Sensex, Nifty continue to trade in green

Indian benchmarks have continued to trade in the green holding on to their gains through the late morning session. On the global front, Asian markets were trading mostly in the red as sentiments got dented on the back of weaker than expected economic data from China which added worries about global growth, hitting shares of commodity producers. The Chinese purchasing managers’ index fell to 50.6 in April from an 11-month high in March of 50.9. A reading above 50 indicates expansion; below indicates contraction.

Back home, the traders were seen piling up positions in IT, Teck and Bankex, while selling was seen in FMCG and Oil & Gas sector. In scrip specific actions, Bharti Airtel, India's biggest mobile carrier was trading in green despite reporting disappointing numbers for the fourth quarter ending March 31, 2013.M&M surges after April sales rose 2 per cent year-on-year. Rate sensitive stocks such as State Bank of India gained on hopes that the Reserve Bank of India will cut rates by at least 25 basis points tomorrow. Tata Motors dropped after April sales declined 15 per cent year-on-year in April. The stock was the biggest loser on the Nifty. TVS Motor Company dropped on weak April sales. The company's total sales fell 5.3% to 1.65 lakh in April 2013 over April 2012. Total two-wheeler sales fell 6.4% to 1.60 lakh in April 2013 over April 2012. Exports fell 2.5% to 21,714 units.

Meanwhile, the NSE Nifty and BSE Sensex were trading just above their psychological 5,950 and 19,500 levels respectively. The market breadth on BSE was showing positive trend with advances to declines in ratio of 1015: 575.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 19599.70, up by 95.52 points or 0.49% after trading in a range of 19616.04 and 19451.26. There were 19 stocks advancing against 11 declines on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index was up by 0.68% and Small cap index was up by 0.90%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were, IT up by 1.82%, Teck up by 1.41%, Bankex up by 1.02%, Realty up by 0.84% and Consumer Durables up by 0.75% and while, FMCG down by 0.40% and Oil & Gas down by 0.01% were the losers on the BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were TCS up by 2.02%, SBI up by 1.91%, HDFC up by 1.86%, Infosys up by 1.62%, and Mahindra & Mahindra up by 1.51%. On the flip side, Bharti Airtel was down by 1.43%, Tata Motors was down by 1.40%, Gail India was down by 1.31% , Hindustan Unilever was down by 0.96%, and ITC was down by 0.85% were the top losers on the Sensex.

Meanwhile, the growth in the eight core industries' slowed marginally down to 2.9% in March as against 3% in the same month last year reflecting a slowdown in the economy. For the entire fiscal April- March 2013, the core industries growth slipped to a decade low of 2.6 % compared to 5% in 2011-12 mainly on account of declining output of crude oil and natural gas.

The eight industries - crude oil, petroleum refinery products, natural gas, fertilisers, coal, electricity, cement and finished steel - have a weightage of 37.9% in the overall Index of Industrial Production (IIP).

The marginal decline in growth in March was on account of negative growth witnessed in the production of natural gas and low growth recorded in the production of coal and crude oil. The production of natural gas contracted by 17.7 % in March, while, coal and crude oil output growth dropped to 0.3 % and 0.2 % from 7.3 % and (-) 2.9 % in March 2012. Moreover, cement production growth slowed to 6.6 % in the reported period, as against 7.1 % in March 2012.

On the other hand, petroleum refinery, fertiliser and steel production grew by 5.6 %, 3.6 % and 6.6 % in March 2013, as against 1.6 %, 1.5 % and 6.2 %, respectively, in the year-ago period. Electricity generation grew marginally to 3% growth in March 2013 compared to its 2.8 per cent growth in the same month of previous year. 

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 5,961.10 up by 30.90 points or 0.52% after trading in a range of 5,965.70 and 5,910.95. There were 37 stocks advancing against 13 declines on the index.

The top gainers of the Nifty were TCS up by 2.35%, M&M up by 1.94%, Reliance Infrastructure up by 1.87%, Infosys up by 1.85% and IDFC up by 1.67%. On the flip side, Tata Motors down by 1.50%, Hindustan Unilever down by 1.33%, Gail down by 1.22%, Bharti Airtel down by 1.05% and Cairn down by 1.01% were the major losers on the index.

Most of the Asian equity indices were trading in red; Shanghai Composite declined 4.57 points or 0.21% to 2,173.34, Hang Seng slipped 102.94 points or 0.45% to 22,634.07, Jakarta Composite dropped 13.84 points or 0.27% to 5,047.08, KLSE Composite decreased 4.04 points or 0.24% to 1,713.61, Nikkei 225 contracted 136.32 points or 0.99% to 13,663.03 and KOSPI Composite was down by 7.79 points or 0.41% to 1,955.86.

On the flip side, Straits Times added 26.16 points or 0.77% to 3,394.48 and Taiwan Weighted was up by 40.56 points or 0.50% to 8,134.22.