indian stock markets just doesn’t seem to be waning any time soon as buying momentum remained intact for the fourth session in a row, taking the benchmark equity indices to the highest levels seen in more than last two weeks. The frontline indices surged by about one and a half percent in the session and re-captured psychological 19,650 (Sensex) and 5,900 (Nifty) levels buoyed by firm global cues. Sentiments also got some boost after leading global brokerage house Goldman Sachs, in a recent report, said it expects the benchmark index Nifty to hit the 7,000 mark by the end of this year. Goldman Sachs is overweight on markets where they see a favorable growth ‘deltas’ and where valuations are still attractive, such as China, India, Korea and Singapore.

Markets picked up the pace tailing firm opening in European counters. Markets in Europe traded firmly in early deals with investors anticipating a stronger US jobs figure reading, while unprecedented central bank monetary policy support kept equities around multi-year highs. Meanwhile, Asian markets ended the session largely in the positive led by Japanese Nikkei which edged higher by over two and a half percent on optimism that aggressive easing will soon be adopted by the Bank of Japan’s new leadership.

Back home, sentiments got buttressed after Moody’s Analytics, an arm of the global ratings agency Moody’s forecasted that India’s economic growth in 2013 will be 6.2% from 5.1% in 2012. It said that the worst may be over for the Indian economy with December quarter likely the bottom of the economic cycle. Rally in banking stocks too aided the sentiments as stocks like Axis Bank, ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank, SBI, PNB, Union Bank and Yes Bank all edged higher on hopes of rate-cut in RBI’s upcoming policy meet.

Some support also came in from rally in stocks of state-run up-stream and down-stream companies like ONGC, Oil India, BPCL, HPCL and Indian Oil Corporation after the Indian government sought parliament’s approval to spend an additional Rs 24,774 crore on oil subsidies in the current fiscal year that ends in March. Sentiments also got some boost after Aviation stocks flied higher as the government decided to replace the present Director General of Civil Aviation with more powerful Civil Aviation Authority. Additionally, steel shares rose after the Minister of Steel, Beni Prasad Verma on March 7, 2013, said that the Supreme Court has permitted some mines in Karnataka to reopen.

The NSE’s 50-share broadly followed index Nifty gained by over eighty points to end way above its psychological 5,900 support level, while Bombay Stock Exchange’s Sensitive Index - Sensex rose by about two hundred and seventy to finish over its psychological 19,650 mark. Moreover, the broader markets too traded with traction and snapped the session with a gain of over half a percent.

The overall volumes stood at over Rs 1.70 lakh crore, which remained on the higher side as compared to that on Thursday. The market breadth remained in favor of advances as there were 1,730 shares on the gaining side against 1,138 shares on the losing side while 108 shares remain unchanged.

Finally, the BSE Sensex surged 269.69 points or 1.39% to settle at 19,683.23, while the CNX Nifty jumped by 82.40 points or 1.41% to end at 5,945.70.

The BSE Sensex touched a high and a low of 19,706.03 and 19,477.61, respectively. The BSE Mid cap index up by 0.72% and Small cap index was up by 0.68%.

The top gainers on the Sensex were, Jindal Steel up by 5.73%, HDFC up 4.04%, GAIL up 2.91%, HDFC Bank up 2.44% and Tata Steel up 2.36%, while Maruti Suzuki down by 1.64%, Infosys down by 1.15%, Wipro down by 0.91%, Tata Motors down 0.72% and TCS down by 0.40% were the top losers on the index.

The top gainers on the BSE Sectoral space were, Oil & Gas up 2.00%, FMCG up 1.93%, Metal up 1.77%, Bankex up 1.72% and Capital Goods up 1.57%, while IT down by 0.69% and TECk down 0.36% were top losers on the sectoral space.

Meanwhile, though surging current account deficit is a big problem for now, Planning Commission Montek Singh Ahluwalia believes that India has all the requirements to return to a GDP growth rate of 8-percent in the coming years. While addressing an event he said, ‘India has averaged 7.5% growth in the last 10 years. It should have done that for 15 years but it is possible to bring it back to the average performance of the last decade. The target for 2013-14 is 6.5-7% and then accelerate further.

As per Ahluwalia, economic growth is important but that growth should be inclusive and sustainable. By adding further he said that in recent years, India has posted high economic growth, but it was not an inclusive growth and the latest data indicates that the pace of poverty reduction has increased. For the current fiscal, the economy is expected to grow by a little over 5 percent, but it is not a big disaster as the whole world is experiencing a slowing of growth, he added.

On the global scenario, Ahluwalia said, the current state of the economy is challenging, but the global financial system appears to be stabilizing. The focus of government policy is to attract the foreign investment and with the recovery of global economy, the country will re-assure foreign investors as India is a good bet for foreign investment. India has the human resources in place and an expanding private sector, the only problem is the current account deficit, which needs to be contained.

The CNX Nifty touched a high and a low of 5,952.85 and 5,883.00 respectively. 

The top gainers on the Nifty were Jindal Steel up by 5.70%, IDFC up 4.22%, HDFC up 3.96%, Siemens up 3.55% and BPCL up by 3.42%.

On the flip side, the top losers of the index were, Maruti Suzuki down by 1.29%, Infosys down by 1.13%, Wipro down by 1.08%, Ambuja Cement down by 1.05% and Tata Motors down by 0.69%.

The European markets were trading in green, France’s CAC 40 up by 0.82%, United Kingdom’s FTSE 100 up by 0.33% and Germany’s DAX up by 0.55%.

Most Asian markets ended firm on Friday, following upbeat economic data from the US. However, some markets backed out from higher levels and turned a bit subdued with a part of investors treading cautiously at higher levels. Japan’s Nikkei went home with green mark as the yen continued its downward trend and by fairly encouraging economic reports, which witnessed GDP growth rose at 0.2% in Q4, boosted market sentiments.