Markets continue to trade weak in the noon session

Indian markets are not getting any respite after a sluggish start of the new week and continue to trade in the negative terrain in the noon session. The mood of the market remains impacted by the weakness in the global markets and the opening of the European markets are likely to give further direction to the local markets. Metal stocks were particularly under pressure after the official manufacturing data of China came in lower than expected. Banking stocks are the other biggest drag for the trade today with major banks reacting to the disappointing earnings announcements during the weekend. There is additional pressure of the telecom stocks, as the bidding has started for the 2G spectrum. In a major setback the Supreme Court rejected an appeal by Bharti Airtel, Vodafone, Loop and Idea for a stay on the spectrum auction. The order is likely to force the incumbent spectrum holding companies to bid aggressively to regain their bandwidth holdings and intensify the bidding process as it progresses. The only sectoral index that is showing some resistance is the defensive healthcare sector.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 20353.09, down by 160.76 points or 0.78% after trading in a range of 20480.35 and 20342.97. There were just 8 stocks advancing against 22 decliners on the index.

The broader indices were showing mixed trend; while the BSE Mid cap index was down by 0.28%, the Small cap index was up by modest 0.05%.

BSE Healthcare was the only gaining sectoral index on the BSE up by 0.80%, on the other hand Metal down by 1.96%, Realty down by 0.95%, Bankex down by 0.94%, TECK down by 0.83% and IT down by 0.74% were the losing indices on BSE.   

The top gainers on the Sensex were GAIL India up by 1.94%, Dr Reddy’s up by 1.65%, Hero MotoCorp up by 0.79%, Sun Pharma up by 0.65% and Axis Bank up by 0.61%. On the flip side, Hindalco down by 3.19%, Bharti Airtel down by 2.79%, Tata Steel down by 2.58%, Tata Motors down by 2.53% and ICICI Bank was down by 1.96%.

Meanwhile, the inflation based on consumer price index for industrial workers (CPI-IW) in the month of December eased to 9.13 percent on y-o-y basis as compared to 11.47 percent in November and 11.17 in the corresponding month in 2012 on the back of softening of prices of food items.

The food inflation stood at 11.49 percent in December against 16.17 percent in previous month and 13.53 percent during the corresponding month of 2012. Among food items, low prices of sugar, onion, ginger, brinjal, cauliflower, peas and other vegetable items are responsible for the decrease in the index. However, high prices of some food items including fish, eggs, poultry, milk, pure ghee and garlic imparted some stickiness to food inflation.

All India CPI-IW for December 2013 declined by four points and pegged at 239 points from 235 points in November. At the centre level, Giridih recorded maximum decline of 12 points followed by Ahmedabad, Chhindwara, Varanasi, Munger, Jamalpur, Nagpur and Bhavnagar (10 points each), Jamshedpur (9 points) and Rourkela, Ludhiana, Tripura and Angul Talchar (8 points each). On the contrary, Sholapur and Puducherry centres recorded increase of 4 points and 2 points respectively, while  the index remained stationary in 37 centres.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 6,041.60, down by 47.90 points or 0.79% after trading in a range of 6,074.85 and 6,040.90. There were 13 stocks advancing against 37 declining ones on the index.

The top gainers of the Nifty were GAIL up by 2.08%, Dr Reddy's up by 1.51%, Lupin up by 1.03%, Powergrid up by 0.94% and Asian Paint  up by 0.86%. On the flip side, Bank of Baroda down by 3.81%, JP Associates down by 3.60%, Hindalco down by 3.38%, Bharti Airtel down by 2.87% and Tata Steel down by 2.65% were the major losers on the index.

All the Asian equity indices continue to trade in red, Jakarta Composite down by 0.60%, Nikkei 225 plunged by 1.98%, Straits Times declined by 1.83% and Seoul Composite down by 1.09%.