Street signs: Catching up with China, mkt trend remains positive, and more

Catching up with China  

India is closing in on China in at least one segment. The country had previously delivered more tips to the US Securities and Exchange Commission under its whistleblower programme. The gap narrowed in 2019, but largely because of a drop in tips from China, which fell from 40 to 32, shows the 2019 annual report to Congress on the whistleblower programme. Tips from India rose from 26 to 27. This comes even as domestic support for whistleblowing has improved. The Securities and Exchange Board of India has also recently set up a similar mechanism, where it has established the Office of Informant Protection (OIP) for receiving and processing Voluntarily Information Disclosure form from the informant.

Sachin P Mampatta

Market trend remains ‘positive’ 

Even as the markets snapped their two-day winning streak on Friday, analysts say the broader trend remains positive. Technical analysts are holding onto targets of 12,400-12,450 for the Nifty. They expect the headline index to get support at 12,200-levels. Further, analysts say the upside strength of the index still remains intact, and there is possibility of the Nifty attempting its fresh highs during the week. On Friday, the Nifty closed 0.4 per cent lower at 12,226 points as news of US-Iran tensions dampened market sentiments. Analysts caution that it is important the Nifty holds onto its support levels, or there can be possibility of a deeper correction.

Jash Kriplani 

PSBs’ weight in Nifty slips  

The share of banking and financial stocks has risen steeply in the last decade, so much so that these stocks now comprise 42 per cent of the Nifty 50 index. Be that as it may, the share of private and public sector banks (PSBs) has swung in opposite directions. The weight of private sector banks rose 8 percentage points in the five years to December 2014 and another 7.9 percentage points in the next five years, taking their total weight to 27.8 per cent at the end of December 2019, a report by Motilal Oswal Financial Services showed. In contrast, the weight of public sector banks remained flat in the first five years and declined 2.2 percentage points in the next five years to 2.6 per cent. The trend could continue, experts say, unless the PSBs ramp up their digital offerings and ready themselves to face the competition from new-age banks.

Ashley Coutinho