Post Session;Quick Review

After facing a decline in the last session, Indian equity markets once again managed to resume their northbound journey largely on the back of bargain hunting. Though, consolidation remained the theme of the session, given that benchmarks managed to negotiate just about flattish yet positive close. Gains at D-street also crept in after some investors seeing the recent global equity sell-off as overdone cautiously bought back into the market, amidst expectation that Fed will not cut the pace of bond purchases at the meeting which ends late on Wednesday. Thus, by the close of trade, benchmarks Sensex and Nifty eked out slender gains, to end past psychological 19200 and 5800 levels respectively. While, Sensex faced stiff resistance at 19250 level, widely followed index, Nifty, found great support around 5800 level. Meanwhile, the session clearly belonged to broader indices, which went home with gains of around half a percent.

However, the gains at D-street remained largely limited on account of mixed trend of global markets, due to mounting anxiety for clarity on the US Federal Reserve's next policy step. While, Asian pacific shares mostly ended lower, European counterparts edged higher on Wednesday, as investors look to the US Federal Reserve for clues on how soon it may start to scale back its stimulus programme.

Closer home, it was basically last minute buying which aided bourses in shaving off all their losses. Much of the support was rendered by stocks belonging to Consumer Durables, Metal and Oil & Gas counters, which outperformed rest of the index pivotal on BSE. Besides, stocks from Aviation and Telecom also gained traction. These stocks rallied after a key panel led by economic affairs secretary Arvind Mayaram reportedly called for hiking the foreign investment caps in nearly all sectors, including defence and telecom, and permitting automatic approval to proposals entailing 49% foreign equity infusion. Meanwhile, telecom stocks also rang loud after TRAI had allowed telecom service providers the option of either charging a flat upfront fee or rates set by TRAI, for roaming services. In scrip-specific action, IDFC and Religare rallied on plan for going for a banking license. On the flip side, stocks from Auto, Power and Health Care counters kept the gains under check.  The market breadth on the BSE remained positive; advances and declining stocks were in a ratio of 1260:1106, while 153 scrips remained unchanged. (Provisional)

The BSE Sensex gained 13.90 points or 0.07% to settle at 19237.18.The index touched a high and a low of 19274.26 and 19100.13 respectively. Among the 30-share Sensex pack, 15 stocks gained, while 15 stocks declined. (Provisional) 

The BSE Mid cap and Small cap indices ended higher by 0.53% and 0.49% respectively. (Provisional)

On the BSE Sectoral front, Consumer Durables up by 2.11%, Metal up by 1.26%, Oil & Gas up by 0.64% Realty up by 0.53% and Teck up by 0.37% were the only gainers, while Auto down by 0.84%, Power down by 0.70%, Health Care down by 0.48%, PSU down by 0.31% and IT down by 0.20% were the top losers. (Provisional)

The top gainers on the Sensex were Hindalco Industries up by 2.81%, Sterlite Industries up by 2.77%, Bharti Airtel up by 2.49%, Jindal Steel up by 2.290% and  Tata Steel up by 1.65%. While, Sun Pharma down by 1.94%, Tata Motors down by 1.88%, TCS down by 1.58%, Dr Reddys Lab down by 1.55% and NTPC down by 1.39% were the top losers in the index. (Provisional)

Meanwhile, the Central Board of Direct Taxes' (CBDT) chairperson, Sudha Sharma said that the income tax department will focus on non-filers and stop-filers to increase government's revenue collection. In her first communication to the Income Tax department, she said that the number of people who pay taxes in the country is too small and raised doubt over the accuracy of latest data that only 42,800 people in the country have an annual income of more than Rs 1 crore. 

By adding further, she said that potential for tax collection in India is much higher than what we achieve at present. Although, the I-T department’s endeavor would be to promote voluntary compliance and provide a hassle-free service to honest tax payers, it will also have to focus on non-filers and stop-filers in order to enhance the tax base and augment tax collection. ‘We aim at achieving a tax regulation regimen in India which can match the best in the world’ she added.  

The net direct tax collection in April-May period rose by 6.44% to Rs 37,596 crore as compared to the same period of previous fiscal. The government has fixed a direct tax collection target of Rs 6.68 lakh crore for the current fiscal, up from Rs 5.65 lakh crore in the previous fiscal. Meanwhile, to boost the tax revenue, the government is doing all efforts include issuing notices to tax evaders and set advertising campaign etc. Further, the government is addressing hurdles like human resources, technology and time to improve tax collection and deal with the menace of tax evasion.

India VIX, a gauge for markets short term expectation of volatility gained 0.92% at 18.46 from its previous close of 18.29 on Tuesday. (Provisional)

The CNX Nifty gained 7.25 points or 0.12% to settle at 5,820.85. The index touched high and low of 5,828.40 and 5,777.90 respectively. 28 stocks advanced against 22 declining on the index. (Provisional)

The top gainers on the Nifty were Hindalco Industries up by 3.26%, Sesa Goa up by 2.89%, Ambuja Cements up by 2.54%, Bharti Airtel up by 2.40% and Jindal Steel up by 2.33%

On the other hand, Tata Motors down by 2.08%, Hero MotoCorp down by 1.81%, Dr. Reddy's Laboratories down by 1.74%, UltraTech Cement down by 1.66% and Tata Power down by 1.62%.

The European markets were trading in green; Germany’s DAX up by 0.18%, the United Kingdom’s FTSE 100 up by 0.06% and France’s CAC 40 down by 0.18%.

All the Asian equity indices, barring Japanese Nikkei, ended the Wednesday’s session in negative terrain as investors opted to stay away from piling up positions in risky assets awaiting Federal Reserve to clarify the outlook on its massive stimulus when it ends a two-day policy meeting later in the day. Hong Kong benchmarks remained the top loser, declining by over a percent, while Shanghai Composite, Jakarta Composite, KOSPI Composite and Straits Times too witnessed a significant cut during the trade. Bucking the trend, Japan’s Nikkei average hit a one-week high on Wednesday, with traders citing the launch of a near $780 million investment trust as a driving factor. Some support also came in with rally in exporters after the nation’s shipments increased and the yen weakened.