16:00 (IST)
Sensex plunges over 300 points, Nifty above 8,900-mark at close
The benchmark indices gave up the morning gains as the Sensex tanked 310.21 points or 1.01 percent to 30379.81 while Nifty was down 68.55 points or 0.76 percent at 8925.30 at close.
Kotak Mahindra Bank, Hero MotoCorp, Bajaj Financ,e HDFC, Maruti, HDFC Bank, Reliance and Sun Pharma were the major losers in the Sensex pack.
As many as 1429 shares have advanced, 940 shares declined, and 174 shares remained unchanged.
On sectoral front, bank, auto and energy ended in the red, while buying seen in the FMCG, IT and metal.
#MarketAtClose | Sensex & Nifty end 1% lower after a sharp intra-day fall. Sensex slips 1,189 points, Nifty 336 points & Nifty Bank 1,127 points from highs pic.twitter.com/lr1PxZ8uv2
— CNBC-TV18 (@CNBCTV18Live) April 15, 2020
15:52 (IST)
Petrol, diesel demand to pick up as govt allows trucks to ply
15:50 (IST)
Railway to make 30,000 PPE in April, 1 lakh in May
To provide protection to healthcare professionals in the fight against #COVID19, Indian Railways plans to produce over 30,000 coveralls (Personal Protective Equipment) in April 2020. Railways plans to manufacture 1,00,000 of the same in May: Ministry of Railways pic.twitter.com/PrBfG5AsQ1
— ANI (@ANI) April 15, 2020
15:47 (IST)
ITC expects collaborations with unlikely partners to open new supply channels
FMCG major ITC expects its new collaborations with unlikely partners, including Domino’s, Swiggy and Zomato in the wake of coronavirus pandemic and subsequent lockdown opening new distribution channels, to become mainstream in future, according to a company official.
The Kolkata-based firm had launched multiple initiatives to partake in India’s fight against coronavirus infection by tapping a range of distribution channels to ensure that supplies of essential food and hygiene products are delivered at the doorsteps of its consumers during the national lockdown.
It had partnered with food delivery chains such as Domino’s, Swiggy and Zomato along with community centric apps such as Apna Complex, My gate, No broker and Azgo which had the readiness to address delivery to housing societies in metros.
The company had also joined hands with logistics player like Dunzo besides opening up directly to the consumers with its portal ITCstore.in with an aim of ensuring uninterrupted supplies of essential items and foods to its consumers.
15:46 (IST)
Japan’s $1 trillion coronavirus stimulus to lift GDP by 3.8%: Shinzo Abe
Japan’s coronavirus emergency economic stimulus should boost the country’s real gross domestic product by 3.8 percent, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said on Wednesday at the end of a meeting of the government’s top economic advisory council.
The government last week approved an emergency economic stimulus package worth 108.2 trillion yen ($1.01 trillion), with fiscal spending of 39.5 trillion yen, aimed at battling the fallout from the coronavirus.
15:44 (IST)
Construction contracts plunge 43% in FY20: Report
Infrastructure sector activity witnessed a decline of 43 percent in FY20, following financial troubles at the national road builder NHAI and the massive contraction in March due to the lockdown, according to a report.
The problem was more pronounced in the final quarter of the year, as the government contracts came to an almost full standstill as it cut spending to maintain fiscal numbers under check, and the final week saw the entire nation coming to a halt due to the lockdown.
The overall contract awarding activity fell 26 percent year-on-year in March.
The power distribution contracts plummeted 77 percent on an annualised basis; real estate awards fell 35 percent; infrastructure contracts slipped 43 percent; irrigation awards nose-dived 66 percent and water supply awards dipped 29 percent, show the numbers collated by the brokerage Emkay Global.
15:40 (IST)
Food service sector to be severely impacted by lockdown extension: Elior India
Food services firm Elior India on Wednesday said the food service sector is expecting up to 70 percent drop in revenue which will have a cascading effect on various other things amid lockdown extension.
“The food service sector essentially faces the same challenges as the hospitality sector and even somewhat like the aviation sector. Being a $7 billion industry in India, it is going to see the most severe impact imaginable,” Elior India CEO and MD Sanjay Kumar told PTI.
The sector expects a revenue drop of not less than 60 to 70 percent, which is going to leave a cascading impact on a host of different things, he added.
15:38 (IST)
BMW Group India pledges Rs 3 cr for battle against COVID-19
BMW Group India on Wednesday pledged Rs 3 crore for the ongoing battle against the coronavirus pandemic.
The company said it has partnered with government and non-government organisations for on-ground implementation in Delhi-NCR and Chennai.
It will also participate in setting up an isolation ward for COVID-19 patients at the government hospital in Chengalpattu, near its Chennai plant, BMW Group India said in a statement.
15:37 (IST)
Hyundai donates medical equipment to fight COVID-19 in Tamil Nadu
Korean automajor Hyundai Motor India on Wednesday donated medical equipment to the district administration of Kancheepuram to help fight against coronavirus pandemic.
Senior executives of the Hyundai Motor India Foundation handed over personal protective equipment (PPE) and dry rations to district collector P Ponniah.
The dry rations were meant for distribution to those in need in the district, surrounding the manufacturing facilities of Hyundai Motor India at neighbouring Sriperumbudur.
Also, the company said it would hand over 10,000 kits of PPEs and dry rations to district administrations of Tiruvallur and Chennai in coming days. The auto-maker said it has donated Rs 5 crore to Chief Minister Relief Fund and was taking wide range of other initiatives towards the battle against COVID-19.
15:35 (IST)
Vistara again announces compulsory leave without pay for up to 3 days for senior staff
Vistara CEO Leslie Thng on Wednesday announced that senior employees will be going on compulsory leave without pay for up to three days between 15 April and 30 April as a measure to further conserve the airline”s cash flow amid the lockdown to combat the coronavirus threat.
On 27 March, the airline had also introduced compulsory leave without pay for up to three days between 1 April and 14 April for the same set of senior employees.
The compulsory no pay leave will affect around 1,200 employees in senior grades.
The remaining 2,800 employees of the airline such as members of cabin crew and ground handling services will be unaffected.
Stock Market Today Latest Updates: Sensex soars above 770 points, Nifty crosses 9,200-mark; Rupee opens high
New York: Asian shares looked set to pull back from a one-month high on Tuesday, as warnings of a deep recession dampened investor optimism that the slowing spread of the coronavirus could allow businesses to re-open.
E-Mini futures for the S&P 500 fell right from the closing bell and were down 0.26 percent, while Nikkei futures pointed to an opening loss of around five points, defying broad gains in US stocks overnight.
The retreat from riskier assets followed the International Monetary Fund’s prediction on Tuesday that the global economy may shrink by 3 percent in 2020 due to the virus outbreak, in the worst downturn since the Great Depression of the 1930s.
Even estimates for a partial recovery next year are marred by “extreme uncertainty” and the outcome could be far worse, depending on the course of the pandemic, the fund warned.
Some analysts agreed and counselled caution.
“The current market optimism may be premature because the global economy is in a deep recession,” said Kim Mundy, an analyst at Commonwealth Bank of Australia. “We expect the global economy will contract by 2.8 percent in 2020, vastly more than during the great financial crisis.”
Asian stocks had climbed to their highest in a month on Monday, buoyed by Chinese trade data that showed exports did not slow as much as feared in March, even though analysts warned the outlook for the world’s second-largest economy remained grim.
In energy markets, concerns about a global recession led crude oil prices to plunge by over 10 percent towards $20 a barrel overnight, as investors doubted a record global output cut could offset a sharp drop in demand as the economy stalls.
By 2300 GMT, US crude futures CLc1 had recovered a touch and were up 3.1 percent at $20.74 a barrel, but a long way from a January high of $63.27.
Representational image. Reuters
Healthy demand for less risky investments and a softer dollar kept gold prices near a 7-1/2-year peak. Spot gold prices were flat at $1,728.44 an ounce, after hitting a high of $1,738.05 earlier, a level not seen since late 2012.
Still, some investors took heart from news the coronavirus outbreak may be near a peak as European countries such as Austria and Spain started to loosen lockdown restrictions.
In the United States, which has suffered the most fatalities from the virus, the governors of seven states, including New York, said they were preparing plans to gradually restart the economy.
Sparks of investor optimism, alongside the US Federal Reserve’s massive new lending programme to support the economy, pinned the US. dollar—another traditional safe-haven asset—at a two-week low.
Against a basket of six currencies, the US. dollar index eased 0.5 percent to 98.86. That helped the euro cling to earlier gains at $1.0984, while the greenback stayed soft against the Japanese yen at 107.17.
US 10-year yields were little changed at 0.750 percent as investors braced for Wednesday’s release of March US retail sales data, which will give a key gauge on how the virus pandemic has hurt the US economy.
In a sign of the pandemic’s toll on the economy, two major U.S. banks — JPMorgan Chase & Co (JPM.N) and Wells Fargo & Co (WFC.N) — reported plunges in first-quarter profit on Tuesday as both set aside billions of dollars to cover potential loan losses.
James Bullard, the president of St Louis Federal Reserve, estimated on Tuesday that the economic shutdown due to the coronavirus pandemic is costing the United States perhaps $25 billion a day in lost output and cannot be sustained indefinitely. But to re-open, he said the country needs risk management strategies and widespread testing.
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Updated Date: Apr 15, 2020 16:04:45 IST
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