Indian benchmarks trade choppy in early deals

Indian equity indices have made a choppy start on Monday and are trading slightly in red tailing sluggish global cues. Most of the Asian equity indices were trading in red at this point of time as ongoing tensions on the Korean peninsula weighed on sentiment while, the US markets suffered decline on Friday on getting weaker monthly jobs data. Back home, foreign institutional investors (FIIs) have sold Indian shares for three straight days after buying over $10 billion so far this year. The selling comes amid worries about the domestic economy and on lingering concerns about political stability.

Though, the losses remain capped as market-men got some support with Chief Economic Advisor Raghuram G Rajan’s statement expressing optimism of the economy growing by over 6 percent during the current fiscal. Meanwhile, stocks from power sector traded firmly on Finance Minister P Chidambaram’s statement that the Cabinet will take a view on price pooling of coal to address the fuel supply issue. He also said that price pooling may assist in addressing the supply of fuel in a reasonably satisfactory manner. On the sectoral front, public sector undertaking witnessed the maximum gain in trade followed by oil and gas and power while, software, capital goods and technology remained the top losers on the BSE sectoral space. The broader indices were outperforming benchmarks while, the market breadth on the BSE was negative; there were 750 shares on the gaining side against 541 shares on the losing side while 68 shares remain unchanged.

The BSE Sensex opened at 18,455.80; about 5 points higher compared to its previous closing of 18,450.23, and has touched a high and a low of 18,504.48 and 18,426.61 respectively.

The index is currently trading at 18,443.92, down by 6.31 points or 0.03%. There were 19 stocks advancing against 11 declines on the index.

The overall market breadth has made a strong start with 56.60% stocks advancing against 38.96% declines. The broader indices were outperforming benchmarks; the BSE Mid cap and Small cap indices were up by 0.25% and 0.36% respectively. 

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were, PSU up by 0.40%, Oil & Gas up by 0.38%, Power up by 0.37%, Auto up by 0.32% and Realty up by 0.14% while, IT down by 0.65%, Capital Goods down by 0.43%, Teck down by 0.41%, FMCG down by 0.34% and Metal down by 0.12% were the only losers on the sectoral index.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Cipla up by 1.48%, Bajaj Auto up by 1.46%, Tata Motors up by 0.94%, Tata Steel up by 0.70% and Bharti Airtel up by 0.70%.

On the flip side, Jindal Steel was down by 1.54%, Maruti Suzuki was down by 1.33%, TCS was down by 1.30%, Wipro was down by 1.12% and ITC was down by 1.08% were the top losers on the Sensex.

Meanwhile, regretting that economic policies designed to promote growth have been implemented without considering their full environmental consequences, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said, economic growth should be based on optimal use of natural resources and development must be environmentally sustainable. Normally economic policies are often designed on the assumption that these consequences would either take care of themselves or could be dealt with separately.

While addressing an event, Singh said, ‘India’s commitment to planned economic development reflects the government’s determination to improve the economic conditions of people and an affirmation of the role of the government in bringing about this outcome through a variety of social, economic, and institutional initiatives.’

However, as the economy develops rapidly, it gives rise to many new challenges like scarcity of natural resources. As a result, it is important to decide how to use scarce resources optimally, both from the economic development and the sustainability perspectives.

By adding further, he said the environmental degradation is manifesting itself through the loss of fertile soils, desertification, decreasing forest cover, reduction of fresh water availability, and an extreme loss of bio-diversity, so it has become clear that economic development should be environmentally sustainable. Moreover, through planned economic development, India aims to attain economic growth and poverty alleviation.

The CNX Nifty opened at 5,550.50; about 3 points lower as compared to its previous closing of 5,553.25, and has touched a high and a low of 5,569.20 and 5,544.90 respectively.

The index is currently trading at 5,549.50, down by 3.75 points or 0.07%. There were 26 stocks advancing against 24 declines on the index.

The top gainers of the Nifty were Reliance Infrastructure up by 1.71%, Ambuja Cements up by 1.64%, Cipla up by 1.33%, Bajaj-Auto up by 1.16% and UltraTech Cement up by 1.04%.

On the flip side, Ranbaxy down by 2.30%, Jindal Steel & Power down by 1.76%, Maruti Suzuki down by 1.37%, TCS down by 1.10% and ITC down by 1.08%, were the major losers on the index.

Most of the Asian equity indices were trading in red; Shanghai Composite declined 16.23 points or 0.73% to 2,209.07, Jakarta Composite dropped 33.76 points or 0.69% to 4,892.31, Straits Times slipped 2.45 points or 0.07% to 3,297.33, KOSPI Composite declined 4.25 points or 0.22% to 1,922.98 and Taiwan Weighted was down by 165.85 points or 2.09% to 7,776.50.

On the flip side, Hang Seng rose 23.76 points or 0.11% to 21,750.66, KLSE Composite increased 1.67 points or 0.10% to 1,690.32 and Nikkei 225 was up by 312.48 points or 2.43% to 13,146.12.