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Sensex Trades Marginally Lower; Dow Futures Down by 39 Points
Fri, 5 Mar 12:30 pm

Share markets in India are presently trading marginally lower.

The BSE Sensex is trading down by 160 points, down 0.3% at 50,685 levels.

Meanwhile, the NSE Nifty is trading down by 66 points.

ONGC and GAIL is among the top gainers today. IndusInd Bank and Wipro are among the top losers today.

The BSE Mid Cap index trading down by 1.3%.

The BSE Small Cap index is trading down by 0.8%.

On the sectoral front, stocks from the telecom sector are witnessing most of the selling pressure.

On the other hand, stocks from the energy sector are witnessing most of the buying interest.

US stock futures are trading lower today, indicating a negative opening for Wall Street.

Nasdaq Futures are trading down 34 points (down 0.3%) while Dow Futures are trading down by 39 points (down 0.1%)

The rupee is trading at 72.83 against the US$.

Gold prices are trading down 0.6% at Rs 44,293 per 10 grams.

In global markets, gold continued its downward trend with prices declining 0.2% to US$ 1,693.8 per ounce.

Amid weak global cues, gold prices suffered further losses today in domestic markets. On MCX, gold futures were down 0.3% to Rs 44,400 per 10 grams in its eighth day of decline in past nine sessions that has taken prices to more than 10-month lows.

Note that the precious metal is down more than 2% this week amid a hardening of US bond yields and a stronger US dollar. Higher yields increase the opportunity cost of holding bullion, which pays no interest.

To know more about gold, check out our article on how to invest in gold here: How to Invest in Gold?

Moving on to stock specific news...

Among the buzzing stocks today is Indiabulls Housing Finance.

HYPERLINK "https://www.equitymaster.com/share-price/IBHF/IBULHSGFIN-535789/INDIABULLS-HOU-FIN-Share-Price" Indiabulls Housing Finance has raised US$150 million (Rs 10.9 billion) by issuing foreign currency convertible bonds, the company said on March 4, 2021.The FCCBs, set to mature on March 4, 2026, bear a coupon rate of 4.5%. The bonds are proposed to be listed on Singapore Exchange Securities Trading Limited.Indiabulls said as many as 45 million equity shares of the company would be in the trade-off with the FCCBs.

This is Indiabulls Housing's debut convertible bond issuance. Besides, it is also the first FCCB by a financial institution from India in the last ten years.The housing finance company already raised Rs 26.7 billion through a qualified institutional placement (QIP) in September 2020, and a partial stake of its investment in the London based OakNorth Bank.

On tapping various sources to raise funds, CEO of IBH Sandeep Banga said convertibles have emerged as an alternative source of capital for Asian corporates, having raised US$ 40 billion of capital through convertibles in the last 3 years.With this issuance, Indiabulls Housing Finance has one of the most diversified sources of funding among Indian corporates," he said.The company said macros have strongly turned for the residential housing market in India and it is on the cusp of an extended period of growth. IBH hopes to realise better yields on its retail loans and also to diversify its loan book and customer base.

How this pans out remains to be seen. Meanwhile, stay tuned for more updates from this space.

At the time of writing, Indiabulls Housing Finance share price was trading down by 4.2% on the BSE.

Speaking of the stock markets, Brijesh Bhatia, Research Analyst at Equitymaster, discusses why he thinks there is a possibility of the rupee falling to Rs 80 against the dollar in 2021, in his latest video for Fast Profits Daily.

Tune in to the video below to find out more:

Moving on to news from the power sector...

Reliance Power Defaults on Repayment to Lenders

Reliance Power has defaulted on repayments to Axis Bank, Yes Bank and Lakshmi Vilas Bank (LVB) due on January 31, 2020.

As per regulatory disclosures, the company has defaulted on repaying Rs 7.8 million to Axis Bank, Rs 10.9 million to Yes Bank and Rs 12.5 million to LVB. The firm had taken a loan of Rs 750 million from Axis Bank, Rs 630 million from Yes Bank and Rs 200 million from LVB. Total borrowings from financial institutions stood at Rs 13.5 billion as of March 3, 2021.

Reliance Power had earlier disclosed during the December quarter that the group was confident of meeting its obligations by generating sufficient and timely cashflows through time-bound monetisation of gas-based power plant equipment and other assets of certain subsidiaries. The firm also hopes to realize the amount from ongoing regulatory arbitration claims.

"Considering the dependence on these material uncertain events and realization of assets, the group is confident that such cashflows would enable it to service its debt and discharge its liabilities in the normal course of its business," Reliance Power said.

The power generation firm had posted a 6% year-on-year (YoY) rise in its consolidated net profit at Rs 522.9 million during the December quarter. Total income also rose around 6% YoY to Rs 20 billion during the quarter from Rs 18.9 billion a year ago.

In November 2020, ICRA had said that the ratings of Reliance Power would continue to remain under the 'issuer non-cooperating category' since the time it was last rated in August 2019.

"The liquidity profile of the company continues to remain poor as evident from the considerable decline in its net cash accruals in the last two fiscals and net-worth erosion due to significant impairment of assets," ICRA had said.

We will keep you posted on more updates from this space. Stay tuned.

Speaking of the power sector, it is interesting to note that the power exchanged in India is about 4.5% of the overall power production, as can be seen in the chart below:


As per Tanushree Banerjee, India's power sector is currently in transition. It is driven by increasing reliance on short-term contracts and electricity spot markets. This transition to the short-term market is happening due to quickly evolving industry dynamics.

Tanushree believes the Indian power sector will see a surge in spot power volumes due to certain factors.

In August 2020, Tanushree recommended a high quality stock from this space. Subscribers can read the report here (requires subscription).

If you are not a StockSelect subscriber, here's where you can sign up.

And to know what's moving the Indian stock markets today, check out the most recent share market updates here.

For information on how to pick stocks that have the potential to deliver big returns, download our special report now!

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