Market Live: Sensex, Nifty trade higher despite Brent crude hits $70 a barrel

11:05 am Gold Update: Gold prices rose 0.26 percent to Rs 29,465 per 10 grams in futures trading today as speculators raised bets, tracking firm trend overseas.

Gold for delivery in February was trading Rs 75, or 0.26 percent, higher at Rs 29,465 per 10 grams, in a business turnover of 376 lots.

Similarly, the metal for delivery in April was also trading higher by Rs 56, or 0.19 per cent, at Rs 29,430 per 10 grams in 34 lots.

Here are the top headlines at 11 am from Moneycontrol News’ Sakshi Batra

10:53 am Market Outlook: Midcap stocks witnessed a stellar rally last year with the Nifty Midcap index rising 50 percent in 2017. They were seen as one of the major reasons behind the market clocking fresh highs last year.

So, will the streak continue in this year? Macquarie Capital Securities strongly believes so. “Midcaps will perform strongly…in the near term, there could be some surprises in IT and pharma names. This could be a year where smaller businesses do well,” Sandeep Bhatia, Head of Equity-India at Macquarie Capital Securities told CNBC-TV18 in an interview.

Speaking on different sectors, Bhatia believes non-banking financial companies (NBFCs) are richly-valued. “They have gone through a bubble phase and we would want to stick to larger banks. PSU banks should do well. In the housing finance space, we are sticking to HDFC,” he told the channel.

10:40 am Management Interview: Bajaj Corp posted a weak set of earnings in the third quarter ended December, 2017 as advertising spends were on the rise. Growth in revenue however was supported by other operating revenues

Sumit Malhotra, MD, Bajaj Corp in an interview to CNBC-TV18 clarified that the decline in profits was not due to ad spends but more due to other income falling by Rs 9 crore on account of large treasury book.

The company has a large treasury book of around Rs 480 crore and returns from that came off, which accounted for mark to market (MTM) losses, said Malhotra.

He said business is coming back to normal post goods and services tax (GST) and Patanjali competition. The urban market growth is coming back and the Ayurvedic hair oil segment was the lowest growing segment in Q3.
However, the rural volume growth is a cause of concern. In hair oil volume growth is down to 2 percent and in light hair oil it is down to 9 percent.

The rural demand is expected to come back by April, May post the Rabi crop and government initiatives in terms of MSP and other likely announcements in the upcoming Budget.

10:20 am Market Update: Benchmark indices continued to trade higher in morning, with the Sensex hovering around 34,600 level despite Brent crude oil hit December 2014 high of USD 70 a barrel.

The 30-share BSE Sensex was up 99.01 points at 34,602.50 and the 50-share NSE Nifty gained 29.80 points at 10,681.

About 1,584 shares advanced against 732 declining shares on the BSE.

10:10 am Market Outlook: Hadrien Mendonca of IIFL said the New Year cheer extended to the second consecutive week in a row in the year 2018 as the benchmark indices once again closed at fresh lifetime highs. We may call it a pre-Budget rally or positive global wave but what is evident is that the momentum continues to persist.

For the past few days, the Nifty50 has been trying to digest the rally from 10,400 to 10,600 in the previous week. These are healthy signs as even when the index is consolidating it is managing to hit fresh highs.

What’s more intriguing is that the weekly chart is pointing out at another fresh breakout. The projections indicate that Nifty is all set to fire up towards the 10,850-10,900 zone.

While any decline towards the 10,575 mark should be a healthy opportunity to re-enter which is the crucial near-term support for the Nifty.

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

9:55 am Rupee Trade: The rupee strengthened by 11 paise to 63.55 against the dollar in opening trade today on fresh selling of the US currency by exporters and banks.

Forex dealers said a weak dollar in overseas markets on fears that a huge amount of foreign demand for American currency would dry up bolstered the rupee.

Yesterday, the rupee had settled lower by 6 paise at 63.66 on fresh bouts of demand for the American currency.

9:40 am Buzzing: Shares of Shree Cements rose 1.5 percent in the early trade on strong December quarter numbers.

The company has reported a better-than-expected December quarter numbers, with net profit increased 41.6 percent at Rs 333.3 crore against Rs 235.4 crore posted during the same quarter last year.

The revenue also grew 23.1 percent at Rs 2,296.2 crore against Rs 1,864.4 crore, year-on-year.

The company in its board meeting held on January 11 approved the acquisition of majority equity stake (minimum 92.83 percent) in Union Cement Company (UCC), UAE for an enterprise value of USD 305.24 million (Rs 1,945 crore).

9:29 am IPO Subscription: The initial public offer (IPO) of Apollo Micro Systems, which caters primarily to the defence and aerospace sectors, was subscribed 9 times on the second day of bidding on Thursday.

The IPO, to raise Rs 156 crore, received bids for 3,72,44,150 shares against the total issue size of 41,44,955 shares, data available with the NSE showed.

The category set aside for qualified institutional buyers (QIBs) was subscribed 3.25 times, non institutional investors 1.58 times and retail investors 15.14 times.

9:20 am Buzzing: Jain Irrigation rallied 5 percent and IFCI gained 4 percent after both stocks came out of F&O ban.

9:15 am Market Check: Equity benchmarks opened at fresh record high on last day of the week, with the Nifty inching towards new milestone of 10,700, tracking record highs on Wall Street.

The 30-share BSE Sensex was up 112.01 points at 34,615.50 and the 50-share NSE Nifty rose 31.10 points to 10,682.30.

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

TCS fell nearly 1 percent on profit booking. Brokerage houses maintained their ratings following in-line numbers.

Infosys gained 0.5 percent ahead of Q3 earnings later today. A CNBC-TV18 poll expects 1 percent growth in dollar revenue.

Vedanta, IOC and Indiabulls Housing Finance were other gainers.

Nifty Midcap index was up 0.4 percent. Amtek Auto, Subros, Sarda Enegy and Aban Offshore gained 3-5 percent while Sintex Plastics fell 4 percent.

All three major US indices finished solidly higher at records as investors appeared to jump at the chance to buy stocks at lower prices following Wednesday’s modest pullback.