Closing Bell: Sensex, Nifty end flat amid volatility; realty, PSU Banks outshine

Markets ended almost unchanged in a volatile trading session, mirroring the previous session’s move. The benchmark opened on a negative note amid weak global cues and drifted further lower due to profit booking in FMCG, IT and financials. However, a rebound in the latter pared all the losses and helped the index to close on a flat note. Among the benchmark indices, Nifty managed to settle above 17,500 levels. A mixed trend was witnessed on the sectoral front while the market breadth was inclined on the advancing side.

Markets will first react to macroeconomic data in early trade on Monday. On the global front, the upcoming Fed meet will remain in focus along with the updates on the new variant.

Amid all, we reiterate our view to maintain a positive yet cautious approach and focus more on stock selection. Nifty needs to hold the 17300-17400 zone for further recovery.

The Nifty witnessed a strong bounce in the week gone by, which has brought the index to a crucial resistance zone of 17500-17600. The recent past shows that the index had stumbled near this barrier, which had attracted selling pressure. This time, the key DMAs are also near this zone thus putting additional pressure on the index. So the Nifty is consolidating near this hurdle for the last couple of sessions.

Structurally, the consolidation can continue for some more time before the Nifty prepares for the next leg on the upside.

The index can take a dip towards 17300-17250 in order to fill up a recent gap area on the daily chart. On the other hand, once the level of 17600 is crossed on a closing basis, it will make a room for the Nifty to take a shot at 18000 subsequently.

Indian benchmark indices traded with cuts to close flat following weak sentiments in the global market as the market awaits the release of Indian and US November inflation numbers.

Losses in financial and IT sectors pressurized indices lower while positive realty, auto and metal stocks helped in erasing losses along with strong support from mid and small caps.

Asian and European indices were trading weak ahead of the US inflation data release as the market expects inflation levels to remain elevated.

: Benchmark indices ended on flat note in the highly volatile session on December 10.

At close, the Sensex was down 20.46 points or 0.03% at 58,786.67, and the Nifty was down 5.50 points or 0.03% at 17,511.30. About 2024 shares have advanced, 1165 shares declined, and 125 shares are unchanged.

Asian Paints, Grasim Industries, SBI, SBI Life Insurance and M&M were among the top Nifty gainers. Losers included Divis Labs, Titan Company, HDFC, Kotak Mahindra Bank and Tata Consumer Products.

Among sectors, realty and PSU Bank indices rose nearly 3 percent each, while metal, oil & gas, power indices ended in the green. BSE midcap index added 0.35 percent and the smallcap index up nearly 1 percent.

Domestic equities gave positive returns this week amid easing concerns pertaining to the potential severity of the Omicron covid variant. BSE Sensex and Nifty 50 gave positive returns of ~1.7% this week. BSE Midcap and BSE Smallcap index outperformed the larger indices with gains ranging between 2-3% this week.

The majority of the sectoral indices saw positive returns. With weekly gains ranging between 4.5-4.8%, BSE Real Sector and BSE Metal index saw renewed interest amongst market participants.

RBI’s monetary policy committee unanimously kept the repo rate unchanged at 4% along with an accommodative stance.

Markets in the immediate term will keenly watch out for the actions on asset tapering and key policy rates in the upcoming US Federal Reserve meet. So far this month, FII continues to be a net seller in the Indian market.

We believe Medplus will trade at higher multiple as it is a pure play omni channel company, scarcity premium and high growth rates.

Medplus EBITDA (adjusted for pre IND AS) has grown at 48% CAGR over FY19-22. Annualizing H1FY22 nos, at upper end of price band, the company will trade at 2.4x EV/sales and 44x EV/EBITDA (adj for pre IND AS) versus 35x EV/EBIDTA/3x EV/sales (our parameter) to Apollo’s offline pharmacy business on one year forward basis. Recommends subscribe.

Zydus Cadila’s U.S. subsidiary Zydus Pharmaceuticals (USA) Inc. has received tentative approval from the USFDA to market Cariprazine Capsules in the strengths of 1.5 mg, 3 mg and 4.5 mg, and 6 mg.

Cariprazine is an atypical antipsychotic. Zydus’ Cariprazine Capsules are indicated for the treatment of schizophrenia and acute treatment of manic or mixed episodes associated with bipolar disorder.

The drug will be manufactured at the group’s formulation manufacturing facility at the SEZ, Ahmedabad.

Cadila Healthcare was quoting at Rs 467.55, up Rs 4.90, or 1.06 percent on the BSE.

TCS has underperformed its peers in the last one year and is available at 20% valuation discount to its Tier 2 peers for the first time in history.

This should reverse as peer growth starts to normalize as well as on increased aggression from TCS to gain market share.

We expect TCS to benefit from demand tailwinds and deliver a ~14% revenue CAGR over FY21–24E. We are turning positive on the company given the strong growth potential. Our target price of Rs 4,220 implies 30x FY24E EPS. We upgrade our rating to buy.

Tata Consultancy Services was quoting at Rs 3,631.30, up Rs 27.70, or 0.77 percent on the BSE.

Sun Pharma Advanced Research Company (SPARC) announced today that an abstract on updated safety and efficacy outcomes of vodobatinib in refractory chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) subjects has been selected for oral presentation at the 63rd American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting, company said in its release.

The Phase 1 study outcomes will be presented by Prof. Jorge Cortes, the Principal Investigator for the study, on Saturday, 11 December 2021, it added.

Sun Pharma Advanced Research Company was quoting at Rs 258.05, up Rs 9.25, or 3.72 percent on the BSE.

Dhruv Consultancy Services has received the “Letter of Award (LOA) for the consultancy services as the independent engineer for development of 6 lane Amrtsar Bathinda Greenfield Section of NH -754A as a part of Amritsar-Jamnagar Economic corridor in the state of Punjab under Bharatmala Pariyojana Phase I on HAM Mode (Package-II) from the office of General Manager (Tech), National Highways Authority of India, New Delhi.

Fees towards the independent engineer’s services for the said project will be Rs 5,15,00,085 excluding taxes. The contract period will be 48 months.

Dhruv Consultancy Services was quoting at Rs 66.30, down Rs 0.60, or 0.90 percent.

Trident Group has sent an exclusive discount Gift Vouchers to its 15 lakh shareholders on all its products on www.myTrident.com, company said in its release.

This special offer is valid from 10th December, 2021 until 2nd January, 2022 wherein each Shareholder can avail Rs 2,000 off on a minimum purchase of Rs 5,000 and Rs 4,000 off on a minimum purchase of Rs 10,000, it added.

Trident was quoting at Rs 55.55, up Rs 1.40, or 2.59 percent.

The public issue of footwear retail-company Metro Brands has been subscribed 21 percent, so far, garnering bids for 39.24 lakh equity shares against the IPO size of 1.91 crore equity shares on December 10.

The portion set aside for retail investors was subscribed 41 percent and non-institutional investors portion booked 1 percent.

Qualified institutional investors are yet to put in their bids for the offer.