Market Live: Sensex, Nifty, Midcap trade flat; Just Dial, Axis Bank most active

12:16 pm Earnings Estimates: Public sector lender Bank of Baroda’s second quarter profit is expected to fall 16.8 percent to Rs 459.3 crore against Rs 552.1 crore in year-ago. It may be impacted by higher provisions due to ageing of non-performing assets.

Net interest income, the difference between interest earned and interest expended, may increase 2.7 percent year-on-year to Rs 3,519.6 crore in Q2, according to average of estimates of analysts polled by CNBC-TV18.

Analysts feel if slippages come below Rs 3,500 crore (against Rs 5,200 crore in Q1FY18), gross non-performing assets improve (11.4 percent in Q1) and net interest margin comes above 2.5 percent (2.48 percent) then that would be taken positively by the Street.

12:05 pm WPI Inflation: Wholesale price index inflation for October month increased to 3.59 percent against 2.6 percent in previous month.

It was higher than CNBC-TV18 poll of 3.21 percent.

Food inflation increased to 3.23 percent from 1.99 percent MoM.

Here are the top headlines at 12 pm from Moneycontrol News’ Anchal Pathak

11:55 am Buzzing: Cadila Healthcare share price rallied nearly 3 percent after the company reported healthy 32.5 percent growth year-on-year in second quarter profit at Rs 503.3 crore.

Revenue grew by 37.4 percent while operating profit increased 67.5 percent to Rs 857 crore and margin expanded by 480 basis points to 26.5 percent.

11:40 am Share sale: Bharti Airtel via its wholly owned subsidiary, Nettle Infrastructure Investments Limited today announced the successful divestment of 8.3 crore shares of its subsidiary Bharti Infratel through a secondary share sale in the stock market (NSE, BSE).

The sale was for a total consideration of over Rs 3,325 crore (USD 510 Million) and was executed at a price of Rs 400.6 per share, representing a discount of 3.6 percent to the previous day’s closing price.

The allocation was done to global investors, fund managers and long only funds, including many repeat investors. Led by healthy investor appetite, the deal was upsized by over 25 percent.

Bharti Airtel will primarily use the proceeds from this sale to reduce its debt. Following the closure of this transaction, Bharti Airtel and its wholly owned subsidiaries together have an equity holding of 53.51 percent in Bharti Infratel.

11:20 am Earnings estimates: Sun Pharmaceutical Industries’ second quarter profit is expected to fall sharply by 64 percent year-on-year to Rs 802 crore due to lower revenue as well as operating income.

Revenue during the quarter is seen declining 17 percent to Rs 6,861 crore compared with Rs 8,265 crore in same quarter last fiscal, according to average of estimates of analysts polled by CNBC-TV18.

EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation) is likely to fall 57 percent to Rs 1,357.4 crore and margin may shrink 1830 basis points to 20 percent YoY.

In Q2FY17, numbers included other operating income of Rs 501 crore (against Rs 15 crore YoY) aided by milestone payment due to Tildrakizumab licensing (studied for psoriasis) to Almiral, Spain for European market.

11:05 am Buzzing: Shares of Apollo Hospitals Enterprises touched 52-week low of Rs 981, slipping 1.5 percent today on the back dismal Q2 (July-September) numbers.

The company has reported 22.92 percent declined in its standalone net profit at Rs 70.90 crore in the quarter ended September against net profit of Rs 91.99 crore in the same quarter last year.

The revenue of the company rose 112 percent at Rs 1,851.64 crore against Rs 1,634.10 crore.

Axis Capital has put buy rating on stock with a target of Rs 1410 per share.

According to the firm, the company’s Q2 numbers were steady and EBITDA of Rs 220 crore was ahead of their estimate of Rs 190 crore.

11:01 am Management interview: In an interview to CNBC-TV18’s Latha Venkatesh, Rajiv Lall, MD & CEO, IDFC Bank said everything about the Shriram merger fall out was in the public domain. There was a valuation mismatch that led to the deal falling through, he added.

However, he confirmed that they are not shutting out anything inorganic and will continue to explore various alternatives.

He empathetically denied they had honed in on Manappuram Finance with regards to inorganic growth but said they routinely look at options and are speaking to a lot of people.

When asked about the stressed book, he said they have always been transparent about it. He further explained that their total advances as of September, 2017 stood at Rs 69,000 crore of which Rs 29,000 crore of total advances are legacy and those assets, which they did not desire to grow. Out of this Rs 29000 which are largely infra assets, Rs 7000 crore are stressed, he said.

10:55 am Buzzing: Repco Home Finance shares rallied nearly 14 percent intraday after strong set of earnings for July-September quarter. Edelweiss has maintained its buy rating on the stock with a target price of Rs 892 per share.

The target price implies 51 percent upside in the stock compared with its Monday’s closing price.

Edelweiss believes structurally Repco Home Finance has the potential to grow manifolds in under-served markets capitalising on emerging opportunities, which will help deliver superior return ratios.

10:40 am BharatNet second phase: The second phase of BharatNet project with an outlay of Rs 31,000 crore and a mandate to provide high-speed broadband to all panchayats by March 2019 got off the block on Monday.

Additionally, the Department of Telecom requested all states to provide a list of unconnected villages so that all of them can be connected with telecom services by 2020.

Telecom Minister Manoj Sinha, along with Law and IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad, Human Resource Development Minister Prakash Javadekar and Bihar Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi were present at the launch of the second phase of the project.

“Under the project, we will provide 1 gbps (gigabuit per second) bandwidth capacity at panchayat level. The Cabinet in July 2017 approved a modified implementation strategy for BharatNet which include…project completion for all 2.5 lakh panchayats by March 2019,” Sinha said at the launch.

The telecom ministry expects to complete the first phase of the project covering over 1 lakh panchayats by the end of December.

10:35 am Market Check: Equity benchmarks as well as broader markets continued to trade flat in morning due to lack of cues. Investors focussed on September quarter earnings as more than 200 companies will announce numbers today.

The 30-share BSE Sensex was down 14.16 points at 33,019.40 and the 50-share NSE Nifty fell 8.80 points to 10,216.20.

Bharti Infratel remained the most active stock on exchanges due to multiple block deals. Reports suggested that Bharti Airtel was likely to sell around 4 percent stake in the company.

Kotak Mahindra Bank, Just Dial, Axis Bank, SBI and Sun Pharma were other most active shares.

10:26 am Market Outlook: The September quarter earnings season is almost over and thankfully it has not been that disappointing as was expected. India Inc. reported results which were largely in-line with estimates but the recovery in earnings is likely to take place only by second half of FY18.

“In general, companies have reported decent numbers compared to expectations. In terms of Nifty50 names, EBITDA is slightly ahead of our estimates especially for companies such as RIL, Tata Motors, Bharti Airtel etc.” Sanjeev Prasad, co-head, Kotak Institutional Equities said in an interview with CNBC-TV18.

10:12 am Order Win: Shares of Jain Irrigation Systems rose 1.6 percent as it has received contract worth Rs 183 crore.

The company’s pipe division has been awarded a contract of Jalgaon City Water Supply Scheme under the Amrut Abhiyan Yojana.

The contract includes design and construction of 661Km of pipeline and required elevated storage reservoirs and pump houses.

The said project is to be completed in 24 months.

In the last one month, this is a third major project, in the water supply sector i.e. drinking & piped irrigation has been awarded to pipe division of the company, as per company release.

Here are the top headlines at 10 am from Moneycontrol News’ Anchal Pathak

10:00 am Listing: Footwear retailer Khadim India started off the first day on a tepid note. The stock listed at Rs 723 on the National Stock Exhange, a 3.6 percent discount to issue price of Rs 750 per share.

The stock fell as much as 4.5 percent in early trade to hit day’s low of Rs 716 while its pre-opening price of Rs 730 remained the highest level.

9:55 am Bids for Jaypee Infratech: Metals and mining giant Vedanta has submitted a preliminary expression of interest (EoI) for Jaypee Infratech currently undergoing the Insolvency Resolution Proceedings (IRP).

The company has “submitted a preliminary non-binding Expression of Interest for submission of resolution plan of Jaypee Infratech Ltd under corporate insolvency process (CIRP),” Vedanta Ltd said in a BSE filing.

It, however, said that no negotiations have taken place on this with Jaypee Infratech Ltd.

The statement comes amid reports that Vedanta is among the few players who have shown interest in buying Jaypee Infratech in full or in part.

9:50 am Pre-opening: Khadim India share price has settled at Rs 730 on the National Stock Exchange, lower by 2.7 percent from issue price of Rs 750 per share.

9:45 am Earnings Reaction: Shares of Madhucon Projects, Jindal Poly Films and Tamil Nadu Newsprint were down 3-8 percent in morning on the back of poor Q2 (July-September) numbers.

Madhucon Projects has recorded 64 percent fall in its Q2 net profit at RS 3.3 crore and revenue was down 14 percent at Rs 118 crore.

Jindal Poly Films’ Q2 net profit declined 40 percent at Rs 41.2 crore and revenue was down 2 percent at Rs 1,807 crore. EBITDA was flat at Rs 162.6 crore, while margin was up 20 bps at 9 percent.

Tamil Nadu Newsprint (TNPL) has reported loss of Rs 13 crore in the quarter ended September against profit of Rs 70.5 crore, in the same quarter last fiscal.

9:36 am Buzzing: Share price of Havells India gained 1 percent in the early trade on signing pact with Hyundai Electric & Energy Systems.

Hyundai Electric & Energy Systems and Havells India announced the signing of memorandum of understanding (MoU) to mutually explore and supply low and medium voltage protection and switching devices, as per company release.

Under the agreement, Hyundai Electric will supply low and medium voltage protection and switching devices to Havells as brand labeling.

Hyundai Electric will also grant manufacturing license and technology transfer for low-capacity Magnetic Contactors (MC) and Molded Case Circuit Breakers (MCCBs) to Havells.

9:26 am Listing: Footwear retailer Khadim India will list on the bourses today following the conclusion of its Rs 543 crore initial public offer last week.

Khadim India’s IPO was subscribed 1.90 times during November 2-6. The price band for the offer was fixed at Rs 745-750 per share.

The IPO comprised fresh issue of equity shares aggregating up to Rs 50 crore, besides an offer for sale of up to 65,74,093 shares by existing shareholders.

The net proceeds from the issue are to be utilised towards payment of loans and general corporate purposes. Axis Capital and IDFC Bank were the book running lead managers to the issue.

9:20 am MSCI rejigs index constituents: In the semi-annual index review for the MSCI equity indexes, Britannia, Petronet LNG and Vakrangee have been added to MSCI Global Standard Index while Apollo Hospitals has been removed. The MSCI Global Small Cap Index has seen 30 additions and 10 deletions. The stocks that have been added include CDSL, Chambal Fertilisers, Cochin Shipyard, DCM Shriram, Deepak Fertilisers, Eris Lifescience, Fortis Healthcare, Gujarat Alkalies, Gulf Oil Lubricants, Himadri Chemicals, IDFC, Jindal Saw, Jindal Stainless, Minda Industries, Nesco, Quess Corp, Radico Khaitan, Rain Industries, Shankara Building Products, Suprajit Engineering, Techno Electric, Tejas Networks, Time Techno, Uflex, VIP Industries and Welspun Corp. The exclusions include Adani Transmission, Future Retail, Indo Count, JB Chemicals, Kansai Nerolac, Kushal, L&T Finance, TVS Motor, Vakrangee and Videocon.

9:15 am Market Check: Equity benchmarks opened flat on Tuesday after sharp correction seen in previous session. Investors focussed on corporate earnings.

The 30-share BSE Sensex was down 14.55 points at 33,019.01 and the 50-share NSE Nifty fell 3 points to 10,222.

Coal India, Vedanta, BPCL, L&T and Bharti Infrtel were early losers.

Sun Pharma, HCL Technologies, Bharti Airtel, M&M, Lupin, Yes Bank, Kotak Mahindra Bank and Eicher Motors were early gainers.

PTC India Financial, Dhanlaxmi Bank, United Bank, Jindal Poly and TNPL fell 1-8 percent after weak earnings. Repco Home, Satin Creditcare, KEI Industries and NMDC were under pressure.
Vakrangee, Future Retail and Apollo Hospital gained 2-4 percent.