Indices were trading with modest losses in the mid-morning trade. At 11:19 IST, the barometer index, the S&P BSE Sensex, was down 134.34 points or 0.36% at 37,250.65. The Nifty 50 index was down 37.35 points or 0.34% at 11,038.55.
The S&P BSE Mid-Cap index was up 0.12%. The S&P BSE Small-Cap index was up 0.52%, outperforming the Sensex.
The market breadth, indicating the overall health of the market, was positive. On the BSE, 1213 shares rose and 837 shares fell. A total of 134 shares were unchanged.
Realty stocks were trading higher after Finance minister announced new measures to boost housing and facilitate home buyers. The Phoenix Mills (up 4.7%), Indiabulls Real Estate (up 3.13%), Sobha (up 1.46%), Mahindra Lifespace Developers (up 1.45%) and Godrej Properties (up 0.69%) advanced. The S&P BSE Realty was up 0.37% at 2,066.68.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman addressed a press conference on Saturday, 14 September 2019. FM announced relaxation of external commercial borrowing (ECB) guidelines for affordable housing. ECB guidelines will be relaxed to facilitate financing of home buyers who are eligible under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (PMAY), in consultation with Reserve Bank of India (RBI). This is in addition to the existing norms for ECB for affordable housing. Furthermore, the interest rate on house building advance shall be lowered and linked with the 10 Year G-Sec Yields. The FM also addressed to set up fund as a category - II AIF trust and which would be professionally run with experts from housing and banking sector. The fund size of Rs 10,000 crore will be contributed by GOI and roughly same amount from outside investors.
FM also announced new export promotion scheme for the remission of duties or taxes on export products. This scheme will completely replace Merchandise Exports from India Scheme (MEIS) and Rebate of State Levies (ROSL).
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Larsen & Toubro was trading 0.74% lower at Rs 1353.30. The company said that its water and effluent treatment business secured a 'significant' order from the West Bengal Public Health Engineering Department for construction of an intermediate pumping station, secondary transmission mains, overhead tanks and water distribution network. The work order includes 2 years of operation and maintenance in the Nandigram-I and Nandigram-II blocks of East Medinipur, West Bengal.
On the domestic macro front, India's merchandise exports declined 6% to US$ 26.13 billion in August 2019 over a year ago. Meanwhile, merchandise imports dipped 13.4% to US$ 39.58 billion. The trade deficit narrowed 24.9% to US$ 13.45 billion in August 2019 from US$ 17.39 billion in August 2018.
India's services exports increased 8.7% to US$ 19.08 billion in July 2019 over July 2018. Meanwhile, India's services imports jumped 18.2% to US$ 12.83 billion in July 2019. India's services trade surplus declined 6.7% to US$ 6.26 billion in July 2019 from US$ 6.70 billion in July 2018.
Overseas, Asian stocks were trading mixed as oil prices surged following drone attacks over the weekend that hit major oil production facilities in Saudi Arabia. Japanese market was shut for a public holiday.
A cut in the reserve requirement ratio for banks by the People's Bank of China (PBOC) went into effect on Monday. The PBOC said in early September that its reserve requirement ratio would be cut by 50 basis points and it would further reduce that ratio by 100 basis points for some qualified banks. That is set to release 800 billion yuan ($113 billion) in liquidity into the economy.
US stocks ended mixed on Friday as a drop in Apple stock countered cooling US-China trade tensions. Tariff-vulnerable industrials helped keep the blue-chip Dow in positive territory, which has now gained in eight straight sessions, its longest winning streak since May 2018.
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