The markets have cooled off a bit after spurting by more than three percent in the aftermath of the budget. The Sensex has given up around 200 points from the day's high and is now quoting at 18111, higher by 412 points or 2% and the Nifty is at 5420, up 117 points.
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(Updatet at 1344hrs)
The markets have reacted in style to the positive tone of the budget. With the event risk and accompanying nervousness behind us, the resultant short-covering rally has seen the Sensex soaring by 585 points to 18276 and the Nifty zooming by 162 points at 5465. ITC is calling the shots in the absence of an excise duty hike on cigarettes and other tobacco products, and auto stocks are also on fire in wake of the decision to keep the excise duties unchanged.
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(Updated at 1320hrs)
The markets have put behind the choppiness that marked the FM's speech and now have a confident look about them in an immediate reaction to the slew of budget proposals. The Sensex has reclaimed the 18k mark and is now quoting at 18058, higher by 355 points or 2% and the Nifty is at 5407, up 104 points. The midcap index is at 6389, higher by 36 points and the smallcap index is at 7850, up 60 points. All the sectoral indices on the BSE on the green, with the reversal in the hitherto depressed auto sector stocks accounting for a significant portion of the gains post the budget.
The finance minister has stressed on lower fiscal deficit despite the subsidy burden accruing from the oil and fertiliser spaces. And on the direct tax front, the FM has raised the exemption limit for general tax payers from Rs 1.6 lakh to Rs 1.8 lakh.
The shares of automobiles companies have bounced back from their intra-day lows after the government keep the excise duty unchanged. The Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) Auto index has recovered almost 200 points from its intra-day low and currently trading higher by 1% or 64 points. Mahindra and Mahindra has raced ahead by 7.3% at Rs 638 and Maruti Suzuki has gained 3% at Rs 1207.
The announcement that 10 lakh numbers would be generated per day from 1st Oct 2011 under the UID scheme enthused the IT stocks; TCS has jumped by 12% at Rs 1122, Infosys has gained 31% at Rs 3038 and Wipro has added 7% at Rs 440.
The 20% increase in the FY12 health sector outlay at Rs 26760 crore is a positive for the pharma sector. Sun Pharma has junped by 8% at Rs 426, Dr Reddy's has gained 3.4% at Rs 1530 and Cipla has added 0.8% at Rs 302.
The public sector undertakings (PSUs) are in limelight on the bourses after the Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee said that the government is planning to raise Rs 40,000 crore from disinvestment programme in 2011-12. Among individual PSU stocks, Hindustan Copper, State Trading Corporation (STC) India, HMT, Dredging Corporation and NMDC are trading higher by upto 5% on the BSE.
Education shares are also in the limelight after the finance minister proposed an allocation of Rs 52,057 crore to education sector, an increase of 24% over previous year. Navneet Publications, Zee Learning, NIIT and Aptech are up in the region of 1-3% each.
And realty stocks are also seeing action on a likely rise in demand for new homes after the finance minister proposed a 1% interest subvention on home loans up to Rs 15 Lakh
On the other hand, Tata Power has weakened by 1.6% at Rs 1156, Hero Honda has shed 1.2% at Rs 1481 and Reliance Infra has lost 1.1% at Rs 630 among the index pivotals.
The move to levy MAT on SEZ developers has been a negative for the stocks in this space. Mundra Port has crashed by 8% at Rs 140.20, while Thermax has plummeted by 9% at Rs 590 and Engineers India has slid by 3% at Rs 284
The market breadth is positive. Out of 2711 stocks traded on the BSE, there are 1668 advancing stocks as against 937 declines.
