Indian equity enlarges losses; Nifty holds 6,000 mark

Indian equity markets enlarged the losses in the late afternoon session on account of selling in front line blue chip counters and taking cues from the weakness in the European counterparts. The sentiments on the street turned pessimistic with the benchmarks dropping to the intra-days low after a trade ministry official stated that the country’s April trade deficit leapt to $17.8 billion, on a massive surge in imports of cheaper gold that will increase concerns about the current account deficit (CAD) in Asia’s third largest economy. The release of retail inflation which slipped to 9.39% in April month provided no support to the market. Investors are now eyeing the wholesale price index (WPI) data for April 2013, slated to be released tomorrow i.e. May 14, 2013. Traders were seen selling FMCG, Capital Goods and Metal sector stocks.  In scrip specific development, Bank of Baroda was trading in red after the bank’s Q4 net dropped 32% on account of higher provisions.

On the global front, the Asian markets were trading mostly in red, while the European markets were too were trading on pessimistic note. Back home, the NSE Nifty and BSE Sensex were trading below their psychological 6,050 and 19,800 levels respectively. The market breadth on BSE was negative in the ratio of 769:1419, while 105 scrips remain unchanged.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 19,775.50, down by 346.82 points or 1.72% after trading in a range of 20,109.08 and 19,762.22. There were no gainers while all 30 stocks declined on the index.

The broader indices too have declined further; the BSE Mid cap index and Small cap index were trading lower by 1.06% and 0.79% respectively.

There were no sectoral indices in green on the BSE, while FMCG down by 3.11%, Capital Goods down by 2.13%, Metal down by 1.77%, TECK down by 1.74% and IT down by 1.53% were the top losers.

The top losers on the Sensex were, ITC down by 5.22%, Bharti Airtel down by 3.52%, Gail India down by 2.69%, Tata Steel down by 2.49% and BHEL down by 2.45%, while there were no gainers on the Sensex.

Meanwhile, in order to provide adequate capital for the road projects, the parliamentary panel has asked the road transport ministry to seek enhancement of gross budgetary support in mid-term review of 12th Plan as a cut in allocation will hit projects. The road ministry has projected requirement of Rs 2,64,080 crore for the 12th Five Year Plan (2012-17), while the total gross budgetary support (GBS) outlay provided to the sector for the period stood at around Rs 1,44,769 crore.

The panel was of the view that inadequate fund allocation will certainly deter the Ministry in taking up the new projects/schemes envisaged for the 12th plan period. On the other hand, the road ministry is expected to drop major road projects like connectivity to 50 minor ports, connectivity to 24 airports owing to the reduction in allocation. Further, the ministry also objected to only Rs 6,400 crore allotments for works of National Highways (NH) against a requirement of Rs 37,540 crore for the 12th Plan period, considering the length of roads taken up for improvement under the scheme.  

This reduced allocation for national highway will affect the plan adversely and ultimately result in diversion of cess towards development of non-NHDP projects from National Highways Development Project (NHDP). Expressing concern over this, the panel said that such diversions of cess meant for NHDP projects has been taking place for the last three years which is alarming. Therefore it asked the ministry to take up the enhancements of GBS, so that new road projects and schemes apart from ongoing ones do not suffer.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 6,003.80, down by 103.45 points or 1.69% after trading in a range of 6,104.95 and 6,000.70. There were 2 stocks advancing against 48 declines on the index.

The top gainers of the Nifty were Asian Paints up by 0.46% and NTPC up by 0.03%. On the flip side, ITC down by 5.15%, Bharti Airtel down by 3.81%, Relaince Infrastructure down by 3.23%, Ranbaxy down by 2.77% and BHEL down by 2.75% were the major losers on the index.

Most of the Asian equity indices were trading in red; Shanghai Composite declined 0.22%, Hang Seng tumbled 1.42%, Jakarta Composite dropped 1.36%, Straits Times slipped 0.30% and Taiwan Weighted was down by 0.39%.

On the flip side, KLSE Composite rose 0.91%, Nikkei 225 was up by 1.20% and KOSPI Composite surged by 0.20%. 

The European markets were trading in red; France’s CAC 40 was down 0.19%, Germany’s DAX lost 0.39% and United Kingdom’s FTSE 100 edged lower by 0.24%.