BSE Sensex, Nifty end flat; metals, IT stocks hold firm

03:40 pm Market closing: The market closed on a flat note but Nifty managed to hold the 6300-level. The Sensex was down 24.31 points at 21265.18, and the Nifty ended at 6318.90, down 2.00 points. About 1149 shares have advanced, 1486 shares declined, and 261 shares are unchanged.

Metal and IT stocks lend support to the indices while auto and some banking stocks were weak. With a gain of 3 percent, Coal India was the biggest gainer in the Sensex followed by Hindalco, Wiprom HDFc and BHEL . Among the losers were Bharti Airtel , Tata Motors , Sun Pharma , ONGC and Cipla .

03:30 pm Big relief! In a major relief to the government, Moody's in its latest report has said that India's rating downgrade is not on the cards. Moody's has given India an investment grade rating of Baa3 with a stable outlook. This follows the World Bank report which projected India's growth to rise to over 6 percent in FY2014-15 followed by 7.1 percent growth in FY2016-17.

The rating agency expects inflation and interest rates to decline and sees a slow economic recovery in the July-December period. It sees the General Elections outcome may affect the growth.

03:20 pm Stock in news: Shares in Ranbaxy Laboratories gained as reports the company has partnered with an unnamed multinational drug maker to procure API, or active pharmaceutical ingredient, for a generic version of an anti-hypertension drug, citing unnamed sources.

HSBC notes that sourcing API could potentially mean reduced profits for Ranbaxy, but would help increase confidence on cash flow generation.

03:10 pm Boardroom: Calling it a strong and balanced growth that showed up across businesses and verticals, HCL Technologies CEO Anant Gupta said the firm's impressive second-quarter showing could be attributed to a renewed focus on clients and introducing efficiencies within the firm.

CFO Anil Chanana said the wage hike was offset by greater efficiencies and savings on depreciation and general and administrative expenses and a general

''The company has started a shift in the business model from time and material services to outcome-based services. The new model is risky but if you know it well, it supports high margins,'' CEO Gupta said.

02:55pm Wipro to declare Q3 earnings on Friday
Investors will closely eye India's third-largest technology services firm Wipro's third-quarter earnings due Friday to gain insights into how much its turnaround strategy has made progress.

A CNBC-TV18 poll of analysts expects the company's operating profits to rise 5.7 percent to Rs 2,393 crore compared to Rs 2,264 crore in the previous quarter. Revenues are expected to go up to Rs 10,332 crore versus Rs 10,068 crore, an increase of 2.6 percent.

In dollar terms, revenue is expected to rise 2.8 percent to USD 1,677 million from USD 1,631.1 million in the September quarter. This is the midpoint of the company's forecast in the last quarter, which stood at USD 1,660-1,690 million.

If the company meets its guidance, this will be its second quarter of sustained growth and would likely indicate the company is putting behind the problematic two years it faced after 2010, when annual earnings per share growth came in about flat.

Wipro has since initiated a slew of restructuring initiatives, including hiving off its consumers business in a bid to streamline operations and focus on the IT business.

In the earnings season so far, peers Infosys and HCL Tech have reported stronger-than-expected earnings with dollar revenue growth rising 1.65 percent and 4 percent, respectively. IT companies have benefited from a general pick-up in global IT spending as developed economies recover from global financial crisis.

02:45pm South Indian Bank up 2.5 percent post earnings
Improved asset quality, lower provisions and higher other income helped private sector lender South Indian Bank to report 10.2 percent jump in its Q3 net profits. But, its net interest income (NII) declined marginally to Rs 350.5 crore in Q3 from Rs 352.6 crore in a year ago period.

Explaining this fall in NII, MD & CEO VA Joseph said the bank shifted its focus from corporate lending to retail lending, which led to slow pick-up in advances. However, he is confident of sustaining profitability going ahead. NII is the difference between interest earned and interest expended.

He pointed out that the bank's recoveries were higher than slippages in Q3 . Slippages stood a little over Rs 100 crore and recoveries were at Rs 160 crore. Meanwhile, the bank's net interest margin stood at 3.03 percent.

Going forward, the bank would aggressively focus on recovery and aims to reduce its gross NPA and net NPA below 1.5 percent and 1 percent respectively by March.

02:35pm Jain Irrigation talks to CNBC-TV18
Jain Irrigation is expecting to report significant margin improvement in the seasonally strong fourth quarter, Anil Jain, MD told CNBC-TV18. "Fourth quarter is sesaonally strong, almost 40 percent of our sales come through in this quarter and we are now seeing all our businesses clocking very good growth," Anil Jain, MD said in an interview to CNBC-TV18.

It is also hopeful of clocking more than 25 percent growth in its standalone operations for FY14. He is also upbeat on export revenue growth and expects it be around Rs 1,000-1,100 crore for FY14.

Meanwhile, he said its total foreign exchange loan stands at USD 220 million, out of which around USD 100-110 million is unhedged. Further, he expects receivables to decline from the current 270 days to three months over the next few quarters.

02:25pm The market is completely lacklustre in afternoon trade as it seems to be looking for trigger to get direction on either side. The Sensex declined 4.38 points to 21,285.11 while the Nifty rose 7.90 points to 6,328.80.

The broader markets too are listless, though the market breadth is in favour of declines. Declining shares outnumbered advancing ones by a ratio of 1456 to 1096 on the BSE.

Coal India, Infosys, Axis Bank , HCL Tech, Bharti Airtel and HDFC are most active shares on exchanges.

Coal India is the biggest gainer in the Sensex, rising 2.5 percent in addition to 2 percent in earlier session. The rally is after the company declared a special dividend of Rs 29 per share.

Shares of HDFC, Hindustan Unilever , Wipro, Tata Steel , Sesa Sterlite, BHEL, Hindalco Industries and NTPC gained between 1-2 percent.

However, Bharti Airtel plunged 5 percent, keeping its top position in the selling list after Credit Suisse downgraded the stock to neutral and cut target price to Rs 310 from Rs 420 apiece.

The brokerage house also downgraded Idea Cellular to underperform and cut target price to Rs 130 from Rs 190 apiece. The stock plunged 6.5 percent.

Tata Motors fell more than 2 percent followed by ITC , TCS , HDFC Bank , ONGC, Sun Pharma, Cipla and M&M with 0.5-1 percent.

2:00 pm Result: Motorcycle maker Bajaj Auto reported a better-than-expected 10.5 percent increase in quarterly net profit, helped by a foreign exchange gains and as higher revenues from exports helped offset weak demand for its vehicles.

The company, for whom exports contribute more than a third of sales, said net profit for the October-December quarter was Rs 905 crore, compared with Rs 819 crore a year ago. The company also benefited from a foreign exchange contract.

1:50 pm Boardroom: Jain Irrigation is expecting to report significant margin improvement in the seasonally strong fourth quarter, Anil Jain, MD told CNBC-TV18. "Fourth quarter is sesaonally strong, almost 40 percent of our sales come through in this quarter and we are now seeing all our businesses clocking very good growth," Anil Jain, MD said in an interview to CNBC-TV18.

CNBC-TV18 honoured the best of leaders from various fields in its ninth edition of India Business Leaders Awards (IBLA). Jain Irrigation won the India Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Award at the India Business Leaders Awards (IBLA). Seven percent of the company's profit is spent on CSR activities. "Development via increase in productivity is the key focus for CSR," Jain said.

1:40 pm Outlook: Jim O Neill, former chairman, Goldman Sachs Asset Management is confident that world economies will improve in 2014 and sees them growing 3-4 percent this year.

Continuing the bullish tone, Neill told CNBC-TV18 that one is now seeing some signs of improvement seen in Indian economic data, which is boosting sentiment. ''I would not be surprised if people talk about 8-9 percent India GDP growth for 2015. Also, change in leadership at RBI is a big positive,'' he said in an interview. Like most experts, he is also closely watching general elections, scheduled in May this year, and expects poll outcome to determine market movement in India.

1:30 pm Result: Private sector lender South Indian Bank 's third quarter (October-December) net profit climbed 10.2 percent year-on-year to Rs 141.3 crore, supported by improved asset quality, lower provisions and higher other income.

But net interest income, the difference between interest earned and interest expended, declined marginally to Rs 350.5 crore in the quarter ended December 2013 from Rs 352.6 crore in a year ago period due to higher expenses. Total expenses jumped nearly 17 percent on yearly basis to Rs 1,118.86 crore in the third quarter on higher employee cost and other operating expenses.

The market is sliding further third quarter earnings of companies start trickling in. The Sensex is down 49.34 points at 21240.15, and the Nifty slips 8.50 points at 6312.40. About 987 shares have advanced, 1458 shares declined, and 247 shares are unchanged.

HCLTech posts strong second quarter earnings. The company posted dollar revenue growth of 4 percent, which is the highest in the last eight quarters. All eyes are on TCS Q3 which is likely to again lead the sector on third quarter dollar revenue growth.
 
Meanwhile, government sources say fiscal deficit is likely to be lower than projected 4.8 percent of GDP. The government is borrowing for FY14 to be lower by Rs 15,000 crore.

The rupee trades lower against the dollar tracking strength in the dollar globally on the back of US federal reserve officials comments and as risk appetite continued to remain poor after strong US retail sales data.

12:59pm HCL Tech talks to CNBC-TV18
Calling it a strong and balanced growth that was showed up across businesses and verticals, HCL Technologies CEO Anant Gupta said the firm had the impressive second-quarter showing could be attributed to a renewed focus on clients and efficiencies within the firm.

The HCL management spoke with CNBC-TV18 soon after the company declared its quarterly earnings where it reported a net profit of Rs 1,496 crore (up 5.7 percent quarter-on-quarter) on revenues of Rs 8,184 crore (up 2.8 percent).

The company's net margin rose from 17.8 percent in the previous quarter to 18.3 percent despite the fact that the company effected a wage hike.

CFO Anil Chanana said the wage hike was offset by greater efficiencies and savings on depreciation and general and administrative expenses and a general

Over the past year, HCL's net margins have gone up from the 25 percent range to over 30 percent. ''The company has started a shift in the business model from time and material services to outcome-based services. The new model is risky but if you know it well, it supports high margins,'' CEO Gupta said.

12:48pm Expert on India's growth
Jim O Neill, former chairman, Goldman Sachs Asset Management is confident that world economies will improve in 2014 and sees them growing 3-4 percent this year.

Global institutions, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank are optimistic that global growth will pick up this year . The latter expects global growth to strengthen to 3.2 percent this year, 3.4 percent in 2015, and 3.6 percent in 2016 - up from 2.4 percent in 2013. Also, it sees India growing to over 6 percent in FY2014-15, and accelerating to 7.1 percent by FY2016-17.

Continuing the bullish tone, Neill told CNBC-TV18 that one is now seeing some signs of improvement seen in Indian economic data, which is boosting sentiment. ''I would not be surprised if people talk about 8-9% India GDP growth for 2015. Also, change in leadership at RBI is a big positive,'' he said in an interview.

Like most experts, he is also closely watching general elections, scheduled in May this year, and expects poll outcome to determine market movement in India.

While, global economy may see bright spots, global equity market is likely to be volatile in this year, he cautioned. He expects the US Federal Reserve to reduce additional USD 10billion stimulus in every meet. ''The US Fed will not change its stance because of one poor jobs data,'' he added. The fear of impact of withdrawal of QE has been haunting emerging markets for quite sometime now as performance of EMs last year was largely driven by foreign funds.

Further he added that US market looks expensive at this level and from the EM pack, China's economic growth has been disappointing investors.

Transcript to follow soon..

12:38pm Axis Bank flat post Q3 earnings
With the falling provisions, Axis Bank, the country's third largest private sector lender, reported a growth of 19 percent in its profit after tax of Rs 1,604.11 crore, in-line, compared to a year ago period.

Net interest income, the difference between interest earned and interest expended, climbed 19.6 percent year-on-year to Rs 2,984 crore in the quarter ended December 2013.

According to CNBC-TV18 poll, analysts had expected the bank to report net profit of Rs 1,517 crore and net interest income of Rs 3,006 crore for the quarter.

12:28pm The market declined marginally on profit taking in noon trade weighed down by banks, telecom and healthcare stocks.

The Sensex fell 50.27 points to 21,239.22, and the Nifty slipped 8.65 points to 6,312.25. Declining shares outnumbered advancing ones by a ratio of 1259 to 1001 on the BSE.

Improvement in market sentiment over the past few weeks may push the Nifty towards 6,600-6,700 by March, Vibhav Kapoor of IL&FS said. The positivity is aided by declining headline inflation, India Inc's performance in the quarter gone by and a semblance of stability in global environment, he told CNBC-TV18 in an interview. Following these positive cues, the base for Nifty has moved higher to 5,800-5,900.

However, general economic slowdown and an uncertain political scenario remain a huge risk, he added.

Meanwhile, he sees 9-10 percent earnings growth in current earnings season. ''Earnings growth has been narrow in many sectors; I expect private banks to post reasonable earnings growth,'' he said.

12:00 pm Result analysis: In an interview with CNBC-TV18 Bhavin Shah, CEO, Equirus Securities shared his views on IT player HCL Technologies Q2FY14 earnings and his outlook on the stock.

Shah said that the headline numbers are good, but concerns related to balance sheet given its heavy focus on infra services remain. Its infra services segment has seen a slower growth of 4.8 percent sequentially, which suggests that IT services have grown even less because overall growth in constant currency is just 3 percent, he added.

Equirus Securities is cautious on the stock.

11:50 am Boardroom: Yes Bank 's chief financial officer Rajat Monga expects the bank's net interest margin (NIM) to improve hereon due to better liquidity in the system.

"I think we should be restoring our margins as soon as Q4 because the worst of margins was somewhere around September-October period. It is already normalising and the NII growth therefore should begin to slightly lead the balance sheet growth in terms of the current context," Monga said in an interview to CNBC-TV18. He expects the loan book to grow at 15 percent in the coming quarters, and net interest income to grow at 16-18 percent.

11:40 am Results: Private sector lender South Indian Bank's third quarter (October-December) net profit climbed 10.2 percent year-on-year to Rs 141.3 crore, supported by improved asset quality, lower provisions and higher other income.

But net interest income, the difference between interest earned and interest expended, declined marginally to Rs 350.5 crore in the quarter ended December 2013 from Rs 352.6 crore in a year ago period.

11:30 am Market outlook: Improvement in market sentiment over the past few weeks may push the Nifty towards 6,600-6,700 by March, Vibhav Kapoor of IL&FS said. The positivity is aided by declining headline inflation, India Inc's performance in the quarter gone by and a semblance of stability in global environment, he told CNBC-TV18 in an interview.

Following these positive cues, the base for Nifty has moved higher to 5,800-5,900. However, general economic slowdown and an uncertain political scenario remain a huge risk, he added. Meanwhile, he sees 9-10 percent earnings growth in current earnings season. ''Earnings growth has been narrow in many sectors; I expect private banks to post reasonable earnings growth,'' he said.

The market is volatile but Nifty holds 6300 ahead of key corporate earnings today. The Nifty is down 6.65 points at 6314.25, while the Sensex is down 36.20 points at 21253.29.

Tata Steel , Sesa Sterlite, BHEL , Coal India and HDFC are top gainers in the Sensex. Among the losers are Bharti Airtel , ONGC , Tata Motors , M&M and ITC .

The rupee is lower against the US dollar but firm equities limited the downside. Government bond prices rose as market sentiment remained bullish on fall in retail and wholesale inflation rates in December.

The dollar is mostly mixed today. The Australian dollar fell to its lowest level since august 2010 with the yen weaker but Asian currencies were mixed such as Korean won that was higher along with the Thai baht.

Gold was steady after a 2-day fall. Brent crude was trading near 2 month lows.

Asian indices are mixed.

11:00am ALSTOM India in focus, up over 1%
The board of directors of the company approved the sale and transfer by the company of its transportation systems undertaking to a group company, ALSTOM Transport India, as a going concern on a 'slump sale' basis.

The transaction is for a lump sum consideration without values being assigned to individual assets and liabilities, for a total consideration not less than Rs 176.9 crore in cash.

10:55am TCS to deliver Q3 earnings today later in the day
Analysts expect India's largest software services exporter to report better than peers' results in the quarter ended December 2013 as it has beeen delivering quarter-after-quarter top of the class financial results.

According to CNBC-TV18 poll, profit after tax is expected to grow 10.2 percent sequentially to Rs 5,179 crore during October-December quarter.

Experts feel TCS is again likely to lead the sector on dollar revenue growth in the quarter ended December 2013. Constant currency growth is expected to be 2.5 percent as third quarter is seasonally weak due to furloughs, fewer working days and employees going on vacation.

Earlier in December, the management had said in analyst meet that there are no aberrations on a year-on-year basis, suggesting a typical seasonally weak quarter.

Analysts expect revenues of the company to increase 1.9 percent quarter-on-quarter to Rs 21,373 crore while dollar revenues may jump 3.3 percent to USD 3450 million in the quarter gone by.

10:45am ICICIDirect maintains hold rating on YES Bank
ICICIDirect said return ratios for the bank continue to stay healthy considering the current scenario with return on equity and return on asset for Q3 at 24.4 percent and 1.6 percent, respectively.

However, asset quality, though managed well and still acceptable compared to peers, has seen slippages staying elevated for past two quarters, the report said.

The brokerage house feels lower credit growth and NIMs could keep NII growth modest. Hence, ICICIDirect maintains hold rating on the stock.

10:35am HCL Technologies hits record high post Q2 earnings
HCL Technologies stock touched a record high of Rs 1,377.75, up more than 3 percent intraday after strong set of numbers during second quarter (October-December).

Software services exporter beat analysts' forecast on every parameter with the consolidated net profit rising 5.7 percent sequentially (58.4 percent on yearly basis) to Rs 1,496 crore and revenue rose 2.8 percent Q-o-Q (30.4 percent year-on-year) to Rs 8,184 crore in the quarter ended December 2013.

Dollar revenue increased 4 percent sequentially (14.5 percent Y-o-Y), higher-than-expected, to Rs 1,321 crore during the second quarter. This was far better than its peer Infosys that reported 1.6 percent growth. Analysts had estimated dollar revenue growth at 3.3 percent.

10:22am Market Expert
While information technology (IT) will help the Nifty to break out of its current range, it will be underperforming sectors like banks and capital goods that would trigger a rally to 6,500, says Ambareesh Baliga, managing director, Edelweiss.

Speaking to CNBC-TV18, Baliga says that the requirement of banks to provide for unhedged foreign loans will put some pressure on the stocks till the month end. However, he expects the central bank- Reserve Bank of India to maintain status quo in its next monetary policy, due on January 28th.

10:12am The market is consolidating today after a rally of 257-point in earlier session. It seems to be looking for corporate earnings and RBI policy to get direction on either side.

The Sensex fell14.75 points to 21,274.74, and the Nifty declined 0.35 points to 6,320.55. About 850 shares have advanced, 799 shares declined, and 212 shares are unchanged.

Bharti Airtel is the biggest loser, falling more than 4 percent. Credit Suisse downgraded telecom stocks after the telecom operators applied for spectrum auction slated for February 3.

Credit Suisse downgraded Bharti to neutral and Idea to underperform with a target price of Rs 310 (against Rs 420 earlier) and Rs 130 (against Rs 190 earlier), respectively.

''We build 150-250 basis points revenue market share loss for Bharti and Idea over the FY15/FY16 (along with reversal of the recent revenue per minute increases). We also build a step up in capex/sales to 14 percent for FY15/FY16 (from 8 percent LTM run rate and 12 percent assumed earlier),'' it said in a report.

Shares of ITC, Tata Motors, TCS, ONGC, ICICI Bank, Mahindra and Mahindra, Sun Pharma, State Bank of India, Cipla and Dr Reddy's Labs are under pressure.

However, Tata Steel gained 2 percent followed by HDFC, Sesa Sterlite and BHEL with 1-1.5 percent upmove.

9:50 am  FM speech: Attributing the decline in growth to global factors, Finance Minister P Chidambaram today exuded confidence that the economy will get gradually get back to high growth path in the next three years.

"It is true that there has been a slowdown in 2012-13 and in current year. The slowdown reflects the world wide trend. As global economy recovers and as new measures take effect, I am confident that Indian economy will also get back step by step to the high growth path in three years", he said while delivering the valedictory address at Petrotech 2014.

9:40 am Result poll: Axis Bank 's December quarter net profit is seen climbing 13 percent year-on-year to Rs 1517 crore, according to a CNBC-TV18 estimate based on a poll of analysts. Net interest income (difference between interest earned and interest paid out) for the quarter is seen rising 20 percent year-on-year to Rs 3006 crore.

Analysts are expecting around Rs 1,500 crore stressed assets per quarter for the remaining two quarters. The bank had earlier revised its stressed assets guidance from Rs 5,000 crore to Rs 6,000 crore.

9:30 am Buzzing: Shares of HCL Tech are up over 3 percent intraday, hitting a record high of Rs 1377.75 per share on its December quarter earnings. The tech company beat analyst expectations with the second quarter consolidated net profit rising 5.7 percent quarter-on-quarter (58.4 percent on yearly basis) to Rs 1,496 crore.

Consolidated revenue rose 2.8 percent to Rs 8,184 crore crore in the quarter ended December 2013 as against Rs 7,961 crore in earlier quarter. The year-on-year growth was 30.4 percent.

The market has opened in green terrain ahead of key corporate earnings scheduled today. The Sensex is up 67.20 points at 21356.69, and the Nifty adds 20.45 points at 6341.35.

About 294 shares have advanced, 53 shares declined, and 126 shares are unchanged.

Coal India , Axis Bank, L&T, Hindalco and Tata Power are top gainers in the Sensex. Among the laggards are Bharti Airtel , Infosys , Wipro , M&M and ONGC .

The Indian rupee opened lower by 10 paise at 61.64 per dollar versus 61.54 Wednesday.

The US dollar trades at a near one-week high against a basket of major currencies early this morning, having returned to levels seen before last week's soft payrolls data as faith in the US economic recovery was restored.

Ashok Gautam, Axis Bank said, "Strength in Indian equities will have a positive impact on the rupee. Dollar-rupee breached the support of 61.90/USD and could drive towards 60.90/USD support levels. The range is seen between 61.50-62.50/USD," he added.

United States' Wall Street continued its rally on Wednesday with the S&P 500 erasing its 2014 losses and closing at a record on upbeat economic data and earnings from Bank of America. Europe too closed higher and Asia is positive in morning trade.

In the currency space, the USD is trading at a near one-week high against a basket of major currencies early this morning, having returned to levels seen before last week's soft payrolls data as faith in the US economic recovery was restored.

In commodities, crude prices edged higher in early trade, adding to the previous day's gains when data showed US. Stockpiles fell far more than analysts had expected.

From precious metals space, gold prices are little changed this morning after a two-day decline, but a rally in stocks and increasing optimism over global economic growth weighed on the metal's appeal as an alternative investment.