Daily Newsletter
NSE Intra-day chart (20 February 2018)
Top Gainers
Company NameClose% Change
Top Losers
Company NameClose% Change
World Indices
IndicesLast Trade% Change
Indices
IndicesLast Trade% Change
FII Activity(Rs. Cr)
DateMarketGross PurchaseGross SalesNet Change
Equity
Debt
Equity
Debt
Equity
Debt
 
Market Commentary 21 February 2018
Markets likely to start marginally in green

 

Extending their losing streak for third straight session, Indian equity benchmarks settled in red terrain on Tuesday. After a cautious start markets gained momentum and traded in green for most part of the day with traders taking encouragement with Suresh Prabhu's statement that the government will soon come out with a comprehensive strategy to increase the share of global trade to 40 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP), which is expected to touch $5 trillion by 2025. Some support also came with NASSCOM, the IT industry body enlightening that the Indian Information Technology industry expects to grow exports at a marginally higher 7-9 percent in the coming fiscal, slightly higher than its expected growth of 7.8 percent in the current financial year. In June last year, NASSCOM had said it expects growth of 7-8 percent this fiscal. It expects to add $14-16 billion in revenue in the coming year. However, sentiments turned pessimistic and sharp selloff in last leg of trade dragged markets lower. Traders turned cautious ahead of February Futures & Options (F&O) series to be expired on Thursday i.e. February 22, 2018. Traders also remained concerned after the government said the amount of money claimed by exporters as tax refunds under Goods and Service Tax (GST), from the time the regime came into force in July 2017, till December of that year, is Rs 55 billion. This is a major comedown from the Rs 65 billion that the Finance Ministry had announced last year as refunds claimed till October. Exporters continue to assert that thousands of millions worth of tax refunds are yet to be released by the authorities. Investors also took note that the GST Council, headed by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, is likely to meet next week to decide on ease of compliance in filing the GST returns. Since the implementation of the GST on July 1, 2017, traders have been complaining about technical glitches in the GSTN, besides the complex process. Finally, the BSE Sensex shed 71.07 points or 0.21% to 33,703.59, while the CNX Nifty was down by 18 points or 0.17% to 10,360.40.

 

The US market snapped six-day winning streak on Tuesday, with the Dow and S&P 500 weighed down by a steep loss for Walmart as investors also watched climbing bond yields, which could make equities less attractive at current levels. A renewed push higher for US bond yields - with the dollar also stronger - was being blamed for the market's weakness. Climbing bond yields - reflecting rising inflation worries - were the spark that set off the market meltdown earlier this month. Some of the US government's short-term borrowing costs rose to their highest level in more than nine years as the government raised $179 billion in the Treasury securities market to fund spending and make debt payments. Tuesday's auctions made up more than half of the $258 billion in Treasury debt supply scheduled for sale this week, which is projected to raise nearly $48 billion in new cash for the government. Wednesday's release of minutes from the Federal Reserve's January policy meeting, the last chaired by Janet Yellen, will be combed for clues to the central bank's thinking on interest rates. The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 254.63 points or 1.01 percent to 24,964.75, Nasdaq was down by 5.157 points or 0.07 percent to 7,234.31, and S&P 500 dropped 15.96 points or 0.58 percent to 2,716.26.

 

Crude oil prices edged higher for fifth straight session on Tuesday amid reports that Saudi Arabia wants $70 oil. It was previously thought that over $60 oil would compel the Saudis to pump more oil in an effort to keep prices low. Meanwhile, the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and non-OPEC oil producers, including Russia, will discuss extending their cooperation for many more years when they meet in June as they seek to avoid major market shocks. Monday's U.S. holiday for Presidents Day supported U.S. West Texas Intermediate's (WTI) performance compared with Brent as the U.S. markets caught up with Monday's gains. Benchmark crude oil futures for March delivery surged 24 cents at $61.94 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. However, April Brent crude lost 42 cents or 0.06 percent to settle at $65.25 a barrel on London's Intercontinental Exchange.

 

Stretching slide for the second straight session, Indian rupee depreciated to near three-month low against dollar on Tuesday, on increased selling of the US currency by exporters and banks. The domestic currency made a weak start and remained under pressure throughout the day due to the dollar strength against other currencies overseas. Traders also remained concerned after the government said the amount of money claimed by exporters as tax refunds under Goods and Service Tax (GST), from the time the regime came into force in July 2017, till December of that year, is Rs 55 billion. This is a major comedown from the Rs 65 billion that the Finance Ministry had announced last year as refunds claimed till October. Exporters continue to assert that thousands of millions worth of tax refunds are yet to be released by the authorities. Besides, selling in late hour of trade in the domestic equity markets, added some extra pressure on the rupee. On the global front, dollar continued its rebound from three-year lows on Tuesday, having recovered 1.5 percent since Friday on the view that the US currency was due a correction after a brutal sell-off in recent weeks. Finally, the rupee ended at 64.79, 58 paise weaker from its previous close of 64.21 on Friday.

 

The FIIs as per Tuesday's data were net buyers in equity segment, while they were net sellers in debt segment, in equity segment, the gross buying was of Rs 9845.98 crore against gross selling of Rs 8688.69 crore, in the debt segment, the gross purchase was of Rs 172.59 crore with gross sales of Rs 675.14 crore. Besides, in the hybrid segment, the gross buying was of Rs 1.24 crore against gross selling of Rs 1.83 crore.

 

The US markets ended lower on Tuesday as traders digested recent volatility and expressed some uncertainty about the near-term outlook for the markets. Traders also remained reluctant to make more significant moves amid a quiet day on the U.S. economic front. Asian markets were trading mostly in green despite the softer lead stateside, with more convincing gains seen in Taiwan. The Japanese stock market recovered after a weak start and is modestly higher on Wednesday, with a weaker yen lifting exporters' shares. Indian equity markets succumbed to selling pressure for the third day running on Tuesday as worries intensified about fallout from a $1.77 billion fraud at Punjab National Bank and investors waited for the minutes of the latest Federal Reserve meeting for clues on the U.S. rate outlook. Today, markets is likely to make flat-to-positive start, as traders may go for bargain hunting after three successive days of losses. However, renewed selling by foreign investors on worries over the Rs 11,300 crore fraud case at Punjab National Bank (PNB), concerns over the government's fiscal position and chances of another interest rate hike from the Federal Reserve in March may keep underlying sentiment cautious. Traders will get some solace with report that the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has set up a five-member expert panel to look into the reasons for high divergence observed in asset classification and provisioning by banks. Meanwhile, Finance minister Arun Jaitley has come down heavily on public sector banks for not safeguarding taxpayers' money spent to keep them afloat. He warned that the government would explore all options to punish the cheats responsible for bank frauds. There will be buzz in software related stocks on report that India's software services sector will see revenue growth of 7-9 percent in constant currency terms in the fiscal year to March 2019. The forecast, which was put out at the annual summit of the National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM), is in line with the 7.8 percent revenue growth it expects in the six months to the end of March 2018.

 

Support and Resistance: NSE (Nifty) and BSE (Sensex)

 

Index

Previous close

Support

Resistance

NSE Nifty

10,360.40

10,328.92

10,410.62

BSE Sensex

33,703.59

33,587.34

33,890.40

 

Nifty Top volumes

 

Stock

Volume

Previous close (Rs)

Support  (Rs)

Resistance (Rs)

(in Lacs)

SBI

334.58

269.65

264.90

274.30

ICICI Bank

160.31

317.25

314.30

322.20

Vedanta

113.95

328.70

322.13

333.13

Yes Bank

113.89

308.70

305.43

314.03

Tata Steel

102.14

651.30

645.80

659.15

 

  • M&M is planning to make an additional investment at its Chakan plant in Maharashtra.
  • Tata Motors has inaugurated its 22nd commercial vehicle dealership on February 16, 2018 in the state of Maharashtra through Ujwal Automotives in Nashik.
  • Indian Oil Corporation has entered into partnership with payments platform, PhonePe.
  • Sun Pharmaceutical Industries' one of the wholly owned subsidiaries has increased its shareholding in Ranbaxy Malaysia.
News Analysis