Market come off day lows, banks remain weak

Markets remained weak but came off their day lows led by gains in FMCG and IT shares and financial shares recovered marginally from their early lows.

At 10:25AM, the 30-share Sensex was down 246 points at 19,789 after hitting a low of 19,650 and the 50-share Nifty was down 80 points at 5,951 after touching a low of 5,911.

The Indian rupee appreciated sharply on Tuesday after the Reserve Bank of India has decided to lower rupee liquidity in the system by capping the liquidity adjustment facility at (LAF) Rs 75,000 crore from Wednesday.

As a result, the marginal standing facility (MSF) rate has been raised 200 bps to 10.25 bps. The MSF rate is considered a penal rate and banks avail of this as a last resort. Accordingly, the bank rate also stands adjusted at 10.25 per cent.

The rupee today gained a hefty 64 paise to 59.25 in early trade at the Interbank Foreign Exchange market on fresh dollar selling by exporters after the RBI announced a slew of measures to stem the local currency's volatility.

Financial stocks continued to exhibit a weak trend on concerns that borrowing costs of banks would increase following RBI's decision to reign in liquidity. ICICI Bank, HDFC, HDFC Bank and SBI down 2-5% each.

Other Sensex losers include engineering major L&T and auto shares such as Tata Motors, Mahindra & Mahindra and Maruti Suzuki down over 1.3-1.7% each.

FMCG majors ITC and Hindustan Unilever were up 0.5-1.0% each.

Shares of software exporters firmed up on the back of a weakening rupee. TCS and Infosys were up 0.4-0.7% each.

Among other shares, Crompton Greaves is trading higher by 3.4% at Rs 92, in otherwise weak market, on the commencement of buyback offer today. The offer will be closes on January 15, 2014.

Exide Industries is trading higher by 3% at Rs 126 after reporting a better-than-expected 4.6% year-on-year (yoy) growth in net profit at Rs 159 crore for the quarter ended June 30, 2013 on back of strong operating performance.Analyst on an average had expected profit of Rs 152 crore from the auto parts and equipment makers.

In the broader market the BSE Mid-cap was down 1% and BSE Small-cap index was down 0.6%.

Market breadth was weak with 974 losers and 517 gainers on the BSE.