Market Live: Sensex higher, Nifty above 9600; Tata Motors, HDFC Bank lead

10:00 am Market check: Equity benchmarks continued to trade marginally higher in morning trade but the broader markets outperformed.

The 30-share BSE Sensex was up 36.37 points at 31,112.10 and the 50-share NSE Nifty rose 22.55 points to 9,600.60 while the BSE Midcap and Smallcap indices gained over half a percent on positive market breadth.

About two shares advanced for every share falling on the BSE.

ITC, Tata Motors, ICICI Bank, M&M and Axis Bank were top contributors to Sensex’ gains while Reliance Industries, Infosys, Wipro and TCS were under pressure.

9:30 am FII View: Ridham Desai of Morgan Stanley said three-month return correlations across stocks have plummeted to single-digit levels for only the third time in 15 years.

The previous two occasions were accompanied by a major upward move in the market.

“The directional view on the market is more difficult for us to judge, even though in our base case we think that the pace of returns will slow down in the second half of 2017, Desai said.

Also read – Buy, Sell, Hold: 3 stocks and 1 sector on analysts’ radar today

9:15 am Market Check: Equity benchmarks opened moderately higher on Friday, with the Nifty reclaiming 9600 level despite mixed Asia trade.

The 30-share BSE Sensex was up 66.32 points at 31,142.05 and the 50-share NSE Nifty rose 26.40 points to 9,604.45.

HDFC Bank and Tata Motors were leaders in early trade while Infosys, Reliance Industries, HDFC and Asian Paints were under pressure.

The broader markets marginally outperformed benchmarks, with the BSE Midcap and Smallcap indices rising 0.4 percent each. Four shares advanced for every share falling on the National Stock Exchange.

Bhushan Steel (down 3 percent), Jyoti Structures (down 13 percent) and Amtek Auto (down 13 percent) were sharply under pressure after sources told CNBC-TV18 that these companies are in the list of 12 accounts to be sent to Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC).

Ipca Labs was down 13 percent after USFDA said all drugs manufactured at Ratlam unit will not be allowed to sell in the US.

BPCL, HPCL and IOC gained 1-3 percent.

The Indian rupee declined in the early trade. It has opened lower by 12 paise at 64.66 per dollar, lowest level since May 30, against 64.54 on Thursday.

Ashutosh Raina of HDFC Bank said the shrinking of Fed balance sheet can impact the EM currencies including rupee, and one can expect some weakness going ahead. He expects the USD/INR currency pair to trade in 64.40-64.70/dollar range today.
Indexes in Asia traded mixed following the declines in tech stocks on Wall Street and the Bank of Japan announced monetary policy. Japan’s benchmark Nikkei 225 index gained 0.53 percent while South Korea’s Kospi erased earlier gains to trade lower by 0.11 percent.