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Sensex, Nifty attain highest closing level in nearly 14 weeks

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Last Updated : Jul 24 2015 | 12:01 AM IST

Oil and auto stocks led rally for key benchmark indices. The barometer index, the S&P BSE Sensex, and the 50-unit CNX Nifty recorded gains of more than 1% each. Sensex and Nifty, both, attained their highest closing level in nearly 14 weeks. The market breadth indicating the overall health of the market was strong. The Sensex garnered 322.749 points or 1.15% to settle at 28,504.93. The BSE Mid-Cap index gained 1.3%, outperforming the Sensex. Meanwhile, the Rajya Sabha Select Committee on the Goods and Services Tax (GST) bill presented its report in the Rajya Sabha today, 22 July 2015.

Index heavyweight Reliance Industries (RIL) surged to 52-week high. Shares of TV broadcasting firm Zee Entertainment Enterprises jumped. Bank stocks edged higher on renewed buying.

Key indices today, 22 July 2015, snapped their two-day losing streak.

Foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) sold shares worth a net Rs 195.50 crore into secondary equity market yesterday, 21 July 2015, as per data from Central Depository Services (India). Domestic institutional investors (DIIs) bought shares worth a net Rs 146.32 crore yesterday, 21 July 2015, as per provisional data released by the stock exchanges.

Earlier, key indices bounced back after an initial slide triggered by weakness in Asian stocks. The Sensex and the 50-unit CNX Nifty, both, hit one-week low in early trade.

In overseas stock markets, European stocks edged lower as sentiment across equity markets worldwide was soured by a round of disappointing corporate earnings. Asian stocks edged lower amid disappointing results from technology and industrial heavyweights in the US. US stocks edged lower yesterday, 21 July 2015, after disappointing quarterly reports from IMB and United Technologies Corp.

The S&P BSE Sensex rose 322.79 points or 1.14% to settle at 28,504.93, its highest closing level since 16 April 2015. The index jumped 364.28 points at the day's high of 28,546.42 in late trade. The index lost 111.23 points at the day's low of 28,070.91 in early trade, its lowest level since 15 July 2015.

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The Nifty rose 104.05 points or 1.22% to settle at 8,633.50, its highest closing level since 16 April 2015. The index hit a high of 8,643.90 in intraday trade. The index hit a low of 8,498.65 in intraday trade, its lowest level since 15 July 2015.

The BSE Mid-Cap index rose 143.97 points or 1.3% to settle at 11,234.56, outperforming the Sensex. The BSE Small-Cap index rose 99.34 points or 0.66% to settle at 11,676.16, underperforming the Sensex.

The market breadth indicating the overall health of the market was strong. On BSE, 1,770 shares gained and 1,055 shares fell. A total of 118 shares were unchanged.

Among the sectoral indices on BSE, the S&P BSE Bankex index (up 1.45%) and BSE Oil & Gas index (up 2.36%) outperformed the Sensex. The S&P BSE FMCG index (up 0.71%), BSE Auto index (up 1.1%), BSE Healthcare index (up 0.94%), BSE IT index (down 0.4%), BSE Capital Goods index (up 0.37%), BSE Consumer Durables index (up 0.68%), BSE Metal index (up 0.95%), BSE Power index (up 1.07%), BSE Realty index (up 0.8%) and BSE Teck index (down 0.33%) underperformed the Sensex.

Index heavyweight and housing finance major HDFC rose 2.74% at Rs 1,345.55. The stock hit a high of Rs 1,349.30 and a low of Rs 1,304.40 intraday.

Auto stocks gained. Mahindra & Mahindra (up 3.39%), Bajaj Auto (up 2.93%),TVS Motor Company (up 2.35%), Hero MotoCorp (up 0.81%) and Maruti Suzuki India (up 0.64%) edged higher. Tata Motors (down 0.13%) and Eicher Motors (down 0.81%) edged lower.

Shares of commercial vehicles maker Ashok Leyland rose 2.65% to Rs 81.40. The stock hit record high of Rs 81.65 in intraday trade today, 22 July 2015.

Bank stocks edged higher on renewed buying. Among private bank stocks, IndusInd Bank (up 2.19%), Yes Bank (up 1.93%), ICICI Bank (up 1.8%), HDFC Bank (up 1.43%), Kotak Mahindra Bank (up 1.1%) and Axis Bank (up 0.81%) edged higher.

Among PSU bank stocks, Andhra Bank (up 2.61%), Union Bank of India (up 2%), Syndicate Bank (up 1.45%), UCO Bank (up 1.62%), IDBI Bank (up 1.26%), Bank of Baroda (up 1.16%), Bank of India (up 0.97%), Punjab National Bank (up 0.61%), Corporation Bank (up 0.39%) and Indian Overseas Bank (up 0.13%) edged higher. United Bank of India (down 0.42%) and Vijaya Bank (down 0.12%) edged lower.

State Bank of India (SBI) gained 1.67% at Rs 268.65. The Minister of State for Home Affairs, Kiren Rijiju said in a written reply to a question in the Rajya Sabha today, 22 July 2015, that the government has decided to transfer accounts of Central Freedom Fighter Pensioners from State Bank of India (SBI) to other authorized banks for disbursal of Central Freedom Fighter Pension due to certain irregularities on the part of SBI like paying pension to more than 3,000 dead pensioners for many years after their death, payment of wrong amount of pension to many pensioners, delayed payment of revised Dearness Relief, loss of more than 1,100 original disburser's portion of PPOs. On account of these irregularities more than Rs 16 crore has already been recovered from SBI, according to the government's written statement.

Sun Pharmaceutical Industries edged higher on bargain hunting after a steep slide in the stock yesterday, 21 July 2015, triggered by a profit warning. The stock rose 3.35% at Rs 832.25. The stock had tumbled 14.95% yesterday, 21 July 2015, after the company said in a business update that its various consolidation initiatives globally due to the acquisition of Ranbaxy Laboratories are likely to adversely impact the company's revenue and profits for the current financial year.

Cipla rose 1.67% at Rs 675. Cipla announced after market hours yesterday, 21 July 2015, that the company's board has approved an investment by Fidelity Growth Partners India and US-based Fidelity Biosciences, through FIL Capital Investments (Mauritius) II Limited or its affiliates, in its recently launched consumer healthcare business which is under incorporation. The investment is subject to execution of definitive agreements, and regulatory approvals. Through Cipla Consumer Healthcare, the company has entered the rapidly growing over-the-counter (OTC) healthcare market in India. The vision is to improve the lives of Indian consumers, building on Cipla's strengths in bringing good science to good medicine, while also leveraging its market outreach and equity with the Indian healthcare system. The business will focus on opportunities arising from the shift from illness to wellness and self-care.

Shares of upstream oil exploration & production (E&P) firms gained. ONGC (up 1.28%) edged higher. Oil India (down 0.09%) edged lower.

Index heavyweight Reliance Industries (RIL) gained 4.26% at Rs 1,050.45. The stock hit a 52-week high of Rs 1,053.50 in intraday trade today, 22 July 2015. RIL is scheduled to announce its Q1 June 2015 results on Friday, 24 July 2015.

Cairn India rose 2.58% at Rs 166.95. The stock hit a high of Rs 167.45 and a low of Rs 156.80. Cairn India's consolidated net profit fell 23.59% to Rs 834.98 crore on 36.18% decline in total income to Rs 3190.66 crore in Q1 June 2015 over Q1 June 2014. The result was announced after market hours yesterday, 21 July 2015. Cairn India's average price realisation dropped 42% to $56 per barrel in Q1 June 2015 over Q1 June 2014 mainly due to 43% decline in oil prices to $56.30 per barrel in Q1 June 2015 over Q1 June 2014.

Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) for the quarter was Rs 1302 crore with healthy EBITDA margin of 50%. EBITDA for the quarter is higher by 79% compared to Q4 March 2015 which saw an exploration cost write-off of Rs 552 crore. EBITDA margins were boosted by lower operating costs which for Rajasthan waterflood case have reduced by 10% from the previous fiscal year average of $5.8 to $5.2/boe in Q1 June 2015 as a result of reduction in well and facility maintenance costs and MG&A. Along with field opex, corporate MGA too has been brought down by 14% as a result of manpower optimisation and decrease in overheads on account of various cost optimisation initiatives currently underway.

Total cashflow from operations for the quarter was Rs 1268 crore. This quarter saw a net capex spend of $104 million. The company closed the quarter with a healthy cash and cash equivalent position of Rs 16467 crore; of which 72% is invested in rupee funds and the rest in dollar funds.

In its outlook for the year ending 31 March 2016 (FY 2016), the company said it continues to remain committed to creating long term shareholder value. Despite low oil prices and substantial cut in capital expenditure (capex), the company will at a minimum maintain Rajasthan production in current year at the year ending 31 March 2015 (FY 2015) levels. Planned capital investment is for a net capex of $500 million; 45% in Core MBA fields, 40% in Growth projects of Barmer Hill, Satellite Fields & Gas and 15% in exploration. The company retains the flexibility to invest balance $1.4 billion as oil prices improve and costs bottom out and also aims to have healthy cash flows post capex so as to retain the ability to pay dividends.

GAIL (India) rose 1.14%. With respect to news article titled "GAIL plans to buy US shale gas asset for $1.5 billion to meet future Indian demand", GAIL (India) during market hours today, 22 July 2015, clarified that at present there is no concrete discussion or proposal for buying any US Shale gas asset.

Shares of public sector oil marketing companies (PSU OMCs) edged higher. Indian Oil Corporation (up 2.06%), BPCL (up 2.14%) and HPCL (up 3.42%) edged higher.

Shares of TV broadcasting firm Zee Entertainment Enterprises jumped. The stock surged 4.99% to Rs 406. The stock hit a 52-week high of Rs 407.20 in intraday trade today, 22 July 2015.

Idea Cellualar fell 1.84% at Rs 178.95. The stock hit a high of Rs 186.50 and a low of Rs 176.55 intraday. Idea Cellular's net profit rose 27.8% to Rs 821.23 crore on 18.04% rise in total income to Rs 8868.61 crore in Q1 June 2015 over Q1 June 2014. The result was announced after market hours yesterday, 21 July 2015.

Due to changes in the TRAI Interconnect (IUC) regulations (Amendment XIth and XII th) effective from 1 March 2015 primarily reducing mobile incoming IUC charges from 20 paise to 14 paise per minute the revenue figures for this quarter are not comparable to earlier quarters. The gross revenue for Q1 June 2015 is negatively impacted by Rs 317 crore (compared to Q1 June 2014), due to IUC rate changes. Additionally, implementation of TRAI Roaming TTO (Sixtieth Amendment) effective from 1 May 2015 reducing the upper cap for national roaming voice call charges & SMS charges between 20%-75% & increase in service tax rate effective from 1 June 2015 from 12.36% to 14% have also impacted the financial results for this quarter.

On the sequential quarterly basis the gross revenue has grown by 4.5% (normalized for IUC change QoQ revenue growth is 6.9%) primarily driven by 4.4 million active subscribers addition (VLR), expansion of voice minutes at 5.8% clocking 195.8 billion minutes on Network and 15% Mobile data (2G+3G) volume growth to 62.7 billion Megabytes.

Idea clocked 24.9 million annual net VLR subscriber additions between July 2014 to June 2015 against 18.6 million additions in the same period previous year and is now servicing 165.8 million quality consumers in India. Competitively, the company has improved its standing with Customer Market Share (on VLR) at 18.9% (May 2015) and Revenue Market Share (RMS) at 18.2% in Q4 March 2015, an RMS improvement of over 1.6% compared to Q4 March 2014.

Despite the large subscriber addition the quality of Idea's overall consumer base has been steady with average revenue per user (ARPU) at Rs 182 (v/s Rs 181 in Q1 June 2014) and Voice usage per subscriber at 408 minutes (v/s 401 minutes in Q1 June 2014).

The Voice rate realisation remained under pressure and fell sharply by 11.2% to 32.9 paise per minute, including the impact of TRAI regulation changes and increase in service tax rate, but the elasticity of demand compensated the rate decline with 18.5% minute growth in Q1 June 2015 versus Q1 June 2014. However, because of mobile data growth the blended 'Average Realisation per Minute' (ARPM) was lower by only 1.3% to 44.5 paise per minute in Q1 June 2015 from 45.1 paise per minute (Q1 June 2014) and the Non-Voice revenue share increased to 26.1% this quarter (17.8% in Q1 June 2014).

Due to increased competition, the blended data 'Average Realisation Per MB' (ARMB) has sharply fallen by 6.5% from 26.3 paise per Mb in Q1 June 2014 to 24.6 paise per Mb in Q1 June 2015. But, the higher mobile data usage per data customer at nearly 600 MB/sub (409 MB/sub in Q1FY15) helped improve the blended Mobile data ARPU (2G+3G) to Rs 147 (v/s Rs. 108 in Q1 June 2014).

The 3G subscriber base for the company has grown by about 90% over last one year, with addition of 7.9 million new 3G data customers, now servicing overall 16.7 million 3G data customers. Over last one year, 3G data volume growth led the growth of overall Mobile data traffic (2G+3G) by nearly 1.9 times from 32.5 million Megabytes in Q1 June 2014 to 62.7 million Megabytes in Q1 June 2015.

To support this exponential Voice & mobile data growth, Idea capex spend in Q1 June 2015 was Rs 1367.40 crore (excluding spectrum, Interest & exchange rate difference capitalization); adding 3,208 2G sites, 3,330 3G sites and about 1,700 km of OFC network. The capex spend for the quarter was fully funded from quarterly cash profit of Rs 2553.10 crore.

The company's consolidated net profit rose 27.82% to Rs 930.83 crore on 17.45% rise in total income to Rs 8920.78 crore in Q1 June 2015 over Q1 June 2014.

The company is slated to launch its Kolkata 3G services by end of this calendar year. Idea has also initiated multiple steps towards introduction of 4G LTE services on 1800 MHz spectrum band in 10 service areas of Kerala (10 MHz), Maharashtra & Goa, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh & Chhattisgarh, Punjab, Haryana, North East, Tamil Nadu and Orissa (5MHz each), in a phased manner from calendar year 2016 onwards. The company is also in the process of revisiting its existing Value Added Services offering and intends to introduce its own range of 'Digital Services' across various categories like entertainment, information, communication, utilities and API services etc. in next financial year.

Key indices snapped their two-day losing streak today, 22 July 2015. The Sensex had declined 281.17 points or 0.98% in the preceding two trading sessions to settle at 28,182.14 yesterday, 21 July 2015, from a recent high of 28,463.31 on 17 July 2015. The Sensex has risen 724.10 points or 2.6% in this month so far (till 22 July 2015). The Sensex has risen 1,005.51 points or 3.65% in this calendar year so far (till 22 July 2015). From a 52-week low of 25,232.82 on 8 August 2014, the Sensex has risen 3,272.11 points or 12.96%. The Sensex is off 1,519.81 points or 5.06% from a record high of 30,024.74 hit on 4 March 2015.

Meanwhile, the Rajya Sabha Select Committee on the Goods and Services Tax (GST) bill presented its report in the Rajya Sabha today, 22 July 2015. The GST Bill has been passed by the Lok Sabha and was referred to the Select Committee by Rajya Sabha, where the ruling NDA government does not enjoy majority, for scrutiny. The government aims to roll out GST from 1 April 2016.

GST, touted as the single biggest indirect taxation reforms since independence, will simplify and harmonise the indirect tax regime in the country. Central taxes like Central Excise Duty, Additional Excise Duties, Service Tax, Additional Customs Duty (CVD) and Special Additional Duty of Customs (SAD), etc. will be subsumed in GST. At the state level, taxes like VAT/Sales Tax, Central Sales Tax, Entertainment Tax, Octroi and Entry Tax, Purchase Tax and Luxury Tax, etc. would be subsumed in GST.

Meanwhile, India's weather office, the India Meteorological Department (IMD), said in its daily monsoon update issued yesterday, 21 July 2015, that the Southwest Monsoon was active over Andaman & Nicobar Islands, West Madhya Pradesh and Konkan & Goa during past 24 hours ending until 8:30 IST.

For the country as a whole, cumulative rainfall during this year's monsoon season was 7% below the Long Period Average (LPA) until 21 July 2015. Region wise, the rainfall was 14% below the LPA in Central India, 12% below the LPA in South Peninsula, 6% below the LPA in East & Northeast India and 8% above the LPA in Northwest India until 21 July 2015.

The quantum of and the spatial distribution of rainfall this month holds key, with July being a crucial month for the sowing of Kharif crops. The June-September southwest monsoon is critical for the country's agriculture because a considerable part of the country's farmland is dependent on the rains for irrigation.

In overseas stock markets, European stocks edged lower today, 22 July 2015, taking their cue from a downbeat session in the US as disappointing earnings from technology companies undermined sentiment. Key indices in Germany, UK and France were off 0.36% to 1.04%.

In UK, the minutes of the Bank of England's (BOE) Monetary Policy Committee's July policy meeting published today, 22 July 2015, showed all nine members of the rate-setting panel voted to keep the BOE's benchmark rate at a record low of 0.5%. All nine also voted to leave the BOE's bond portfolio at 375 billion pounds ($583.51 billion).

In Greece, the country's parliament is set to vote today, 22 July 2015, on a second set of austerity measures demanded by the country's lenders. Formal negotiations on a third bailout program for Greece can only start once the measures have legislative approval. Meanwhile, trading in Greek stocks remains closed. Standard & Poor's yesterday, 21 July 2015, upgraded Greece's sovereign credit rating by two notches and revised its outlook to stable from negative, citing euro zone countries' initial agreement to start negotiations with Athens on a third bailout.

Asian stocks edged lower today, 22 July 2015, amid disappointing results from technology and industrial heavyweights in the US. Key benchmark indices in Singapore, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan and South Korea fell by 0.32% to 1.19%. Key benchmark indices in China and Indonesia rose 0.22% to 0.76%.

Chinese business sentiment fell sharply in July, suggesting that recent dramatic falls in company share prices had severely dented optimism. The MNI China Business Indicator fell 8.8% to 48.8 in July, below the 50 score which marks optimism. The reading matches the April level, which was the lowest since January 2009. The index had jumped 7.6% in June to 53.5. MNI, a part of Deutsche Bse Group, surveys 200 companies listed on the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges.

Trading in US index futures indicated a weak opening of US stocks later in the global day today, 22 July 2015, after Apple Inc.'s forecast disappointed investors. Trading in US index futures indicated that the Dow could slide 76 points at the opening bell. US stocks dropped yesterday, 21 July 2015 on weak earnings from bellwethers International Business Machines Corp. (IBM) and United Technologies Corp.

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First Published: Jul 22 2015 | 4:19 PM IST

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