A rangebound day of trading

Thu, 28 Nov Closing

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Indian equity markets traded firm throughout today's trading session on the back of sustained buying across index heavyweights. However, trading remained largely within a range. While the BSE Sensex today closed higher by 115 points, the NSE-Nifty closed higher by 35 points. The BSE Mid Cap and the BSE Small Cap also did well and gained around 1% each. Gains were largely seen in metals, IT and healthcare stocks.

As regards global markets, Asian indices closed mixed today while European indices have opened in the green. The rupee was trading at Rs 62.34 to the dollar at the time of writing.

Steel stocks closed firm today and the key gainers were Maharashtra Seamless and Tata Steel. As per a leading business daily, the first phase of Tata Steel's greenfield steel plant at Kalinganagar in Odisha is expected to become operational by the second half of 2015. The total cost of the project has been pegged at Rs 400 bn out of which the first phase accounts for Rs 250 bn. In 2004, the total cost of the project was pegged at Rs 154 bn but this considerably escalated since then on account of delays. In addition to this, the company's proposed 50,000 tonnes per annum ferroalloys plant at Gopalpur will also be commissioned in FY15. Going forward, the domestic business is expected to be the key growth driver for Tata Steel while earnings for Corus would remain under pressure in the near term. But from a longer term perspective, capacities coming on stream and revival in demand in Europe are expected to bolster the company's fortunes.

As per a leading business daily, the US market is expected to become a key growth driver for Dr.Reddy's backed by a strong product pipeline. What is more, large part of this pipeline consists of limited competition, high margin products. According to the company, 51-52% of its FY14 and FY15 estimated sales in the US will come from such products. This proportion stood at 15% in FY10 and surged to 43% in FY13. For starters, Wockhardt's inability to supply Toprol on account of the import alert on its Chikalthana plant will benefit Dr.Reddy's, Actavis and Mylan. The size of this product has been pegged at over US$ 130 m. Other products which Dr.Reddy's is expected to benefit from include Lamictal (epilepsy) as well as Prevacid (heartburn), Vidaza (cancer) and Dacogen (cancer). Dacogen had US sales of around US$ 260 m for the 12 months ending July 2013 according to IMS. The stock closed higher today.