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Benchmarks trade with traction on firm global cues
Oct-17-2018

Indian equity benchmarks made a gap-up opening and are trading with traction in early deals on Wednesday, with frontline gauges recapturing their crucial 35,300 (Sensex) and 10,600 (Nifty) levels following firm trade in global markets. Sentiments remained up-beat with report that India has been ranked as the 58th most competitive economy on the World Economic Forum’s global competitiveness index for 2018, which was topped by the US. The WEF said India’s rank rose by five places from 2017, the largest gain among G20 economies. Traders also took some encouragement with the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) forecast that the share of investments in gross domestic product (GDP) will rise to 33% by FY23 from 31.4% recorded in the last fiscal. However, markets trim some of their initial gains with Commerce and Industry Minister Suresh Prabhu’s statement that no country can benefit from the decline in the world trade, and the slowing global economy is a concern for all nations including India.

Global cues too remained supportive with all the Asian counters trading in green at this point of time after upbeat US earnings reports drove a rebound on Wall Street and helped restore a little confidence in emerging market stocks and currencies. Recovering from previous session’s losses, the US markets settled higher on Tuesday as a batch of strong earnings reports pushed aside lingering tensions over trade and geopolitics that have pressured markets.

Back home, traders shrugged off report that investments in the Indian capital market through participatory notes (P-notes) hit a nearly nine-and-a-half year low of Rs 79,548 crore till September after registering a rise in such fund infusion in the preceding month. In scrip specific developments, Adani Enterprises gained on inking agreement with Total and Aurionpro Solutions strengthened with arm inking agreement to acquire stake in SC Soft.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 35398.20, up by 235.72 points or 0.67% after trading in a range of 35390.40 and 35605.43. There were 20 stocks advancing against 10 stocks declining on the index, while 1 stock remained unchanged.

The broader indices were trading mixed; the BSE Mid cap index declined 0.35%, while Small cap index was up by 0.27%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were IT up by 1.56%, TECK up by 1.45%, FMCG up by 1.21%, Bankex up by 0.50% and Utilities was up by 0.49%, while Healthcare down by 0.47%, Realty down by 0.33%, Oil & Gas down by 0.20% and Basic Materials was down by 0.06% were the few losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Infosys up by 2.99%, Hero MotoCorp up by 1.70%, ITC up by 1.54%, Coal India up by 1.48% and Hindustan Unilever up by 1.44%. On the flip side, Yes Bank down by 2.23%, ONGC down by 0.76%, Mahindra & Mahindra down by 0.56%, Adani Ports down by 0.54% and Sun Pharma down by 0.40% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, the World Economic Forum (WEF) in its latest Global Competitiveness Report for 2018 has ranked India the 58th most competitive economy. As per the report, India's rank rose by five places from 2017, the largest gain among G20 economies. India recorded a score of 62.0 in the Global Competitiveness Report.  According to the report, the top performers in the upper and lower middle-income brackets, such as China and India, are catching up with or even outperforming the average among high-income economies. The report stated that China, is already more advanced when it comes to investing in research and development sub-pillar than the average high-income economy, while India is not far behind and let down only by its less-efficient bureaucracy for business creation and insolvency.

India remained the South Asia's main driving force. India leads the region in all other areas of competitiveness except for health, education and skills, where Sri Lanka boasts the highest healthy life expectancy (67.8 years) and the workforce with the highest amount of schooling (9.8 years). The WEF in report said India's greatest competitive advantages include its market size, innovation (in particular the quality of its research establishments and business dynamism (including the number of disruptive businesses). While the areas that the country needs to improve include, labour market (in particular workers rights), product market (in particular trade tariffs) and skills (in particular pupil-teacher ratio).

On the list of 140 economies, the index was topped by the US, while Singapore and Germany were at the second and the third positions respectively. Other countries in the top 10 include Switzerland (4th), Japan (5th), Netherlands (6th), Hong Kong (7th), United Kingdom (8th), Sweden (9th) and Denmark (10th). Among the BRICS economies, China topped the list at 28th place with a score of 72.6, ahead of the Russian Federation (65.6, 43rd), India (62.0, 58th), South Africa (60.8, 67th), and Brazil (59.5, 72nd).

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 10631.15, up by 46.40 points or 0.44% after trading in a range of 10626.95 and 10710.15. There were 27 stocks advancing against 23 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Infosys up by 3.14%, HCL Tech up by 1.90%, Coal India up by 1.75%, Hero MotoCorp up by 1.66% and GAIL India up by 1.59%. On the flip side, Indiabulls Housing down by 12.18%, Yes Bank down by 5.52%, Bajaj Finance down by 1.80%, BPCL down by 1.72% and Indian Oil down by 1.14% were the top losers.

All the Asian markets are trading in green; Nikkei 225 surged 232.80 points or 1.02% to 22,782.04, Taiwan Weighted increased 57.88 points or 0.58% to 10,038.98, Straits Times soared 51.83 points or 1.68% to 3,086.14, Jakarta Composite jumped 32.50 points or 0.56% to 5,833.32, KOSPI added 19.93 points or 0.92% to 2,165.05 and Shanghai Composite was up by 2.55 points or 0.1% to 2,548.88.
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