WAITING FOR RBI

After making a decent start, Indian benchmark turned flat as investors remained cautious ahead of Reserve Bank of India's policy meet due later today. Globally, Asian counters were capped while the euro eased on Tuesday, as soaring Spanish borrowing costs underscored the fading impact of the European Central Bank's bond purchases and stoked investor nervousness over euro zone debt. Back home, domestic cues will play an important role in deciding the market trend today as the Reserve Bank of India reviews the Monetary Policy later in the day. The investors are expecting a cut of 25 basis points in the policy rate. However, rate sensitive's banking, auto and realty witnessed some selling while, metal, public sector undertaking and power remained the top gainers on the BSE sectoral indices. Moreover, the broader indices were outperforming benchmarks. The market breadth on the BSE was positive; there were 917 shares on the gaining side against 661 shares on the losing side while 76 shares remained unchanged.

Among frontliners, Coal India up 2.6% on reports that the board members approved inking of fuel supply agreements (FSAs) with buyers and said the company would pay penalty of 0.01% of value on shortfall in supply. Moreover, BHEL, TCS, Infosys, Tata Steel, Sesa Goa, Sterlite Industries, Reliance Communications and Tata Motors were also trading higher in early trade.

The BSE Sensex opened at 17,200.97; about 50 points higher compared to its previous closing of 17,150.95, and has touched a high and a low of 17,225.13 and 17,112.41 respectively.

The index is currently trading at 17,124.32, down by 26.63 points or 0.16%. There were 14 stocks advancing against 16 declines on the index.

The overall market breadth has made a positive start with 55.44% stocks advancing against 39.96% declines. The broader indices were outperforming benchmarks; the BSE Mid cap and Small cap indices rose 0.07% and 0.23% respectively.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were, Metal up by 0.71%, PSU up by 0.64%, Power up by 0.31%, Oil and Gas up by 0.10% and TECk up by 0.08%. While, CD down by 0.93%, Bankex down by 0.67%, HC down by 0.29%, Realty down by 0.21% and CG down by 0.20% were the top losers on the index.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Coal India up by 2.17%, ONGC up by 1.46%, TCS up by 1.21%, Sterlite Industries up by 1.08% and NTPC up by 0.73%.

On the flip side, HDFC Bank was down by 1.00%, Infosys was down by 0.82%, Sun Pharma was down by 0.72%, Maruti Suzuki was down by 0.66% and ICICI Bank was down by 0.65% were the top losers on the Sensex.

Meanwhile, India's services sector has witnessed a growth of a whopping 62% in the inflow of FDI during April-January last fiscal. The growth has come in at a time when the global economy is witnessing a slowdown and leads one into believing that India is emerging as a safe bet for foreign investment.

As per official data, the financial and non-financial services sector had attracted FDI worth $4.83 billion during the 10-months period of 2011-12 as compared to $2.98 billion in the same period of previous year. Total FDI inflows amounted to $26.19 billion during the 10-month period registering an increase of 53%.The sectors that attracted sizeable FDI inflows include drugs and pharmaceutical ($3.20 billion), construction ($2.23 billion), telecommunications ($1.99 billion) and power ($1.56 billion).

During the period, the highest FDI of $8.91 billion came from Mauritius, followed by Singapore ($4.30 billion) and Japan ($2.75 million). The investment trend is encouraging and reflective of the level of confidence of investors in India's growth story.

Though economic growth in India has declined in FY'12 to 6.9%, the economy is still among the best performing in the world. The growth figures, as per government estimates, are expected to improve to 7.6% in the current fiscal. The Asian Development Bank (ADB) has also projected a moderate increase in growth rate for India to 7% in the current fiscal.

The S&P CNX Nifty opened at 5,266.60; about 40 points higher compared to its previous closing of 5,226.20, and has touched a low of 5,212.05 while high remained its opening.

The index is currently trading at 5,216.85, down by 9.35 points or 0.18%. There were 23 stocks advancing against 27 declines on the index.

The top gainers of the Nifty were Coal India up by 2.24%, ONGC up by 1.51%, RCom up by 1.42%, TCS up by 1.23% and Sterlite Industries up by 1.04%.

On the flip side, Cairn down by 1.26%, Kotak Bank down by 1.22%, HDFC Bank down by 1.15%, ICICI Bank down by 0.96% and ACC down by 0.95%, were the major losers on the index.

Most of the Asian equity indices were trading in the red; Shanghai Composite was down 4.30 points or 0.18% to 2,352.72, Hang Seng was down 119.66 points or 0.58% to 20,490.98, Straits Times was down 12.60 points or 0.42% to 2,979.52, Seoul Composite was down 7.66 points or 0.38% to 1,984.97 and Taiwan Weighted was down by 117.15 points or 1.52% to 7,612.71.

On the flip side, Jakarta Composite was up 8.27 points or 0.20% to 4,154.85, KLSE Composite was up 0.69 points or 0.04% to 1,598.20 and Nikkei 225 was up by 13.38 points or 0.14% to 9,484.02.