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Benchmark share indices continued to trade firm in noon trades after May core sector growth signalled recovery in industrial activity while above normal monsoon rains and softening global crude oil prices boosted sentiment.
At 1:15PM, the 30-share Sensex was up 232 points at 28,013 and 50-share Nifty was up 78 points at 8,446
In the broader market, the BSE Mid-cap and Small-cap indices were up 1.4% each. Market breadth was strong with 1,779 gainers and 720 losers on the BSE.
Meanwhile, rainfall in June stood at 189.5 millimetres as against a normal reading of around 163.6 millimetres.
The Indian rupee was trading at 63.62 compared to the previous close of 63.64 on the back of dollar sales by exporters and banks.
ECONOMY
Growth in production in the eight key infrastructure sectors hit a six-month high of 4.4% in May, after two consecutive months of decline, indicating a recovery in industrial activity. The index of these eight core sectors grew 3.8% in the corresponding month last year.
GLOBAL EVENTS
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) in a press release stated that Greece has failed to make a payment of €1.5bn to the IMF that had been set for midnight on Tuesday. It further added that the cash-strapped nation is now in arrears and can only receive IMF financing once the arrears are cleared.
Meanwhile, rating agency Fitch has cut its long-term rating on Greece to 'CC' from 'CCC' amid turmoil over the country's debt negotiations which resulted in fears that the nation could make an exit from the euro zone.
SECTORS & STOCKS
All sectoral indices were trading in the green led by Power index up 1.8% followed by Capital Goods and Realty indices among others.
In the capital goods space, L&T was up 1.4% while BHEL gained 2.5% on the back of encouraging core sector growth.
Auto stocks firmed up post auto major Maruti Suzuki's June sales numbers. Maruti Suzuki was up 1%. The company sold 114,756 vehicles in June, 2015, registering a growth of 1.8% over the previous year. Tata Motors, M&M, were trading marginally higher while two-wheeler stocks Hero Motocorp and Bajaj Auto are trading marginally lower.
Coal India is up 1.5% after a foreign brokerage maintained its 'overweight' outlook on the stock.
Bharti Airtel is up 1.6^%. The company has emerged as the world's third largest mobile operator with 303 million subscribe with operations in 20 countries. .
IT and healthcare shares are surging in today’s trade as an uptick in the earning’s growth is expected as April-June is a seasonally strong quarter for these companies. TCS, Infosys, Wipro was up 1-2% each. In the pharma space, Cipla, Dr Reddy's Labs and Sun Pharma were up 0.5-3% each.
Oil shares gained after data indicated that in May the production of refinery products jumped 7.9%, against contraction of one per cent, 1.3% and 2.9% in February, March and April, respectively. RIL, ONGC, GAIL are up between 0.5-2%.
