Benchmarks trade in green: Index heavyweights lead

The benchmarks traded in the positive territory in the late morning moving in a tight range as the Asian markets remained subdued. Traders seemed active in frontline stocks after the recent correction. The benchmarks may see some upmove in today's session but the near-term trend remains bearish on back of weakness in rupee and weak global cues. Sentiments got some support from fresh buying by participants, though selective, largely in line with a mixed trend on the other Asian bourses and overnight gains in the US stocks.

On the global front, most of the Asian equity indices were trading in red at this point of time led by Chinese Shanghai Composite which crumbled over a percent as investors continued selling on concerns about weak Chinese manufacturing data. Back home, the traders were seen piling up positions in Capital Goods, Health Care and Realty while selling was seen in IT and Consumer Durables sector.

In scrip specific actions, Hero MotoCorp surges after the country's largest two-wheeler maker reported a marginal increase in its total sales at 5, 57,890 units for May this year. Lakshmi Mills Company soared after the textile manufacturer reported a net profit of Rs 8.44 crore for the fourth quarter ended March 31, 2013. Tata Power gained after the company said its 50.4 MW wind energy project in Karnataka has been registered under the United Nation's clean development mechanism programme. Idea Cellular rose as the Aditya Birla group-owned company is in discussions with its second-largest shareholder, Axiata of Malaysia, for selling its towers to the Malaysian company, but the deal could get stuck over valuation of assets. Wipro zoomed, after the country's third-largest software exporter invested $5 million (Rs 28.3 crore) in Axeda, a US-based software solutions provider, for an undisclosed minority stake. Mahindra & Mahindra rallied after the company said its tractor sales rose 24.24 per cent to 23,626 units in May 2013, as compared to 19,016 units in the same period of previous year.

Meanwhile, the NSE Nifty and BSE Sensex were trading just above their psychological 5,950 and 19,000 levels respectively. The market breadth on BSE was showing positive trend with advances to declines in ratio of 1048: 530.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 19709.20, up by 98.72 points or 0.50% after trading in a range of 19742.70 and 19576.18. There were 21 stocks advancing against 9 declines on the index. The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index was up by 0.70% and Small cap index was up by 0.73%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were, Capital Goods up by 2.02%, Health Care up by 1.65%, Realty up by 0.99%, Oil & Gas up by 0.92% and Power up by 0.91% while, IT down by 0.36% and Consumer Durables down by 0.05%were the top losers on the BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were L&T up by 2.88%, Cipla up by 2.61%, Hero MotoCorp up by 1.88%, Dr Reddys Lab up by 1.75% and ICICI Bank up by 1.65%. On the flip side, TCS was down by 0.66%,  Infosys was down by 0.59%, Tata Motors was down by 0.19%, Maruti Suzuki was down by 0.18% and HDFC Bank was down by 0.12% were the only losers on the Sensex.

Meanwhile, Commerce and Industry Minister Anand Sharma said, although the government welcomes foreign direct investments (FDI) into the pharma sector but there are concerns that generic drugs market could be adversely hit if overseas players fully acquire local companies. Meanwhile, India allows 100 percent FDI through the automatic route in green-field projects while for brown-field projects; approval has to be sought from the government.

By adding further, Sharma said, only area of concern for the government is complete takeovers as pharma is a growing industry and we have to protect the domestic players particularly generics so that Indian pharmaceutical industry continue to grow.

India is one of the world's biggest markets for generic drugs and allows 100 percent FDI through automatic route in pharma green-field projects under automatic route. However, last year, the government had decided that all foreign investments in existing domestic pharma firms should be allowed only after clearance by the FIPB, amid mounting concerns over availability of affordable essential drugs in the wake of multinationals acquiring local companies.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 5,972.10 up by 32.80 points or 0.55% after trading in a range of 5,981.60 and 5,932.85. There were 38 stocks advancing against 12 declines on the index.

The top gainers of the Nifty were L&T up by 3.02%, Cipla up by 2.87%, Ranbaxy up by 2.15%, JP Associates up by 1.88% and DR Reddy up by 1.83%. On the flip side, TCS down by 0.64%, UltraTech Cement down by 0.56%, Infosys down by 0.49%, HCL Technologies down by 0.42%, and Sesagoa down by 0.22% were the major losers on the index.

Most of the Asian equity indices were trading in red; Shanghai Composite tumbled 26.60 points or 1.16% to 2,272.65, Hang Seng slipped 32.35 points or 0.15% to 22,249.84, Jakarta Composite dropped 18.96 points or 0.38% to 4,952.39, Straits Times declined 5.13 points or 0.16% to 3,284.80, KOSPI Composite contracted 3.26 points or 0.16% to 1,986.50 and Taiwan Weighted was down by 8.06 points or 0.10% to 8,192.96.

On the flip side, KLSE Composite rose 2.87points or 0.16% to 1,769.20 and Nikkei 225 was up by 258.76 points or 1.95% to 13,526.10.