TRADING IN GREEN

Indian benchmarks are trading in the green terrain as C Rangarajan's statement over India's credit rating strengthened investors' confidence. However, the frontline indices made a flat-to-negative opening tracking weakness in global markets. All the Asian equity indices were trading in the red at this point of time. Chinese market too was marginally in red despite the report that China's services industries rebounded from the slowest expansion in at least 19 months, Services PMI rose to 55.5 in October from 53.7 the previous month. The September's reading was the weakest since a new seasonally adjusted series of the gauge began in March 2011. The US markets suffered sharp cuts on Friday, as traders turned cautious ahead of the Presidential election and also the better than expected jobs data raised concern about the US Fed's bond buying programme.

Back home, sentiments got some support with the Prime Minister's key economic adviser, C Rangarajan's statement that there is no case for lowering India's credit rating and global agencies need to look at the international scenario before taking any rating action. The telecom stocks like Idea Cellular, Reliance Communication and MTNL edged higher as in the CDMA spectrum auction now only one bidder 'Tata Teleservices' is left after Videocon decided to withdraw its application to bid for CDMA spectrum. In GSM segment there are still five players left in the race, however from there too, some are likely to withdraw their candidature.

On the sectoral front, consumer durables witnessed the maximum gain in trade followed by healthcare and fast moving consumer goods while, metal, software and power remained the top losers on the BSE sectoral space. The broader indices were going neck-to-neck with benchmarks while, the market breadth on the BSE was positive; there were 940 shares on the gaining side against 617 shares on the losing side while 71 shares remain unchanged.

The BSE Sensex opened at 18,749.37; about 6 points lower compared to its previous closing of 18,755.45, and has touched a high and a low of 18,792.34 and 18,737.13 respectively.

The index is currently trading at 18,783.62, up by 28.17 points or 0.15%. There were 17 stocks advancing against 13 declines on the index.

The overall market breadth has made a positive start with 57.74% stocks advancing against 37.90% declines. The broader indices too were trading in-line with benchmarks; the BSE Mid cap and Small cap indices rose 0.36% and 0.19% respectively.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were, CD up by 0.76%, HC up by 0.58%, FMCG up by 0.41%, CG up by 0.31% and PSU up by 0.23%. While, Metal down by 0.14%, IT down by 0.15%, Power down by 0.03% and Oil and Gas down by 0.01% were the few losers on the index.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Cipla up by 1.87%, ITC up by 0.90%, Dr Reddy up by 0.88%, Coal India up by 0.87% and Jindal Steel up by 0.81%.

On the flip side, HIndalco was down by 1.19%, Tata Steel was down by 0.98%, Bajaj Auto was down by 0.61%, Sterlite Industries was down by 0.59% and Infosys was down by 0.51% were the top losers on the Sensex.

Meanwhile, amid increasing fiscal deficits and tumbling investments, the Finance Minister P Chidambaram  has urged his cabinet colleagues to work united with the goal to overcome the policy paralysis, by noting that about 700 projects of investments totaling to Rs 7,500 crore are paused due to delays caused by the absence of regulatory approvals.

He noted that the lack of pace is due to the lack of environmental and other regulatory approvals as well as problems arising from land acquisition, difficulty in arranging financing and due to stringent fuel supply. He also stressed on garnering more investments into the nation, while noting that domestic and foreign cash inflows are drying up. The centre had introduced many reform measures including policies with procedural in nature, by aiming to break logjam and taking off the hurdles in investment flows.

About 300 projects came to a halt with approvals held up at various government departments in line with the peaked policy paralysis and bureaucratic delays, during September 2011 and June 2012, when finance ministry was headed by Pranab Mukherjee, now the President of India. He also pointed out that the fresh investment proposals has pummeled in the third quarter of 2012 , which notched near Rs 2,000 billion, while government investments has also trimmed to Rs 500 billion.

The finance ministry had revised the targeted fiscal deficit numbers to 5.3% from the envisaged figure of 5.1% in the 2012 budget. While the fiscal consolidation roadmap was put forth by the FM on October 29 calls for trimming the fiscal deficit to 4.8% for the fiscal ending March 31, 2014 and to 3% by 2016-17. And the trade deficit was forecasted to be a negative $180.3 billion, the current account deficit is expected to touch a negative $70.3 billion by the end of this financial year.

Amid this tough situation, the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has also urged the ministers to increase the pace of approvals and to ensure to make the stranded projects back on track within the next five months of the current financial year, for reviving the growth of the nation.

The S&P CNX Nifty opened at 5,693.05; about 4 points lower compared to its previous closing of 5,697.70, and has touched a high and a low of 5,707.75 and 5,690.50 respectively.

The index is currently trading at 5,705.35, up by 7.65 points or 0.13%. There were 28 stocks advancing against 22 declines on the index.

The top gainers of the Nifty were Cipla up by 1.94%, RInfra up by 1.20%, Jindal Steel up by 0.85%, ITC up by 0.81% and Kotak Bank up by 0.77%.

On the flip side, Cairn down by 1.45%, Tata Steel down by 1.13%, Hindalco down by 0.98%, Sesa Goa down by 0.74% and DLF down by 0.73%, were the major losers on the index.

All the Asian equity indices were trading in the red; Shanghai Composite was down by 7.22 points or 0.34% to 22,036.81, Hang Seng lost 74.52 points or 0.34% to 22,036.81, Jakarta Composite declined by 28.02 points or 0.65% to 4,310.87, KLSE Composite was down by 3.69 points or 0.22% to 1,652.44, Nikkei 225 gained 27.86 points or 0.31% to 9,023.36, Straits Times declined by 18.03 points or 0.59% to 3,022.72, Kospi Composite was up by 11.57 points or 0.60% to 1,907.15 and Taiwan Weighted was down by 30.35 points or 0.42% to 7,180.12.