Sensex, Nifty Hit 2018 Low After 5-Day Decline

Indian equity benchmarks tumbled, sending the indices to their steepest drop this year after Bloomberg reported that the Enforcement Directorate had sought meetings with 31 banks as part of the probe into the $2 billion fraud at Punjab National Bank.

Financial stocks led by ICICI Bank and SBI were the biggest laggards. The S&P BSE Sensex fell 1.27 percent or 429.58 points to 33,317 and the NSE Nifty 50 Index tumbled 110 points or 1.06 percent to 10,249.25.

Losses were broad-based as the S&P BSE MidCap index fell 0.8 percent and the S&P BSE SmallCap index declined 1.3 percent.

All sector gauges compiled by BSE ended lower led by the S&P BSE Realty index's 2.2 percent drop.

• Indian equity benchmarks fell sharply in the last 30 minutes of trade dragged down by weakness in banking and IT shares.
• The S&P BSE Sensex fell as much as 703 points from intraday highs to 33,357 and the NSE Nifty 50 Index fell as much as 189 points from day's high to 10,252.
• All sector gauges compiled by the National Stock Exchange were trading lower dragged down by the Nifty PSU Bank index’s 2.3 percent drop.

• Fortis Healthcare has 11.6 lakh shares change hands in a block deal.

Buyers and sellers were not immediately known

Source: Bloomberg

• Reliance Infrastructure: Shares of the Mumbai-based infrastructure company rose 2 percent to Rs 442 after it won case against DMRC in Delhi High Court. Delhi High Court has directed DMRC to deposit Rs 3,502 crore in escrow account within four weeks.
• Bharat Wire Ropes: Shares of the Mumbai-based steel wire rope maker rose as much as 6.2 percent to Rs 126.35 ahead of board meet on March 9 to consider and approve raising of funds
• Ramco Cements: Shares of the cement maker rose 2 percent to Rs 743 on plans to acquire clinker grinding unit from Ramco Industries for Rs 17 crore. The plant has capacity of 18,000 tonnes a month.
• PVR: Shares of the movie exhibitor snapped their eight-day losing streak and rose as much as 1.7 percent to Rs 1,290.

• Indian equity benchmarks erased gains as banking heavyweights like ICICI Bank, GDFC Bank and State Bank of India came under selling pressure.
• The S&P BSE Sensex fell 0.2 percent or 72 points to 33,675 and the NSE Nifty 50 Index declined 0.1 percent or 10 points to 10,348.
• Nine out of 11 sector gauges compiled by the National Stock Exchange were trading lower dragged down by the Nifty PSU Bank index's 0.9 percent drop.

Shares of the real estate developer rose 6.6 percent to Rs 146.15 as its management meets fund houses including GMO, Fidelity, SBI MF, BNP Paribas and others, according to stock exchange filing.

Shares of sugar makers were trading lower after the production of sweetner rose to 23.05 million tonnes fin 2017-18 compared with 16.26 million tonnes suring the same period last year, according to industry body Indian Sugar Mills Association (ISMA).

Sugar Stocks trade lower:

• Balrampur Chinni down 2.75 percent
• Triveni Engineering down 7.44 percent
• Dhampur sugar down 3.57 percent
• Bajaj Hindusthan down 2.5 percent
• Sakthi Sugar down 5.53 percent
• Avadh Sugar down 5.66 percent

Shares of the government-owned banks climbed back into green around 12:00 pm and rose 0.6 percent to Rs 100.65 after the Indian investigators were said to widen probe into $2 billion PNB fraud.

• Enforcement Directorate (ED) to subsequently meet other lenders too in PNB fraud case
• ED to question officials of Punjab National Bank
• ED likely to meet chiefs of 31 banks in PNB fraud case

• RPG Life Sciences: The Mumbai-based drug maker rose 6.5 percent to Rs 475. As many as 18.47 lakh shares changed hands on the BSE compared with an average of 8,771 shares traded daily in the past two weeks.
• Jyothi Labs: The Mumbai-based company’s share rose 0.9 percent to Rs 356.15. As many as 6.11 lakh shares changed hands on the BSE compared with an average of 7,241 shares traded daily in the past two weeks.
• Motilal Oswal Financial Services: The Mumbai-based financial services provider fell 0.17 percent to Rs 1,159 as many as 5.04 lakh shares changed hands compared with an average of 9,500 shares traded daily in the past two weeks.
• Gayatri Projects: The Hyderabad-based construction and engineering company declined 1 percent to Rs 208 as many as 2.62 lakh shares changed hands on the BSE compared with an average of 14,000 shares traded daily in the past two weeks.

Shares of the debt-ridden steel maker fell nearly 3 percent to Rs 45.55 after NCLT issued notice to the company on resolution professional's plea.

Resolution professional has alleged that Bhushan Steel is not sharing data.

• Bharat Dynamics IPO to open from March 13-15; price band fixed at Rs 413-428 per share.

Shares of JSW Energy rose as much as 2.9 percent to Rs 81.70 after it acquired JSW Electric Vehicles Private Ltd.

Shares of the Mumbai-based private lender rose as much as 5.9 percent, the most in almost six months, to Rs 1,790.

IndusInd Bank Ltd. has invoked the pledge on 6 crore Jaypee Infratech Ltd. shares, which amounts to a 4.3 percent stake of the crisis-hit company. These shares were held by Jaypee Infratech’s promoter Jaiprakash Associates Ltd., which is the flagship company of debt-ridden Jaypee Group.

Indian equity benchmarks pared gains as M&M, State Bank of India, Coal India and Power Grid came under selling pressure.

The S&P BSE Sensex rose 0.4 percent to 33,887 and the NSE Nifty 50 Index gained 0.4 percent to 10,400.

Nine out of 11 sector gauges compiled by the National Stock Exchange were trading higher led by the Nifty Media index's 1.6 percent gain. On the other hand, the Nifty PSU Bank index was the top sectoral loser, down 0.27 percent.

• Hindalco has 18 lakh shares change hands in a block.
• CG Power has 22.5 lakh shares change hands in a block.

Buyers and sellers were not immediately known

Source: Bloomberg

Shares of the tile maker rose as much as 4 percent to Rs 687 after its board approved plan to merge three units of promoter group with itself.

Shares of the Mumbai-based steel wire rope maker rose as much as 6.2 percent to Rs 126.35 ahead of board meet on March 9 to consider and approve raising of funds.

Shares of the Mumbai-based film maker rose as much as 3.26 percent to Rs 103 after its subsidiary Double Negative (DNEG) won an Oscar award for its work on Blade Runner 2049.

This is the third Oscar win for DNEG since the merger with Prime Focus and fourth overall – having earlier won Oscars for Interstellar, Ex Machina and Inception. Last week DNEG was honoured with the BAFTA award for ‘Best Special Visual Effects’ for the same film, the company said in a press release.

Shares of the country's largest drug maker rose as much as 2.5 percent to Rs 562 after the U.S. drug regulator found no data integrity issues, and its observations are mostly to do with procedural matters, according to the information on the Form 483 on its website.

The three observations issued by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration inspectors are focused on equipment and plant cleanliness and hence addressable, said Gurudatta GG, chief executive officer at consulting firm Estima Pharma Solutions in a comment to BloombergQuint.

• Correction in mid-caps occurred as most stocks were overvalued
• Investors should buy and sell stocks on fundamentals and not on taxation
• Overvalued rupee to hurt economy
• Important to manage rupee around fair value
• Excess valuations warrantjavascript:void(0) for correction in markets

Indian equity benchmarks opened sharply higher led by gains in metal producers and private banks amid strong global cues.

The S&P BSE Sensex rose 0.6 percent or 212 points to 33,958 and the NSE Nifty 50 Index climbed 0.6 percent or 64 points to 10,423.

Gains were broad-based as the S&P BSE MidCap and the S&P BSE SmallCap indices rose 0.8 percent each.

All sectoral gauges compiled by the National Stock Exchange were trading higher led by the Nifty Metal index's 2.2 percent gain.

Traders appetite for state government bonds will be tested today with the equivalent of $2.8 billion of debt set to be auctioned.

The quasi-sovereign bonds are being sold in an environment where demand for government paper remains weak

The benchmark 10-year bond yield rose 4 basis point to 7.78 percent on Monday and has advanced in each of the previous three weeks.

Participation in the bond market has been subdued for some time, but it has contracted even further of late, plagued by an acute lack of appetite, Edelweiss Securities said in a note after trading hours Monday.

It appears that the appetite is unlikely to turnaround soon, the note said.

The rupee may climb today, in line with its Asian peers. Forwards imply the currency may start trading around 64.99 to the U.S. dollar.

• Sun Pharma’s Halol plant may get U.S. FDA clearance soon
• Bank of Baroda leaves MCLR unchanged for March.
• RBI imposes Rs 3 crore penalty on Axis Bank and Rs 2 crore penalty on Indian Overseas Bank for non-compliance of NPA classification norms.
• SBI Hong Kong confirms it has no exposure in PNB fraud case.
• HDFC QIP closes today. It has issued 1.03 crore equity shares at Rs 1,825 per share.
• Ramco Cements to acquire clinker grinding unit from Ramco Industries for Rs 17 crore.
• IndusInd Bank invoked 4.3 percent Jaypee Infra stake pledged by Jaiprakash Associates.
• Global Offshore defaults on unsecured demand loan from Axis Bank. The principal amount of Rs 11.26 crore plus interest is outstanding.

• Somany Ceramics board approved plan to merge three units of promoter group with itself.
• Arman Financial to raise Rs 50 crore through issue of 16.66 lakh compulsory convertible debentures at Rs 300 each to Saif Partners India.
• JSW Energy acquires JSW Electric Vehicles.
• Wanbury says U.S. FDA completes inspection of API facility with five observations.

For a complete list of stocks in news, click here

• Nifty March futures closed trading at 10,365.6, premium of 7.6 points versus discount of 1.4 points.
• All series: Nifty open interest up 3 percent, Bank Nifty open interest unchanged
• India VIX ended at 15.3, up 9.4 percent.
• Max open interest for March series at 10,700 call strike (Open interest at 53.2 lakh, up 22 percent).
• Max open interest for March series at 10,400 Put (Open interest at 35.4 lakh, down 4 percent).

• Fortis Healthcare: BNP Paribas Arbitrage bought 37.5 lakh shares or 0.7 percent equity at Rs 155.28 each.
• Punjab Alkalies & Chemicals: IDBI Bank sold 3.12 lakh shares or 1.2 percent equity at Rs 27.9 each.

BSE

• IDFC Imperial Equity Fund bought 6.54 lakh shares or 1.2 percent equity at Rs 799.99 each.
• IDFC Sterling Equity Fund bought 4 lakh shares or 0.7 percent equity at Rs 799.99 each.
• Nomura Asset Management sold 13.89 lakh shares or 2.6 percent equity at Rs 799.99 each.

Corporate Actions

• KPR Mill ex-date for determining buyback eligibility.
• MOIL and Unichem Labs last trading day before start of buyback period.

• PNB fraud going on since 2010, CBI tells court
• RBI to inject additional liquidity of Rs 1 lakh crore in March
• Goa miners seek centre’s intervention against mining ban
• Sun Pharma may be third time lucky after latest U.S. FDA inspection
• Rahul Gandhi accuses BJP of forming ‘opportunistic’ alliance in Meghalaya
• PNB scam: Four accused sent to CBI custody till March 17
• RBI imposes penalties on Axis Bank and IOB
• In a first, Citi launches t-bill rate linked home loan
• After losing China, Jeff Bezos really wants to win in India
• RBI’s one-stop shop the final step for resolving India’s bad loans?
• Air Arabia says it’s not in the fray for Air India
• Barclays’ tie-up with India Post is starting to bear fruit

Good Morning!

The Singapore-traded SGX Nifty, an early indicator of NSE Nifty 50 Index’s performance in India, rose 0.5 percent to 10,414 as of 6:48 a.m.

Asian stocks rallied, following gains in U.S. equities and the dollar, as concern eased on President Donald Trump’s proposed tariffs. The yen weakened and Treasuries held losses. Japan’s Topix index surged almost 2 percent and shares in Australia and South Korea also gained.

The S&P 500 Index advanced for a second day after hedge fund billionaire Ray Dalio called the threat of a trade war “political show” and House Speaker Paul Ryan urged the president to reconsider tariffs on steel and aluminum. Ten-year Treasury yields advanced toward 2.90 percent.

Here are some key events coming up this week:

• The Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference runs through March 15 and overlaps with the National People’s Congress meetings in Beijing, through March 20.
• Reserve Bank of Australia monetary policy decision on Tuesday, with GDP data due Wednesday.
• The ECB isn’t expected to change policy on Thursday, but the Governing Council may discuss a change to pave the way for the end of quantitative easing.
• BOJ monetary policy decision and briefing on Friday.
• U.S. monthly payrolls data.

Bonds

• The yield on 10-year Treasuries rose two basis points to 2.88 percent.
• Australia’s 10-year yield climbed five basis point to 2.79 percent.

Commodities

• West Texas Intermediate crude maintained gains at $62.60 a barrel after advancing 2.2 percent, the biggest gain in more than a week.
• Gold was steady at $1,320.42 an ounce.