Benchmarks continue to remain range-bound with negative bias

Benchmarks continue to remain range-bound with negative bias weighed down by selected frontline blue chip stocks. Sentiments got dampened as the rupee was weaker in early trade tracking strength in dollar vs other currencies in Asia. It was trading at 61.95/96 versus its close of 61.85/86 on Friday. However, losses remained capped after the CII Business Confidence Index (BCI) rose sharply to 54.9 during the October-December period of 2013-14 fiscal, from 45.7 in the previous quarter and the Deputy Chairman of Planning Commission Montek Singh Ahluwalia has said that the economic growth rate was expected to be at 7.5-8 percent next year.

On the global front, all the Asian markets are exhibiting firm trade at this point of time and Japanese market was trading higher as the yen touched a five-year low versus the dollar. Back home, traders were buying, Metal, Auto and Consumer Durables while selling was seen in Realty, Capital Goods and IT on the BSE.  Public sector oil marketing companies (OMCs) like BPCL, HPCL and IOC remained under pressure on talks of increasing the subsidized cylinder cap for households. Meanwhile, telecom stocks witnessed mixed trend after the government delayed the planned mobile phone spectrum auction in the 900 and 1800 megahertz frequency bands by 10 days from the original schedule, it will now start on February 3.

The market breadth on BSE remains positive with advances to declines in the ratio of 1012: 672. BSE Sensex and NSE Nifty were comfortably trading near their psychological 21,100 and 6,300 levels respectively. The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 21184.53 down by 9.05 points or 0.04% after trading in a range of 21304.70 and 21123.30. There were 19 stocks advancing against 11 declines on the index. The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index was up by 0.38% and Small cap index gained 0.39%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were, Metal up by 0.82%, Auto up by 0.38%, Consumer Durables up by 0.23% and Healthcare up by 0.20%, while Realty down by 0.65%, Capital Goods down by 0.55%, IT down by 0.39%, Power down by 0.36% and Oil & Gas down by 0.27% were the top losers on the sectoral index.

The top gainers on the Sensex were SSLT up by 1.57%, Tata Motors up by 1.35%, Coal India up by 1.27%, Hindustan Unilever up by 0.91% and Dr Reddys Lab up by 0.85%. On the flip side, Bajaj Auto was down by 1.44%, ONGC was down by 1.11%, L&T was down by 1.09%, Infosys was down by 0.88% and  Wipro was down by 0.73% were the top losers on the Sensex.

Meanwhile, As per Deputy Chairman of Planning Commission Montek Singh Ahluwalia the Indian economy is likely to grow at a pace of 7.5-8 percent in the next year. Ahluwalia asserted that in a globalised world India cannot become self-reliant and the prevailing economic slowdown is mainly caused by global factors and partially by domestic factors.

Referring to the Indian economic growth over the period of time, Ahluwalia emphasized that reforms have been carried out gradually in large diversified highly democratic country in order to pick up economic growth. However, it takes time to bring economic turnaround. The Indian economy grew by 9 percent for five years in the previous decade, while it came down to 6 percent due to the global financial crisis.

Presently, domestic economy growth has recorded to 4.8 percent in Q2 FY14 as comparison to 4.4 percent in Q1 FY14. Furthermore, the current account deficit (CAD) has narrowed to $5.2 billion, or 1.2% of GDP in Q2 FY14 as against the 4.9% of GDP in the Q1 FY14 on the back of growing exports and declining imports of the country.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 6,303.35 down by 10.45 points or 0.17% after trading in a range of 6,344.05 and 6,287.70. There were 22 stocks advancing against 28 stock declines on the index. 

The top gainers of the Nifty were SSLT up by 1.66%, Coal India up by 1.31%, Tata Motors up by 1.17%, Hindustan Unilever up by 0.94% and Dr Reddy up by 0.87%. On the flip side, DLF down by 1.84%, Bajaj-Auto down by 1.38%, JP Associate down by 1.30%, L&T down by 1.20% and ACC down by 1.20% were the major losers on the index.

The Asian equity indices were trading in green; Shanghai Composite rose 1.77 points or 0.08% to 2,103.02, Hang Seng increased 18.35 points or 0.08% to 23,261.59, Jakarta Composite gained 35.84 points or 0.85% to 4,248.82, KLSE Composite strengthened 0.94 points or 0.05% to 1,862.00, Nikkei 225 surged 51.60 points or 0.32% to 16,230.54, Straits Times edged higher 5.09 points or 0.16% to 3,154.85, Seoul Composite added 2.41 points or 0.10% to 2,004.45  and Taiwan Weighted was up by 59.74 points or 0.70% to 8,594.78.