FIRM START

Buoyed by firm global cues, Indian equity benchmarks have made a gap-up start with both the frontline indices re-capturing their crucial 5,700 (Nifty) and 19,000 (Sensex) levels. Global risk appetite improved amid speculation that the Federal Reserve will continue stimulus measures to boost the world's biggest economy. Asian shares rebounded strongly on Tuesday after a sharp sell-off triggered by slumping Chinese stocks the previous session, as a globally accommodative monetary stance helped revive risk appetite.

Back home, the traders' confidence got some boost with Moody's Investors Service giving thumbs up to Budget 2013, terming it credit positive for the sovereign rating of the country. Also, Finance Minister P Chidambaram has said that fiscal deficit in the current financial year is likely to be less than the provisional figure of 5.2 percent announced in the national budget last week. Buying in software counter too strengthened the sentiments. Stocks like Infosys, TCS, Wipro and HCL Tech edged higher after the Indian rupee hit the lowest level in nearly two months on March 4, 2013, before closing marginally stronger. The unit dropped earlier to a low of 55.15, the weakest since January 8, 2013. A weak rupee boosts revenue of IT firms in rupee terms as the sector derives a lion's share of revenue from exports.

Most of the sectoral indices opened higher with the realty and software leading the opening gains with over 1 per cent. Auto, oil and gas, banking, technology and metal indices were the other notable index movers in the opening trades while, consumer durables remained the lone loser 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 1,191 shares on the gaining side against 721 shares on the losing side while 84 shares remain unchanged.

The BSE Sensex opened at 18,943.62; about 65 points higher compared to its previous closing of 18,877.96, and has touched a high and a low of 19,035.60 and 18,943.62 respectively.

The index is currently trading at 19,001.63, up by 123.67 points or 0.66%. There were 19 stocks advancing against 10 declines and one remains unchanged on the index.

The overall market breadth has made a strong start with 61.07% stocks advancing against 34.72% declines. The broader indices were trading in-line with benchmarks; the BSE Mid cap and Small cap indices rose by 0.76% and 0.45% respectively. 

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were, Realty up by 1.64%, IT up by 1.17%, Auto up by 0.90%, Oil & Gas up by 0.89% and Bankex up by 0.87% while, Consumer Durables down by 0.48% was the sole loser on the index.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Tata Motors up by 2.67%, ICICI Bank up by 2.37%, RIL up by 1.53%, Wipro up by 1.34% and TCS up by 1.08%.

On the flip side, Bajaj Auto was down by 0.85%, Bharti Airtel was down by 0.81%, Cipla was down by 0.47%, HDFC Bank was down by 0.33% and Hero MotoCorp was down by 0.22% were the top losers on the Sensex.

Meanwhile, as per the credit rating agency, Crisil the government is likely to miss the revenue growth target of 23.4 percent in FY14 as its estimates from spectrum and divestment sale inflows are too ambitious. As per the report, given the weak GDP figures, along with the fact that it is an election year, achieving a budgeted revenue and expenditure target will be an arduous task and the Rs 58,000 crore expected from disinvestment and Rs 40,000 crore from spectrum sale are difficult to achieve. 

Regarding the economic growth for the next financial year, the Crisil report said 'as budgetary proposals are broadly in-line with our expectations, we retain our pre-budget forecast of 6.4 percent GDP for 2013-14, which is the midpoint of the GDP growth range (6.1 to 6.7 percent) that the budget has assumed'. On inflation, the rating agency said it would decline during the next financial year with WPI inflation averaging around 6.5 percent due to low crude oil price, strengthening of rupee and lower core inflation.

By adding further, it noted that the government's move for fiscal consolidation could hurt growth in the short-run, but it would also create an environment in which the Reserve Bank can cut interest rates and provide support to growth. 'We expect a lowering of the repo rate by 50-75 bps during the rest of 2013-14, due to lower inflation. This will lower the floor for the G-Sec rate and soften yields to around 7.7-7.8 percent by March-end 2014' it added.

Further, it also added that market borrowing of Rs 4.84 trillion for next fiscal against Rs 4.67 trillion this fiscal would create an upside pressure on 10-year G-Sec yields, while, rupee is likely to settle around 51-52 per dollar by the end of March 2014.

The CNX Nifty opened at 5,722.45; about 23 points higher as compared to its previous closing of 5,698.50, and has touched a high and a low of 5,742.35 and 5,722.40 respectively.

The index is currently trading at 5,736.05, up by 37.55 points or 0.66%. There were 38 stocks advancing against 12 declines on the index.

The top gainers of the Nifty were Tata Motors up by 2.74%, HCL Tech up by 2.43%, ICICI Bank up by 2.21%, JP Associates up by 2.13% and DLF up by 1.76%.

On the flip side, Power Grid down by 1.24%, Bharti Airtel down by 0.84%, Bajaj-Auto down by 0.82%, Ranbaxy down by 0.38% and HDFC Bank down by 0.34%, were the major losers on the index.

Most of the Asian equity indices were trading in the green; Shanghai Composite surged 25.11 points or 1.10% to 2,298.52, Hang Seng rose 59.25 points or 0.26% to 22,597.06, KLSE Composite jumped 5.59 points or 0.34% to 1,641.57, Nikkei 225 increased 52.98 points or 0.45% to 11,705.27, Straits Times added 9.07 points or 0.28% to 3,249.02, KOSPI Composite moved up 7.84 points or 0.39% to 2,020.99 and Taiwan Weighted was up by 42.91 points or 0.55% to 7,910.25.

On the flip side, Jakarta Composite was down by 3.87 points or 0.08% to 4,757.60.