Benchmarks remain in green in morning deals

Indian equity benchmarks remained in green in morning deals, led by gains in Realty, IT and TECK stocks. Sentiments remained positive with ICRA Executive Vice President and Chief Ratings Officer K Ravichandran’ statement that the PLI scheme is expected to attract investments of Rs 3-4 trillion in the next four years and generate 200,000 jobs as large projects in sectors, including semiconductor, solar module and pharmaceutical intermediaries, are expected to take off. He said that going ahead private sector capex is expected to pick up in oil and gas, metals and mining, hospitals, healthcare and cement sectors. Traders took a note of data showing that the Consumer Price Index (CPI) based retail inflation continued its downward slide to reach 12-month low of 4.75 per cent in May as compared to 4.83 per cent in April 2024, due to a marginal decline of prices in the food basket. On the global front, Asian markets are trading mostly in green as traders reacted to soft U.S. inflation data that helped ease concerns about the outlook for interest rates. The US Fed also left interest rates unchanged as widely expected and revealed officials now expect only one interest rate cut this year. 

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 76832.88, up by 226.31 points or 0.30% after trading in a range of 76777.77 and 77145.46. There were 23 stocks advancing against 7 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices ended in green; the BSE Mid cap index rose 0.64%, while Small cap index was up by 0.59%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Realty up by 2.11%, IT up by 1.18%, TECK up by 0.79%, Industrials up by 0.73% and Consumer Durables up by 0.66%, while FMCG down by 0.39% and Utilities down by 0.09% were the top losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Tech Mahindra up by 1.44%, Wipro up by 1.36%, HCL Technologies up by 1.08%, Titan Company up by 1.08% and TCS up by 1.06%. On the flip side, Hindustan Unilever down by 1.41%, Power Grid Corporation down by 0.60%, ICICI Bank down by 0.55%, JSW Steel down by 0.47% and Maruti Suzuki down by 0.38% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, remaining within the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) comfort zone, the Consumer Price Index (CPI) based retail inflation continued its downward slide to reach 12-month low of 4.75 per cent in May as compared to 4.83 per cent in April 2024, due to a marginal decline of prices in the food basket. The Consumer Price Index (CPI) based retail inflation - on a declining trend since January - was 4.31 per cent in May 2023 (the previous low). The government has tasked the Reserve Bank to ensure the CPI inflation remains at 4 per cent with a margin of 2 per cent on either side.

The National Statistical Office (NSO), Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI) in its data has showed that Rural CPI (General) in May 2024 stood at 5.28 per cent over 5.43 per cent in April 2024. The Urban CPI (General) stood at 4.15 per cent in May as against 4.11 per cent in April. The index value for Rural, Urban and Combined CPI (General) stood at 189.3, 185.6 and 187.6 respectively, in May 2024. The price data are collected from selected 1114 urban Markets and 1181 villages covering all States/ UTs through personal visits by field staff of Field Operations Division of NSO, MoSPI on a weekly roster.

Inflation in the food basket stood at 8.69 per cent in May, marginally down from 8.70 per cent in April. The inflation rate for vegetables moderated marginally to 27.3 per cent on a yearly basis as against 27.8 per cent in April. For cereals and Pulses, which constitute a significant portion of India's staple diet, the inflation rate came in at 8.69 per cent and 17.14 per cent respectively. The Fuel and light inflation rate for May contracted to 3.83 per cent as against a contraction of 4.24 per cent in April. For clothing & footwear and housing sectors the inflation rates were 2.74 per cent and 2.56 per cent, respectively.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 23390.00, up by 67.05 points or 0.29% after trading in a range of 23364.05 and 23481.05. There were 35 stocks advancing against 15 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Divi's Lab up by 3.14%, HDFC Life Insurance up by 2.61%, LTIMindtree up by 1.82%, Tech Mahindra up by 1.52% and Shriram Finance up by 1.46%. On the flip side, Hindustan Unilever down by 1.40%, Tata Consumer Product down by 1.34%, Eicher Motors down by 0.84%, Bajaj Auto down by 0.64% and Power Grid Corporation down by 0.59% were the top losers.

Asian markets are trading mostly in green; Hang Seng advanced 96.58 points or 0.54% to 18,034.42, Jakarta Composite gained 22.12 points or 0.32% to 6,872.22, Straits Times rose 13.74 points or 0.42% to 3,321.18, KOSPI increased 40.52 points or 1.49% to 2,768.69 and Taiwan Weighted added 254.47 points or 1.15% to 22,303.43.

On the flip side, Nikkei 225 slipped 32.68 points or 0.08% to 38,844.03 and Shanghai Composite weakened 9.19 points or 0.3% to 3,028.28.