MARKETS HOLD GAINS

The Indian equity bourses continued trading in positive territory holding its early gains after a fairly good start for stocks this morning. Investors were hopeful about a strong recovery of the US economy and expecting that the Reserve Bank of India will soon come out with some monetary easing moves following a sharp decline in food inflation, were driving stock prices up today. Meanwhile, Indian rupee moved up 10 paise to 52.86 per US dollar, supported by gains posted by the euro and other currencies against the American dollar overseas. A positive start in stock markets too aided the rupee's surge. On sectoral front, Telecom stocks have moved higher on the back of reports that the Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal has set the next date for hearing the case related to telecom firm's appeal against the government order that enforced a ban on 3G roaming arrangement between operators. Shares from interest rate sensitive banking, automobile and realty sectors were moving higher amid expectations of a rate cut early next year. Several stocks from capital goods space too have gained significant ground in positive territory. On the global front, markets in the Asia-Pacific region markets were trading in red. Back home, the market breadth favoring the positive trend; there were 1,579 shares on the gaining side against 728 shares on the losing side while 108 shares remained unchanged.
The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 15,934.80, up by 196.10 points or 1.25%. The index has a touched a high and low of 15,956.93 and 15,761.18 respectively. There were 28 stocks advancing against only 2 declines on the index.
The broader indices too were trading with decent gains; the BSE Mid cap and Small cap indices surged 0.81% and 1.01% respectively.
Buying was witnessed across the board. The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were, TECk up by 1.81%, Realty up by 1.58%, CG up by 1.57%, IT up by 1.55%, and Metal up by 1.19%. While, there was no loser on the index.
The top gainers on the Sensex were Bharti Airtel up by 3.40%, Hero MotoCorp up by 1.96%, TCS was up by 1.94%  Jaiprakash Associates up by 1.86% and Sterlite Industries up by 1.86%. On the flip side, Cipla marginally down by 0.24% and Hindalco Industries down by 0.04% were the top losers on the Sensex.
Meanwhile, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) governor, Duvvuri Subbarao has said that India's economic growth will probably fail to meet the central bank's GDP target of 7.6% for the fiscal year 2011-12 citing concerns over the domestic macro-economic situation. The governor also was of the belief that RBI may revise the growth forecast for Asia's third largest economy downward in its third quarter monetary policy review meeting scheduled on January 24, 2012.
Subbarao underscored that factors like stubborn inflation and depreciating rupee are serious cause of concerns for the economy's growth. On one hand, the headline (WPI) inflation in the month of November stayed above the uncomfortable 9% levels for the twelfth straight month, despite thirteen interest rate hikes by Indian central bank since March 2010. While on the other, Indian rupee has become the worst performing currency in Asia depreciating over 15% in 2011 against the dollar.

The RBI had revised the GDP growth forecast for 2011-12 to 7.6%, from 8% on October, 2011 while, the government cut its full-year growth target to between 7.25 - 7.75% earlier this month from 9% in February. Meanwhile, an influential brokerage firm CLSA has slashed India's GDP growth forecast to 6.7% for the current fiscal year ending March, 2012 from its earlier projection of 7.3%, owing to cyclical deceleration caused by high interest rates, policy inertia and the adverse impact of global headwinds.  

The S&P CNX Nifty is currently trading at 4,767.75, higher by 53.75 points or 1.14%. The index has touched a high and low of 4,777.60 and 4,718.15 respectively. There were 41 stocks advancing against 8 declines on the index and one remained unchanged.
The top gainers of the Nifty were Bharti Airtel up by 3.39%, Hero MotoCorp up by 2.17%, Cairn up by 2.06%, JP Associates up by 2.05% and RCOM up by 2.01%.
On the flip side, Ranbaxy down by 1.41%, Powergrid down by 0.74%, Axis Bank down by 0.64%, BPCL down by 0.59% and PNB down by 0.24% remained the losers on the index.
Most of the bourses in the Asian region were trading in the red; Shanghai Composite was down 0.32%, Seoul Composite was down by 0.56% and Taiwan Weighted was down by 0.26%.
On the flip side, Nikkei 225 was up by 93.22 points or 0.99% to 8,478.
However, Stock markets in Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore remained closed on Monday in observance of the Christmas holiday.