Benchmarks start special trading session marginally in green on Saturday

Indian equity benchmarks started a special trading session marginally in green on Saturday tracking mostly positive cues from Wall Street overnight. The National Stock Exchange (NSE), and the BSE are conducting a special, two-part session today, to evaluate their disaster preparedness in the event of major disruptions. Trading volume, however, may remain thin as price bands have been lowered to 5 per cent for most stocks. Some support came in as India’s foreign exchange reserves climbed for the second consecutive week, reaching a peak of $644.15 billion as of May 10, according to data released by the central bank. Traders also take note of 16th Finance Commission chairperson Arvind Panagariya’s statement that India could become the third largest economy by 2026-27 if it continues to grow at the current pace in the forthcoming years, though it is more likely in 2027-28.

However, upside remained capped as foreign portfolio investors (FPI) have pulled out $3.5 billion from India’s equity markets so far this month. The selling comes on the back of election-induced volatility and the rotation of flows from India to China, where stocks are available at half the valuations. On the sectoral front, pharma stocks are in focus with a private report that Indian pharmaceutical companies are a critical player in supplying affordable generic medicines to the US market, with 47 per cent of all generic prescriptions being supplied by Indian companies in 2022. In stock specific development, GPT Infraprojects hits 52-week high on strong Q4 results.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 74036.72, up by 119.69 points or 0.16% after trading in a range of 73921.46 and 74075.04. There were 26 stocks advancing against 4 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index rose 0.63%, while Small cap index was up by 0.87%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Realty up by 1.06%, Industrials up by 1.06%, PSU up by 0.99%, Capital Goods up by 0.91% and Oil & Gas up by 0.58%, while there was no loser on the BSE sectoral front.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Power Grid up by 0.94%, Nestle up by 0.65%, Indusind Bank up by 0.62%, Asian Paints up by 0.47% and Tata Steel up by 0.45%. On the flip side, JSW Steel down by 1.54%, Axis Bank down by 0.25%, ICICI Bank down by 0.15% and ITC down by 0.06% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, expressing optimism over India’s growth prospects, 16th Finance Commission Chairman Arvind Panagariya has said that the country could become the third largest economy globally by 2027-28 if the country continues the growth momentum witnessed in the last two decades. He also said that during the last two decades, beginning 2003-4, India has ended extreme poverty. The extreme poverty, currently, is not more than 3 percent of the total population.

He said there is a problem of under-employment in the agriculture sector as a large portion of the workforce is engaged in the segment, and there is a need to move them out of the vertical to industry for faster urbanisation. He said ‘A large part of the workforce in agriculture has to move to industrial or services economy, and that is the pathway to transformation’. Currently, 45 percent of India's workforce is employed in agriculture and the sector contributes 15 percent of GDP. This means the average productivity in agriculture is one-third the average productivity in the economy.

About growth, Panagariya said in the last two decades, starting 2003-04, India has grown at about 8 percent in real GDP in US dollar terms. In nominal terms, the GDP growth has been 10.2 percent in the past 20 years. He said ‘A lot of what we have today has transpired in the last two decades. During this period, we dealt with the global financial crisis and COVID shocks. It is that growth, which has put us in the fifth spot in international GDP ranking in dollar terms’. India, with a GDP of roughly $3.4 trillion, is currently the fifth largest economy in the world, after the US, China, Germany and Japan.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 22512.05, up by 45.95 points or 0.20% after trading in a range of 22495.70 and 22519.85. There were 44 stocks advancing against 5 stocks declining, while 1 stock remain unchanged on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Power Grid up by 1.13%, ONGC up by 0.92%, Nestle up by 0.91%, Hindalco up by 0.78% and Hero MotoCorp up by 0.73%. On the flip side, JSW Steel down by 1.61%, Divi's Lab down by 0.38%, Axis Bank down by 0.22%, ICICI Bank down by 0.11% and Eicher Motors down by 0.03% were the top losers.