Benchmarks manage to keep their head above water in early trade

After slumping over a percent in last session, Indian equity benchmarks made a flat-to-positive start with frontline gauges managing to keep their head above water, as investors opted to buy beaten down but fundamentally strong stocks. Sentiments also got some support from Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Deputy Governor Anand Sinha’s statement that the government and the central bank are taking all possible steps to get a control over the economy; he also said that financial sector is bound to grow in tandem with the growth of the real economy. Rally in infrastructure and realty counters too helped the up-move as the RBI has said that developers building low-cost or affordable houses can avail of foreign currency loans on softer terms than other builders of real estate.

However, gains remained capped as Asian markets, after a mixed opening, entered into deep red with Chinese Shanghai Composite declining nearly four percent on concern of a potential liquidity crunch in the country after the People’s Bank of China declined to inject money into the financial system. The US markets too ended in the red overnight and extended their downward move seen last week with all the major indices losing another about a percent.

Back home, on the sectoral front, oil and gas witnessed the maximum gain in trade followed by realty and metal, while consumer durables, auto and fast moving consumer goods remained the top losers on the BSE sectoral space. The broader indices were struggling to get some traction, while the market breadth on the BSE was positive; there were 491 shares on the gaining side against 738 shares on the losing side while 62 shares remain unchanged.

The BSE Sensex opened at 18602.25; about 61 points higher compared to its previous closing of 18540.89 and has touched a high and a low of 18630.25 and 18487.30 respectively.The index is currently trading at 18551.56, up by 10.67points or 0.06%. There were 16 stocks advancing against 14 declines on the index.

The overall market breadth has made a weak start with 38.03% stocks advancing against 57.16% declines. The broader indices were trading in red; the BSE Mid cap and Small cap indices down by 0.86% and 0.36% respectively. 

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were, Oil & Gas up by 1.20%, Realty up by 0.69%, Metal up by 0.48% and PSU up by 0.42%, while Consumer Durables down by 1.08%, Auto down by 1.02%, FMCG down by 0.69%, Capital Goods down by 0.52% and Health Care down by 0.32% were the top losers on the sectoral index.

The top gainers on the Sensex were ONGC up by 2.01%, Hindalco Industries up by 1.80%, Bharti Airtel up by 1.52%, HDFC Bank up by 1.42% and Mahindra & Mahindra up by 1.14%.

On the flip side, Tata Motors was down by 2.87%, Maruti Suzuki was down by 1.65%, Bajaj Auto was down by 1.57%, ICICI Bank was down by 1.46% and SBI was down by 1.22% were the top losers on the Sensex.

Meanwhile, India’s power ministry has set an ambitious target of building the world’s largest transmission network connecting across 1,40,000 circuit kilometers by the year 2017 when the 12th plan period ends, empowering the Indian power sector. The new transmission pricing framework for transmission network is likely to attract private sector investment in transmission segment. However, Powergrid with its massive investment plans is expected to continue its major role as a Central Transmission Utility.

Jyotiraditya Scindia, the power minister has said that the plan will support to increase the current capacity of 1 lakh to 1,40,000 circuit kilometers and this could be established by the end of 12th five year plan. Country will have a single transmission grid by coming January. The country’s current power generation capacity which is 2,30,000 MW will touch 4,00,000 MW and 8,00,000 MW by the year 2022 and 2032 respectively.

The minister has further stated that the intense electricity shortage in the southern states could be overcome after connecting the southern grid to national grid. This connection could become possible by January 2014. The minister will directly monitor all those activities at his own personal level and for the smooth functioning of the project, he will meet the power grid officials in every two weeks. The Power sector contributes 40 percent of the investments in the infrastructure.

The CNX Nifty opened at 5,606.95; about 16 points higher as compared to its previous closing of 5,590.25, and has touched a high and a low of 5,616.90 and 5,570.25 respectively.

The index is currently trading at 5,595.15, up by 4.90 points or 0.09%. There were 28 stocks advancing against 22 declines on the index.

The top gainers of the Nifty were BPCL up by 2.61%, Hindalco Industries up by 2.07%, Bharti Airtel up by 1.83%, ONGC up by 1.79% and Sesa Goa up by 1.60%.

On the flip side, Tata Motors down by 2.64%, Ranbaxy down by 2.29%, Lupin down by 2.07%, JP Associate down by 2.06% and NMDC down by 1.80% were the major losers on the index.

All the Asian equity indices were trading in red; Shanghai Composite tumbled 74.55 points or 3.80% to 1,888.68, Jakarta Composite crumbled 45.03 points or 1.02% to 4,384.43, Nikkei 225 clobbered 231.97 points or 1.78% to 12,830.81, KOSPI Composite Index decreased 22.80 points or 1.27% to 1,776.21, Hang Seng declined 280.93 points or 1.42% to 19,533.05, KLSE Composite dropped 10.82 points or 0.61% to 1,773.06, Straits Times contracted 61.20 points or 1.77% to 3,393.17 and Taiwan Weighted was down by 54.40 points or 0.70% to 7,703.63.