Benchmarks trade lower in early deals

Indian equity benchmarks made cautious start on Wednesday tracking overnight losses on Wall Street as well as broadly weak cues from Asian counterparts weighed down by concerns about the health of the US banking sector and broader economy after the downward revision in the ratings of ten smaller and midsize US banks by Moody's, with warning that six big banks might be downgraded as well. Domestic markets soon march towards southward and extend their losses to trade with cut of around 0.35-0.45% in early deals. Investors are keeping close eye on the ongoing monetary policy meeting of the Reserve Bank of India. There are expectations that the rate setting panel will keep the repo rates steady, but adopt a hawkish tone amid rising vegetable prices. 

Persistent foreign fund outflows weighed down on the sentiments. Provisional data from the National Stock Exchange (NSE) showed foreign institutional investors (FII) offloaded shares worth Rs 711.34 crore on August 8. Traders were also concerned with a private report indicating that India's retail inflation likely accelerated to 6.40% in July on surging food prices, breaching the upper end of the Reserve Bank of India's 2%-6% tolerance band for the first time in five months. In stock specific development, Lupin gained after receiving approval from the U.S. health regulator for its abbreviated new drug application for Fluocinolone Acetonide Oil, 0.01% (Body Oil).

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 65558.39, down by 288.11 points or 0.44% after trading in a range of 65538.86 and 65810.96. There were 9 stocks advancing against 21 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading mixed; the BSE Mid cap index fell 0.21%, while Small cap index was up by 0.24%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Metal up by 0.58%, Healthcare up by 0.58%, Consumer Durables up by 0.43%, Telecom up by 0.27% and Utilities up by 0.04%, while Realty down by 0.90%, Bankex down by 0.57%, FMCG down by 0.42%, Capital Goods down by 0.41% and Auto down by 0.35% were the top losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Bharti Airtel up by 0.76%, Mahindra & Mahindra up by 0.69%, Tech Mahindra up by 0.56%, JSW Steel up by 0.49% and Titan Company up by 0.27%. On the flip side, HCL Technologies down by 1.05%, ICICI Bank down by 1.03%, Maruti Suzuki down by 0.97%, ITC down by 0.90% and TCS down by 0.87% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, expressing optimism over India’s growth potential, Sanjeev Sanyal, Member of the Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister, has said the country should be confident enough to deconstruct the rest of the world on its own terms as a rising economic power, creating global norms and benchmarks in various fields. He said India should no longer be bound by benchmarks that are decided by third parties, and in which the country has no role in framing.

Sanyal said ‘for the very first time, an Indian rating agency will assign sovereign ratings to the rest of the world... This is an important thing for us as a rising economic power to get used to doing. All this while, we allowed other people to deconstruct us; it’s time we get confident enough to deconstruct the rest of the world on our terms’. He said the country also needs to come up with global norms in various other fields like medical benchmarks and Environmental, Social & Governance (ESG) standards.

He further said ‘our political leadership is visible...but we need to begin to create more institutional systems... like our own ESG norms, sovereign ratings, global benchmarks for technology and regulations’. He also took umbrage over the way in which countries like India are ranked in other global indices and benchmarks. He added there are other kinds of ratings, too, where these are completely off kilter... for example you will see India, the world’s largest democracy, is placed 102 or 106 or some such absurd ranking in the ‘democracy index’. Similar is the case with the ‘freedom of speech index’ or the ‘happiness index’.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 19504.10, down by 66.75 points or 0.34% after trading in a range of 19498.20 and 19581.80. There were 18 stocks advancing against 32 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Dr. Reddy's Lab up by 2.83%, Coal India up by 1.98%, SBI Life Insurance up by 1.17%, Adani Ports & SEZ up by 1.09% and HDFC Life Insurance up by 0.78%. On the flip side, Hero MotoCorp down by 1.27%, Divi's Lab down by 1.15%, HCL Technologies down by 1.10%, Maruti Suzuki down by 1.01% and ICICI Bank down by 0.95% were the top losers.

Asian markets are trading mostly in red; Nikkei 225 slipped 190.16 points or 0.59% to 32,187.13, Taiwan Weighted lost 25.12 points or 0.15% to 16,851.95, Hang Seng declined 15.01 points or 0.08% to 19,169.16 and Shanghai Composite weakened 11.6 points or 0.36% to 3,249.02. However, KOSPI increased 35.00 points or 1.34% to 2,608.98 and Jakarta Composite was up by 25.57 points or 0.37% to 6,894.38.