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Benchmarks extends gains in late afternoon session
Mar-31-2020

The Indian equity benchmarks extended their gains in late afternoon session, with the Sensex and the Nifty gaining over 800 and 200 points, respectively. Buying activity remained persistent across all sectors on improved investor confidence after government has put off implementation of the uniform stamp duty on transfer of shares, debentures, futures, options, currency and other capital market instruments to July 1, 2020. Markets maintain upward momentum, as in line with the Budget announcement, the Reserve Bank opened certain specified categories of government securities (g-secs) for non-resident investors as part of an initiative to deepen the bond market. Traders ignored domestic credit rating agency India Ratings (Ind-Ra) cuts its FY21 growth forecast to 3.6% amid coronavirus-related worries. It has assumed that a full or partial lockdown will continue till end of April and economic activities will be gradually restored only after May. Besides, the impact of the novel coronavirus outbreak has been felt in the collection of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) for February, with the government collecting Rs 98,000 crore so far (till March 30, 2020). Sector wise, auto stocks remained in focus with a private report that auto sales for March could see a 50% year-on-year (Y-o-Y) decline in volumes, given the lockdown and decline in footfall during the second half of the month.

On the global front, European markets were trading higher, after a rebound in Chinese purchasing managers indexes, slowing growth in new coronavirus cases and progress on a vaccine. Back home, traders took note of report that the government has budgeted a total of Rs 42,000 crore towards disaster relief in the FY21 budget. From April onwards, these budget lines will be available to states to fight against COVID-19 among other calamities.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 29330.07, up by 889.75 points or 3.13% after trading in a range of 28667.36 and 29509.67. There were 27 stocks advancing against 3 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index gained 1.92%, while Small cap index was up by 1.95%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Oil & Gas up by 7.33%, Energy up by 6.03%, Metal up by 5.29%, PSU up by 4.37% and FMCG was up by 4.08%, while there were no losers on sectoral indices on the BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were ONGC up by 6.15%, Ultratech Cement up by 5.73%, HCL Tech up by 5.68%, Reliance Industries up by 5.58% and ITC up by 5.52%. On the flip side, Indusind Bank down by 13.69%, Maruti Suzuki down by 2.33% and Bajaj Finance down by 0.12% were the few losers.

Meanwhile, in a big relief to the agriculture sector, the government has extended the interest subsidy to all crop loans of up to Rs 3 lakh given by banks which are due or will be due between March 1, 2020 and May 31, 2020.

The decision comes as many farmers are not being able to go to banks for payment of their loan dues on account of restrictions imposed due to the lockdown to curb COVID-19. The agriculture ministry noted that due to difficulties in timely sale and receipt of payment of their produce, farmers may face issues in repayment of loans which are due during this period.

Under the Interest Subvention Scheme, a subvention of two per cent per annum is provided for short-term crop loan of up to Rs 3,00,000 per farmer, provided the lending institutions make available short-term credit at the ground level at seven per cent per annum to farmers. An additional interest subvention of three per cent per annum is available to the prompt payee farmers, thus providing loans at 4 per cent per annum interest rate on timely repayment.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 8570.00, up by 288.90 points or 3.49% after trading in a range of 8358.00 and 8604.05. There were 46 stocks advancing against 4 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were BPCL up by 12.17%, GAIL India up by 7.13%, Hindalco up by 6.81%, Wipro up by 6.52% and ONGC up by 6.47%. On the flip side, Indusind Bank down by 13.98%, Bajaj Finserv down by 2.02%, Maruti Suzuki down by 1.58% and Eicher Motors down by 0.26% were the top losers.

European markets were trading higher; UK’s FTSE 100 increased 105.60 points or 1.9% to 5,669.34, France’s CAC increased 68.09 points or 1.56% to 4,446.60 and Germany’s DAX was up by 250.82 points or 2.56% to 10,066.79.

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