Benchmarks surge in afternoon session

Indian equity benchmarks finally made up their mind and surged northwards reaching their intra-day high level in the afternoon session amid buying witnessed in frontline blue chip stocks such as Infosys, Tata steel and SSLT. On sectoral front, metal, IT and realty indices were up by over 1% on the BSE. Banking stocks were marginally higher amid rising concerns that entry of new foreign banks would increase competition for local banks. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has issued guidelines for foreign banks, under which foreign banks operating in the country will enjoy nearly equal terms with local lenders if they move to a wholly owned subsidiary structure. Meanwhile, consumer durables stocks were trading lower on BSE. Further, the rupee has recently hit a low of 62.56 per dollar, its lowest since October 2 on account of rising demand from private oil companies, traders.

On the global front, Asian markets were trading mixed with Japanese indices Nikkei down by 0.76% and Shanghai Composite down by 0.57% as global investors turned cautious ahead of the ECB meeting and US GDP data to be released later in the day. Back home, the NSE Nifty and BSE Sensex were trading above their psychological 6,200 and 21,000 levels respectively. The market breadth on BSE was positive, out of 2,091 stocks traded, 1,129 stocks advanced, while 841 stocks declined on the BSE.       

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 21,071.19 up by 176.25 points or 0.84% after trading in a range of 21,109.08 and 20,866.88. There were 24 stocks advancing against only 6 declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index was up by 0.67%, while Small cap index up by 0.48%.

The gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Metal up by 1.78%, IT up by 1.61%, Realty up by 1.26%, Teck up by 1.24% and Healthcare up by 0.71%. While, Consumer Durables down by 1.08% was only losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Tata Steel up by 3.46%, Hindalco Inds up by 3.03%, SSLT up by 2.38%, M&M up by 1.94% and Infosys up by 1.77%. On the flip side, BHEL down by 3.49%, Bharti Airtel down by 0.70%, Coal India down by 0.54%, Tata Motors down by 0.13% and SBI down by 0.07% were the only losers on the Sensex.

Meanwhile, amid prevailing economic slowdown, the gross direct tax collection rose by 11.6 percent to Rs 3.37 lakh crore during April-October period of 2013 from Rs 3.02 lakh crore reported in the same period of previous year. Meanwhile, the government has set direct tax collection target of Rs 6.68 lakh crore for 2013-14, envisaging a growth of 19 percent, as against Rs 5.65 lakh crore in 2012-13.

Direct taxes mainly include corporate tax and personal income tax, the biggest sources of revenue for the government. However, the government has managed to raise more than half the budgeted corporate tax and personal tax for current fiscal, reflecting that things could be finally looking up. Gross corporate tax grew by 8.2% in the reported period to Rs 2.09 lakh crore from a year earlier, more than half the Rs 4.19 lakh crore budgeted during current fiscal. While, Personal income-tax receipts rose by 17.9% to Rs1.25 lakh crore, which was more than half the budgeted amount of Rs 2.4 lakh crore for this fiscal year.

Further, net direct tax collections rose by 13.33 per cent to Rs 2.84 lakh crore during April-October, 2013 as against Rs 2.51 lakh crore in the year ago period. Securities Transaction Tax (STT) collection stands at Rs 2,645 crore, while, wealth tax collection posted a growth of 5.86 per cent to Rs 560 crore, from Rs 529 crore. The government has been taking measures to enhance tax collection as the fiscal deficit of the country touched 76% of the budget amount in the first half of the current fiscal. Meanwhile, the government expects that it can achieve the set tax collection target during the current fiscal as Indian economy is likely to gain some momentum in second half of FY14 on the back of good farm sector growth and some recovery in investments and core industrial sector. 

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 6,273.70 up by 58.55 points or 0.94% after trading in a range of 6,279.55 and 6,207.35. There were 37 stocks advancing against 13 declining on the index.

The top gainers of the Nifty were Tata Steel up by 3.59%, Hindalco Inds up by 3.25%, HCL Tech up by 2.86%, SSLT up by 2.49% and HDFC up by 2.16%. On the flip side, BHEL down by 3.38%, BPCL down by 1.69%, Bank of Baroda down by 1.61%, Bharti Airtel down by 0.82% and Cairn down by 0.75% was the major loser on the index.

The Asian equity indices were trading mixed; Straits Times up by 0.10%, KLSE Composite up by 0.05%, Jakarta Composite up by 0.74% and Taiwan Weighted up by 0.02%. While, Shanghai Composite down by 0.57%, Nikkei 225 down by 0.76%, Hang Seng down by 0.61%, and Seoul Composite down by 0.52%.