Firm Asian peers pull benchmarks higher ~ Indian Stock Market Trends

The Indian equity markets are trading on a firm note after making a flat start tracking supportive cues from Asian counterparts. All the Asian peers barring Jakarta Composite were trading in the positive terrain at this point of time as China's Wholesale Price Index (WPI) was reported in line with market expectations while, the US markets closed flat overnight with investors opting to remain on sidelines on concerns of slow global economic recovery. Back home, NSE's Nifty breached its crucial 5,500 level and trading comfortably over that mark ahead of WPI numbers for the month of May slated to be released later part of the trade today. On the sectoral front realty witnessed the maximum gain in trade followed by banking and healthcare while, there were no losers on the BSE sectoral space. Meanwhile, PSU oil marketing companies viz., BPCL, HPCL and IOC all edged higher in the trade after crude prices declined further overnight on weak economic signals. The broader indices were going neck to neck with benchmarks. The market breadth has made a positive start; there were 1,162 shares on the gaining side against 417 shares on the losing side while 59 shares remained unchanged.

The BSE Sensex opened at 18,276.78; about 10 points higher compared to its previous closing of 18,266.03, and has touched a high of 18,372.64 while low remain its opening.

The index is currently trading at 18,371.03 up by 105.00 points or 0.57%. There were 25 stocks advancing against 5 declines on the index.

The overall market breadth has made a positive start with 70.94% stocks advancing against 25.46% declines. The broader indices were trading in line with benchmark; the BSE Mid cap and Small cap indices were up by 0.70% and 0.59% respectively.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were, Realty up by 1.28%, Bankex up by 1.01%, CG up by 1.01%, HC up by 0.94% and Metal was up by 0.77%. While, there were no losers on the index.

The top gainers on the Sensex were DLF up by 1.88%, Bajaj Auto up by 1.32%, HUL up by 1.31%, L&T up by 1.28% and ICICI Bank was up by 1.26%.

On the flip side, Tata Motors down by 1.17%, HDFC down by 0.65%, Maruti Suzuki down by 0.56%, Cipla down by 0.19% and Infosys down by 0.14% were the top losers on the index.

Meanwhile, India's farm credit surged by 11% to Rs 4.26 lakh crore in the 2010-11 fiscal, against the government's target of Rs 3.75 lakh crore. The extension of the interest rate subvention scheme for short term crop loans boosted the credit flow to the farm sector. Credit institutions had disbursed Rs 3.84 lakh crore during the previous fiscal year of 2009-10 against a target of Rs 3.25 lakh crore. The credit flow target for the current financial year (2011-12) has been fixed at Rs 4.75 lakh crore.

According to the agency-wise data released by Ministry of Agriculture, Commercial Banks were the top lenders with disbursal of Rs 3.14 lakh crore against the target of Rs 2.80 lakh crore followed by Cooperative Banks with 69 thousand crore versus target of Rs 55 thousand crore and Regional Rural Banks with 43 thousand crore against target of Rs 40 thousand crore. Over the years, agriculture credit flow has registered significant jump. It has gone up from Rs. 86,981 crore in 2003-04 to Rs. 4,26,531 crore in 2010-11, the data showed.

Banks have been asked to step up direct lending, especially to small and marginal farmers. The Government has been providing crop loans at concessional interest rates since 2006-07. In the current financial year (2011-12), the government is providing interest subvention by 3%, thus bringing down the effective rate of interest to 4% per annum. This interest subvention is provided to those farmers who repay their short term crop loans on time. In 2009-10 the subvention rate for timely repayment of crop loans was 1% which was raised to 2% in 2010-11 and further to 3% this year.

The S&P CNX Nifty opened at 5,485.60; about 3 points higher compared to its previous closing of 5,482.80, and has touched a high and a low of 5,520.15 and 5,484.20 respectively.

The index is currently trading at 5,518.60, higher by 35.80 points or 0.65%. There were 45 stocks advancing against just 5 declines on the index.

The top gainers of the Nifty were DLF up by 2.07%, Reliance Capital up by 2.01%, Dr Reddy up by 1.67%, Grasim up by 1.64% and Ranbaxy up by 1.54%.

Tata Motors down by 1.12%, Cipla down by 0.50%, HDFC down by 0.41%, Maruti Suzuki down by 0.40% and Infosys was down by 0.09%, were the major losers on the index.

All the Asian markets barring Jakarta Composite were trading in the green; Shanghai Composite was up 27.19 points or 1.01% to 2,727.57, Hang Seng was up 49.07 points or 0.22% to 22,557.15, KLSE Composite was up 2.36 points or 0.15% to 1,548.24, Nikkei 225 was up 96.81 points or 1.02% to 9,545.02, Straits Times was up 0.64 points or 0.02% to 3,059.68, Seoul Composite was up 31.06 points or 1.52% to 2,079.80 and Taiwan Weighted was up by 107.66 points or 1.24% to 8,820.61.

On the flip side, Jakarta Composite was down by 1.01 points or 0.03% to 3,747.75.