Bourses after recovering from intra-day’s low bounce back in green

Recovering from intra-day’s low, Indian equity markets bounced back in green with the support of banking counters, which along with Fast moving consumer goods and Oil & Gas space, activated the snoozing bears. Heart-tendering Q4 numbers from country’s largest lender, State Bank of India (SBI), mainly buoyed the sentiment at D-street. Led by higher interest income and lower provisioning for non-performing loans, SBI on Friday reported a forecast beating net profit of Rs 4,050 crore for the fourth quarter (Jan-March) of FY12 as against Rs 21 crore a year ago. Shrugging aside, the slide of European shares, 30 scrip sensitive index - Sensex, after reclaiming its 16,000 fortress, were progressively approaching the 16,100 crucial level. Similarly, the widely followed 50 share index - Nifty, too was increasingly close of its 4,900 bastion. However, broader indices recovering from day’s low failed to turn green.

On the global front, European stock markets had a shaky start on Friday as concern over Greece and Spain, continued to linger over investor’s mind. The region’s shares appeared to be on the course for their biggest weekly decline since November, on heightened euro zone debt crisis concerns after Spanish banks were downgraded by Moody's overnight and Fitch cut its debt rating for Greece.

Back on the home turf, Auto stocks were the epitome of weakness, while stocks from Technology and Information Technology space followed the suite. BSE auto index were tottering under pressure right from the start of the trade as record low rupee was seen raising the cost of imports, royalty payments for the sector. The overall market breadth on BSE, despite improving, was in the favour of declines which thumped advances in the ratio of 1519:993, while 138 shares remained unchanged.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 16,085.68, up by 15.20 points or 0.09% after trading as high as 16,137.22 and as low as 16,137.22. There were 16 stocks advancing against 14 declines on the index.

The broader indices sustained their downward trajectory; the BSE Mid cap index was down by 0.51% and Small cap index sank 0.49%.

Bankex up by 1.25%, Fast Moving Consumer Goods up by 0.71%, Oil & Gas up by 0.69%, Public Sector Undertaking (PSU) up by 0.42% and Power up by 0.02% were the top gainers on BSE sectoral chart.

On the flip side, Auto down by 1.75%, TECk down by 0.99%, Information Technology down by 0.97%, Capital Goods down by 0.73% and Realty down 0.43% were the major laggards in the space.

SBI up 3.91%, NTPC up 3.17%, ICICI bank up 1.62%, HUL up 1.59% and Gail India up 1.50% were the only gainers on the Sensex, while Tata Motors down 3.67%, Maruti Suzuki down 3.18%, Tata Steel down 2.38%, Bajaj Auto down 1.91% and Hero Moto Corp down 1.74% were the major losers in the index.

Meanwhile, Retail inflation, as measured by the Consumer Price Index (CPI) has moved up to 10.36% in April 2012 as compared to 9.38% in March. Cost of living has also become more expensive for the urban consumer in April as compared to the rural, as inflation in urban areas surged by 11.10% versus 9.86% in rural (y-o-y).

The major jump in prices came from vegetables that became dearer by a whopping 24.55% in April 2012 as compared to the same month last year. Other commodities that showed a substantial increase were edible oils, which increased by 17.63% followed by milk and products which went up by 14.9% in April 2012, y-o-y basis.

Overall food inflation stood at 10.18% y-o-y. ‘Fuel and light’ as well as ‘clothing bedding and footwear’ also witnessed double digit inflation and increased by 11.4% and 11.95% respectively.

The rising inflation, both the CPI and WPI (7.32% in April), are expected to be a cause of concern for the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) which has been trying to control the spiraling inflation since the last fiscal. Food inflation, in particular has been stubbornly high making the task of rate cuts and hence growth, difficult.

The government of India has recently moved to the practice of reporting the CPI numbers as it feels that they are more representative of the inflationary pressures borne by the common man. However since the Index is still very new, it will be a while before the RBI starts using it as the basis for policy decisions. 

The S&P CNX Nifty is currently trading at 4,880.05, higher by 9.85 points or 0.20% after trading as high as 4,889.60 and as low as 4,788.95. There were 23 stocks advancing against 27 declines on the index.

The top gainers on the Nifty were SBI up 3.95%, NTPC up 3.38%, Grasim up 2.39%, IDFC up 2.26% and Sesa Goa up 2.12%.

Tata Motors down 3.71%, Ambuja Cement down 3.22%, Maruti down 2.79%, Tata Steel down 2.55% and BHEL down 2.35% were the major losers on the index.

In the Asian space, Shanghai Composite plunged 1.44%, Hang Seng sank 1.30%, KLSE Composite shrank 0.76%, Nikkei 225 got butchered by 2.99%, Straits Times Index gut pounded by 1.36%, KOSPI Composite got obliterated by 3.40% and Taiwan Weighted plummeted 2.79%.

Stock markets in Indonesia remained closed on Friday owing to a public holiday.

The European markets got off to a negative start as France’s CAC 40 tanked 1.08%, Germany’s DAX sank 0.66% and United Kingdom’s FTSE dropped 1.00%.