Markets extend early losses; trade at intra-day low level in afternoon session

Indian equity benchmarks extended losses and reached intra-day low level in afternoon session amid profit booking witnessed in IT, Teck and FMCG stocks in line with other global markets after a rally in previous session. Investors remained on the sidelines ahead of November F&O expiry. Rate sensitive stocks such as auto and banking witnessed selling. On stock specific movement, BHEL, SSLT and Hindalco Inds were trading up by over 1%, while, ITC, Tata Steel and Dr Reddy’s Lab were down by over 1% on BSE. Among other stocks, Asian Paints was trading lower as its wholly owned subsidiary; Asian Paints Industrial Coatings has closed down the operations of its powder coatings plant in Himachal Pradesh. On the other hand, Kalpataru Power Transmission has surged nearly 6% on BSE after the company said it has received orders worth of over Rs 1,000 crore.

On Global front, Asian markets were trading mixed with KLSE Composite up by 0.18%, while, Nikkei 225 down by 0.50% and Shanghai Composite down by 0.08%. Back home, the NSE Nifty and BSE Sensex were trading below their psychological 6,100 and 20,600 levels respectively. The market breadth on BSE was negative, out of 2,058 stocks traded, 885 stocks advanced, while 1,030 stocks declined on the BSE.    

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 20,521.47 down by 83.61 points or 0.41% after trading in a range of 20,604.27 and 20,484.67. There were 14 stocks advancing against only 16 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index was up by 0.08%, while Small cap index up by 0.05%.

The gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Consumer Durables up by 0.62%, Capital Goods up by 0.46%, Metals up by 0.33%, Realty up by 0.22% and Power up by 0.16%. While, IT down by 0.72%, Teck down by 0.66%, FMCG down by 0.62%, Auto down by 0.39% and PSU down by 0.16% were losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were BHEL up by 3.50%, SSLT up by 1.57%, Hindalco Inds up by 1.48%, Sun Pharma up by 0.91% and Coal India up by 0.48%. On the flip side, ITC down by 1.42%, Tata Steel down by 1.38%, Dr Reddy’s Lab down by 1.26%, Tata Motors down by 1.17%  and TCS down by 1.01%.

Meanwhile, As per the industry Inc, the nuclear deal between the Iran and six world powers, including the US, will help in sourcing of oil imports from Iran and boost trade with India. Industry Inc has said that any such deal will make it easy for Iran to engage economically with the rest of the world.  Ficci President Naina Lal Kidwai has said that India has maintained strong historic links with Iran and besides increasing oil imports, the recent deal will also open doors to India for exporting manufactured goods to Iran including IT, pharma, electronics, automobile spare parts and food processing. At present bilateral trade between India and Iran is around $15 billion.

Assocham President Rana Kapoor added that the deal would not only reduce India's import bill as energy prices ease, but also help the country to check high inflation. Furthermore, EEPC India Chairman Anupam Shah said that such deal will go a long way in augmenting India's trade with the Persian country as international sanctions has banned domestic exporters for exporting items beyond sanction law. Further, there was so much uncertainty over the payment transfer in the backdrop of sanctions, he added.

Iran and six world powers reached a breakthrough deal early on 24 November to curb Tehran’s nuclear programme in exchange for limited sanctions relief. Earlier, six years ago, the international authorities has initiated a programme to halt Iran’s most sensitive nuclear work and has target Iran’s financial and oil sectors, a main source of revenue for the country. Afterwards, the European Union (EU) has banned oil imports from Iran and now Iranian crude oil importer had declined to 6 importers from 23 importers in June 2012. India is the world’s fourth-largest oil importer and a major customer of Iran’s 1.7 million barrels per day of oil exports. In order to comply with international sanctions, Indian government had drastically cut its energy imports from Iran, which has been replaced by Iraq as the second-largest supplier of fuel to India, after Saudi Arabia.  India’s dependence on imports is as high as 80% for crude oil and 25% for natural gas. The recent Iran nuclear deal will help the country a lot as India’s energy demand is expected to more than double by 2035.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 6,092.40 down by 22.95 points or 0.38% after trading in a range of 6,112.70 and 6,081.70. There were 21 stocks advancing against 29 declining on the index.

The top gainers of the Nifty were BHEL up by 3.67%, Hindalco Inds up by 1.61%, SSLT up by 1.55%, ACC up by 1.29% and Sun pharma up by 0.83%. On the flip side, Tata Steel down by 1.55%, ITC down by 1.41%, Tata Motors down by 1.33%, Dr Reddy’s Lab down by 1.19% and TCS down by 1.09% were the major losers on the index.

The Asian equity indices were trading mixed; Taiwan Weighted up by 0.74%,  Hang Seng up by 0.10%, Seoul Composite up by 0.33%, KLSE Composite up by 0.18%. While, Nikkei 225 down by 0.50%, Shanghai Composite down by 0.08%, Jakarta Composite down by 1.03% and Straits Times down by 0.09%.