Pre-market: Cues for trade today

It is the start of a fresh week today and the markets will react to the HSBC India Manufacturing PMI, which gauges the business activity of India's factories, for November 2012. The data is set to come out today. Later in the week, the government's decision allowing FDI in multi-brand retail will be debated in Lok Sabha.

On the global front, investors would be looking at the possibility of more than $600 billion of automatic tax hikes and spending cuts kicking in from January 2013, if the US Congress fails to act.

In Asia, Hang Seng has jumped over 100 points while Nikkei, Taiwan Weighted and Straits are up marginally. AT 700 hrs IST, the SGX Nifty was up 0.50 per cent at 5,911.

STOCKS TO WATCH

Banking stocks will be in focus as the government tables the Banking Laws Amendment Bill, 2011 in the ongoing winter session of parliament.

Auto and cement stocks will be focus as companies from these two sectors will start unveiling monthly sales data for November 2012.

Bharti Airtel is trying to get a South African partner again, three years after its failed bid to link up with local giant MTN, a media report has said. This might bring the company into the limelight today.

Amid market buzz of the promoters of SpiceJet planning to dilute their majority stake, media tycoon Kalanithi Maran, the principal promoter, has decided to increase his stake by five per cent to infuse Rs 184 crore in the airline.

Hathway Cable & Datacom, along with its joint venture partners, is expecting to cumulatively seed 4.5 million set-top boxes (STBs) in at least 25 cities falling under the phase II of government mandated digitisation.

Ranbaxy Laboratories has stopped production of its generic version of cholesterol lowering drug Lipitor until it investigates the issue of potential glass particles in certain lots, the US health regulator has said.