Sensex closes week 0.5% higher

Thu, 28 Mar Closing

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Buying interest in energy, engineering and banking stocks on the last trading day of the holiday shortened week helped indices in Indian equity markets to close the day and the week in the positive. However, auto stocks were subject to selective profit booking. While the BSE-Sensex closed higher by 131 points (up 0.7%), the NSE-Nifty closed higher by 41 points. The BSE Mid Cap and the BSE Small Cap indices also closed higher by around 1.5% each.

As regards global markets, Asian indices closed mixed today while European indices have opened in the green. The rupee was trading at Rs 54.29 to the dollar at the time of writing.

The country's largest steel producer Tata Steel, is planning to raise US$ 1 bn by selling high-yield bonds. The proceeds from the sale will be mainly used to refinance loans. Other than this, the entity is also raising money for its new factory in the eastern state of Odisha.

Over the last 4 to 5 quarters, Tata Steel has been unable to meet market expectations on the commissioning of the 3 mt Jamshedpur project, on costs for the new project due to delay in coke oven commissioning and on profitability improvement at Tata Steel Europe. The company reported a decline of 3% YoY in topline on a consolidated basis and 11.8% YoY growth in topline on a standalone basis during 3QFY13. This was due to lower demand in European and Indian operations. The group's steel deliveries in 9MFY13 declined by 2.2% to 17.6 mt (million tonnes) compared to 18 mt in 9MFY12. This coupled with an uncertain commodity price environment, has kept Tata Steel's stock performance muted over the last twelve months.

Meanwhile, PSU major National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC)has dismissed news reports claiming that the power producer may abandon generation projects in Sri Lanka and Bangladesh. Undeterred by current political developments in Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, NTPC is quite firm to pursue development of imported coal-based power projects in these countries. Similarly, NTPC is also not perturbed over the present situation due to the faceoff between the ruling and opposition parties in Bangladesh.

NTPC's generation capacity at the end of December 2012 stood at 33,872 MW. This is higher by 2,820 MW as compared to the period ended March 2012. The volumes sold were higher by 5.93% YoY as compared to the nine-month period ended 2011. Revenues during this period were higher by 5.8% YoY, indicating that the average tariff rates were lower as compared to last year.