POSITIVE

Indian equity benchmarks have made a flat-to-positive start and are hovering near their pre-close mark in absence of any major cues. Sentiments remained little optimistic on Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia's statement that Indian economy would grow at a rate between 5 and 5.5 per cent in the current financial year and could expand by seven per cent in 2013-14. Some support also came in from buying in realty counter as National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) is seeking to push a 'relief package' for road developers and the Prime Minister's Office will be considering ways to revitalize the highway sector. Rally in PSU oil marketing companies too boosted the sentiments as stocks like BPCL, HPCL and IOC edged higher after a hike in petrol and diesel prices was announced on February 15, 2013 after market hours. Petrol prices were increased by Rs 1.50 per litre while diesel prices were increased by 45 paise per litre.

Supportive cues from Asian markets provided the much needed support to local markets in initial trade. Japanese Nikkei rallied by over two percent as yen fell after Tokyo escaped direct criticism from the G20 peers on its aggressive reflationary plans that have weakened the currency while, Chinese Shanghai too rose by over half a percent on their first day after the long holiday, with investors remaining optimistic about the domestic economy following strong trade data at the beginning of the month. However, disappointing cues from US market took their toll on domestic sentiments and capped the gains. The US markets made a mixed closing on Friday as some good economic news were overlooked amid weak retail sales numbers.

Back home, on the sectoral front, realty witnessed the maximum gain in trade followed by public sector undertaking and healthcare while, software, technology and consumer durables remained the top losers on the BSE sectoral space. The broader indices were outperforming benchmarks while, the market breadth on the BSE was positive; there were 1,144 shares on the gaining side against 730 shares on the losing side while 84 shares remain unchanged.

The BSE Sensex opened at 19,496.25; about 28 points higher compared to its previous closing of 19,468.15, and has touched a high and a low of 19,512.44 and 19,462.92 respectively. The index is currently trading at 19,490.33, up by 22.18 points or 0.11%. There were 17 stocks advancing against 13 declines on the index.

The overall market breadth has made a positive start with 58.58% stocks advancing against 37.40% declines. The broader indices too were outperforming with benchmarks; the BSE Mid cap and Small cap indices rose 0.37% and 0.54% respectively.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were, Realty up by 0.87%, PSU up by 0.68%, Health Care up by 0.51%, Oil & Gas up by 0.40% and Power up by 0.28%. While, IT down by 0.70%, Consumer Durables down by 0.58%, TECk down by 0.56% and Metal down by 0.32% were the only losers on the index.

The top gainers on the Sensex were HDFC up by 1.47%, SBI up by 0.91%, Sun Pharma up by 0.90%, Hindustan Unilever up by 0.83% and Cipla up by 0.68%.

On the flip side, Coal India was down by 1.30%, Jindal Steel was down by 1.05%, Wipro was down by 0.85%, Tata Power was down by 0.83% and TCS down by 0.79% were the top losers on the Sensex.

Meanwhile, expressing confidence on economic recovery, Finance Minister P Chidambaram said the economy would grow by 5.5 percent in the current financial year and improve to 6 percent in 2013-14. Observing that euro-zone crisis is still continuing, Chidambaram said 'recession in Europe, Japan and Brazil will naturally affect us however, our economy has been witnessing growth and this year it will be 5.5 percent'.
Despite the Central Statistical Organization (CSO), who placed the figures at 5 percent for current fiscal, Chidambaram said that India would come out of the low GDP growth and see 6 percent next year followed by 7 percent growth rate leading to 9 percent gradually, while the economy grew by 6.2 percent in FY12 and 9.3 percent in FY11.

While, expressing views on 2008 financial crises, Chidambaram said that the Indian economy was hit adversely by the global financial meltdown of September 2008, but the stimulus packages provided by the government at that time had helped in economy recovery. He also emphasized that there should be a balance between the welfare schemes and the need to promote growth as without it would not be possible for the government to fund social sector programmes.

The S&P CNX Nifty opened at 5,888.65; about 1 points higher as compared to its previous closing of 5,887.40 and has touched a high and a low of 5,896.15 and 5,878.45 respectively. The index is currently trading at 5,888.00, up by 0.60 points or 0.01%. There were 27 stocks advancing against 23 declines on the index.

The top gainers of the Nifty were DLF up by 1.85%, Power Grid up by 1.37%, BPCL up by 1.23%, ACC up by 1.19% and HDFC up by 1.10%.

On the flip side, Coal India down by 1.33%, IDFC down by 1.30%, Axis Bank down by 1.16%, Jindal Steel down by 1.05% and Wipro down by 1.01%, were the major losers on the index.

Most of the Asian equity indices were trading in the green; Shanghai Composite rose 14.87 points or 0.61% to 2,433.40, Jakarta Composite added 4.78 points or 0.10% to 4,614.56, Nikkei 225 soared 241.03 points or 2.16% to 11,414.86, Straits Times increased 2.41 points or 0.07% to 3,285.48 and Taiwan Weighted was down by 41.33 points or 0.52% to 7,947.98.

On the flip side, Hang Seng declined by 83.27 points or 0.36% to 23,361.29, KLSE Composite slipped by 3.93 points or 0.24% to 1,624.00 and KOSPI Composite was down by 3.72 points or 0.19% to 1,977.46.