Banks, Tata stocks help Nifty end over 2-month closing high
Equity benchmarks closed at over two-month closing high on Monday despite weak global cues, driven by banking & financials and Tata Group stocks. However, the selling in index heavyweights Infosys, Reliance Industries and ITC weighed on the market.Overall it was a volatile session for the market as investors awaited quarterly earnings. The 30-share BSE Sensex was up 50.11 points at 27288.17 and the 50-share NSE Nifty rose 12.45 points to 8412.80, extending last week’s rally.
Jayant Manglik of Religare Securities says indications are favourable for this trajectory to extend further and he expects the Nifty to test 8500 soon.
The positive bias for the market is largely due to better than expected Q3 results so far, Vinod Nair of Geojit BNP Paribas says. Going ahead market will watch the outcome from GST council meet today, any positive signs will provide further push to the current trajectory, he feels.
The broader markets marginally outperformed benchmarks, with the BSE Midcap and Smallcap indices rising 0.3 percent and 0.6 percent, respectively. About 1534 shares advanced against 1240 declining shares on the BSE.
Asian markets ended lower as investors awaited more detail on the UK’s Brexit plan and the inauguration of President-elect Donald Trump in the US later this week. European markets too were lower with France’s CAC and Germany’s DAX falling 0.6 percent each, at the time of writing this article.
Meanwhile, wholesale inflation for December came in at 3.39 percent, marginally higher than 3.15 percent in November. Numbers for October have been revised to 3.79 percent from 3.39 percent.
Nifty Bank closed above 19,000 level for the first time since November 17, rising 1 percent as Punjab National Bank, SBI, HDFC Bank, Bank of Baroda and Axis Bank gained 1-3 percent. ICICI Bank was up half a percent.
Tata Group stocks were in limelight after a media report indicated that borrowing costs could fall 20-30bps after appointment of Chandra as Chairman of Tata Sons. Tata Steel gained 2.7 percent and TCS was up 0.3 percent.
Tata Motors shares surged 2.3 percent. CLSA raised target price on the stock to Rs 650 (from Rs 585 earlier) on likely significant improvement in both JLR and India businesses. Even benefits of significant pound depreciation will flow through into JLR’s margin that may improve to 16 percent by FY19 from 10.3 percent in Q2FY17, it feels.
IT major Infosys fell for second consecutive session, down 2 percent (on top of 2.5 percent fall on Friday) after December quarter earnings but analysts are not so perturbed by its performance in Q3FY17. Morgan Stanley continues to be overweight on the stock with target price at Rs 1130 per share. It says though Q3 performance was in-line, lack of ‘beat & raise’ could explain some of the weakness in stock price. It says while risk reward is favourable, stock may trade in range till FY18 guidance.
Among others, HDFC gained a percent while Reliance Industries, ONGC and Sun Pharma fell over a percent.
In the broader space, DHFL shares surged 6.5 percent after reporting a solid 31.7 percent jump YoY in Q3 profit on strong net interest income.
Sical Logistics spiked 9 percent on letter of intent worth Rs 304.92 crore from Northern coal fields, MP while SPML Infra jumped 7.5 percent on new orders worth Rs 800 crore in Tripura, Jharkhand & West Bengal.
Hindustan Zinc gained 3 percent after Q3 mined metal production increased 44 percent at 2.76 lakh tonnes (QoQ). CMI rallied 8 percent on board approval for allotment of equity shares to promoters on preferential basis at Rs 300/share.
