Indian equity benchmarks continued to trade in green in morning deals, driven by buying in Metal, Healthcare shares and positive cues from Asian markets amid optimism surrounding the ongoing US-China Summit. Traders took support with the report said that India and Chile, a South American nation, have reviewed the progress of negotiations for the proposed free trade agreement and discussed modalities for its early conclusion. Some support also came as the report said India and the United Arab Emirates are expected to firm up two significant agreements to boost cooperation in areas of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) and strategic petroleum reserves during Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to the Gulf nation on May 15. Meanwhile, the Reserve Bank has removed the prior approval requirement for non-bank entities to form tie-up arrangements for facilitating outward remittance services through banks in India. On the global front, Asian markets were trading mixed following the mixed cues from Wall Street overnight, with traders cautiously optimistic for an ease in global trade tensions after the ongoing meeting between U.S. President Trump and China's leader Xi Jinping could ease global trade tensions.
The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 74805.69, up by 196.71 points or 0.26% after trading in a range of 74651.87 and 75079.80. There were 19 stocks advancing against 11 stocks declining on the index.
The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Metal up by 1.50%, Healthcare up by 1.23%, Utilities up by 1.08%, Basic Materials up by 1.05% and Power up by 0.53%, while IT down by 1.83%, Realty down by 1.56%, Capital Goods down by 0.41%, TECK down by 0.39% and Auto down by 0.38% were the top losing indices on BSE.
The top gainers on the Sensex were Bharti Airtel up by 2.38%, Eternal up by 1.49%, Larsen & Toubro up by 1.34%, Adani Ports &SEZ up by 1.22% and Sun Pharma up by 1.06%. On the flip side, HCL Technologies down by 2.32%, Tech Mahindra down by 2.04%, TCS down by 1.77%, Infosys down by 1.62% and Maruti Suzuki down by 0.86% were the top losers.
Meanwhile, in a push to cleaner energy, the Union Cabinet has approved a Scheme for Promotion of Surface Coal/Lignite Gasification Projects with a financial outlay of Rs 37,500 crore. The move will strengthen India’s energy security and reduce dependence on imports of key products such as LNG (more than 50% imported), urea (around 20% imported), ammonia (around 100% imported), and methanol (around 80-90% imported), amid the volatile geopolitical situation due to the ongoing conflict between the United States and Iran.
The Scheme marks a major step towards accelerating India’s coal/lignite gasification programme, advancing the national target of gasifying 100 million tonnes (MT) of coal by 2030. In a significant accompanying reform, the government has also extended coal linkage tenure up to 30 years under the ‘Production of Syngas leading to Coal Gasification’ sub-sector in the Non-Regulated Sector (NRS) linkage auction framework, providing long-term policy certainty for investment in coal gasification projects.
The scheme seeks to incentivise new surface coal and lignite gasification projects for the production of syngas and downstream products, targeting gasification of around 75 million tonnes of coal and lignite. Financial incentives under the scheme will cover up to 20 per cent of the cost of plant and machinery, with project selection to be carried out through a competitive bidding process. Incentives will be disbursed in four equal instalments linked to project milestones. The financial incentive for a single project will be capped at Rs 5,000 crore, while incentives for any single product (except Synthetic Natural Gas and Urea) will be limited to Rs 9,000 crore. The overall cap for a single entity group has been fixed at Rs 12,000 crore across all projects. The scheme is expected to mobilise investments worth Rs 2.5 lakh crore to Rs 3 lakh crore and generate around 50,000 direct and indirect jobs across 25 projects in coal-bearing regions.
The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 23506.40, up by 93.80 points or 0.40% after trading in a range of 23446.70 and 23589.20. There were 34 stocks advancing against 16 stocks declining on the index.
The top gainers on Nifty were Cipla up by 6.73%, Adani Enterprises up by 5.69%, Bharti Airtel up by 2.33%, Hindalco up by 2.04% and JSW Steel up by 1.79%. On the flip side, HCL Technologies down by 2.33%, Tech Mahindra down by 2.07%, TCS down by 1.76%, Infosys down by 1.62% and Eicher Motors down by 1.31% were the top losers.
Asian markets were trading mixed; Taiwan Weighted added 434.38 points or 1.05% to 41,808.88, KOSPI increased 53.11 points or 0.68% to 7,897.12 and Hang Seng advanced 120.56 points or 0.46% to 26,509.00.
On the flip side, Shanghai Composite weakened 42.83 points or 1.01% to 4,199.74, Straits Times fell 20.42 points or 0.41% to 4,983.54 and Nikkei 225 slipped 195.11 points or 0.31% to 63,077.00.
