Nifty holds 4800 amid choppy trade; Re hits low of 52.72/$

The 50-share NSE Nifty is still in its upward spiral amid a choppy trade, supported by oil & gas, capital goods, metals and financials (barring HDFC Bank). The current short covering-led upmove was despite falling rupee and weak Asian cues. The BSE Sensexrose 100.31 points to 16046.41, and the NSE Nifty moved up 28.15 points to 4,806.50.

The Indian rupee touched an all-time low of 52.72 to the dollar today as against 52.16 on Monday, which resulted outflow of foreign money. It depreciated by 74 paise at 70.99 to an euro. Nilesh Shah of Axis Direct points out to high gold imports as the reason for the weakness in rupee.

Sudarshan Sukhani of technicaltrends.com expects rupee to be at 55 to the dollar. He said he would maintain the short positions.

Major largecaps like Reliance Industries, HDFC, Infosys, ICICI Bank and ONGC gained 1-1.8%. Tata Motors, Hindalco and BHEL were top gainers, rising 2.5% each.

L&T and SBI rose 0.7% each. Tata Steel, JSPL, Cipla, NTPC and Maruti were up 1% each.

However, Bharti tumbled nearly 2% and Bajaj Auto lost 2.5%. Hero Motocorp, TCS and Wipro were other losers.

On the global front, Asian markets like Shanghai, Nikkei, Hang Seng and Taiwan fell 1% each. Straits Times and Kospi were flat.

At 9:20 hours IST : Sensex rebounds 100 points; Re hits 52.44/$

The Indian equity benchmarks—Sensex and Nifty—opened above the 16,000 and 4,800 mark, respectively. Short covering helped the market. It was warranted after a fall of more than 1,600 points on the Sensex in the last eight days.

The 30-share BSE Sensex gained 135 points at 16,081.10 led by 27 stocks. Meanwhile, the 50-share NSE Nifty rose 39.6 points to 4,817.95 amid volatility.

The market shrugged off the falling rupee. It hit an all-time low of 52.44 to the dollar today. It was trading at 52.43 a dollar, down 27 paise from the previous closing price. It was down by 46 paise to 70.70 a euro.

Tata Motors, BHEL, Reliance Infrastructure, JP Associates, Reliance Communications, SBI, ICICI Bank, IDFC , DLF, Sterlite, Hindalco, JSPL, Reliance Industries, NTPC and SAIL gained 1-2%.

However, Infosys lost 1.6% post the management's outlook. HCL Tech and Bharti Airtel too were down. 

The CNX Midcap rose 31 points to 6,571.

Asian markets were mixed. Shanghai and Hang Seng fell 0.5-1%. However, Straits Times, Kospi and Taiwan were marginally higher.

The US equity markets managed to recover marginally from the day's low on Monday. S&P and Moody’s reaffirmed the US' ratings even after the congressional committee failed to reach an agreement to reduce the country's USD 15 trillion deficit. However, Fitch warned of a revision of negative, if the US deficit was not controlled.

Aishwarya Rai Bachchan gives birth to baby girl

Mumbai: Actor Aishwarya Rai Bachchan has given birth to a baby girl, the first daughter for the former Miss World and her actor husband Abhishek Bachchan. The delivery took place at the Seven Hills Hospital in Marol, Mumbai.

A proud grandfather, Amitabh tweeted on Wednesday morning, "T 561 - I AM DADA to the cutest baby girl !!"

Abhishek Bachchan and Aishwarya Rai had married on April 20, 2007 as per Hindu customs. The much publicised wedding had taken place in a private ceremony at 'Prateeksha', the Bachchan residence in Juhu, Mumbai.

Twitter has been the speculation ground for the Bachchan baby since long. There have been speculations on the exact date of delivery and the gender of the baby.

An irritated Amitabh Bachchan had even hit back after the interest shown by the media and people by tweeting, "Getting congratulatory messages on Aishwarya delivering a boy !!! Guess they know more than even she does !! False and incorrect news."

Even celebrities did not lag behind in expressing interest about the baby. Renowned novelist Tasleema Nasreen had tweeted that "I love Aishwarya Rai. But when I said 'I wish she would give birth to a baby girl', people asked me, Why do you hate Aishwarya?"

A set of guidelines, issued purportedly by the Broadcast Editors Association, recently surfaced prompting senior Bachchan to deny having tried to influence the coverage of the high profile birth. The much awaited birth of the year has made the child a celebrity in her/his own way.

It will be interesting to see how the Bachchan family will guard the baby from being exposed to the limelight even before it reaches a certain age.

The western world has seen many celebrity children such as David Beckham's son Brooklyn or Brangelina's twins in recent times where the paparazzi have hounded every step of the child and its parents.

The twitterazzi swooped down upon the news from the moment Bachchan broke the news on Twitter. A tweet confirming the pregnancy of a leading actress in the industry, perhaps for the first time in cinematic history, made front page news in major national dailies. As the sun sets on the era of star kids, celebrity babies usher in a trend imported from Hollywood show business.

As Bollywood's first family, the Bachchans have always been in the limelight, be it the intense coverage of the Abhi-Ash wedding or Senior B's illness.

As a celeb baby, every moment of its life is going to be of interest, the pregnancy photos, the delivery date, the first baby photos might go to the highest bidder as is the Hollywood trend, the baby's name will have the nation thinking and whether the new born will get the father's height and gait or the mother's looks. And post that, every action, every decision made by the celeb parents for the baby will be news. Tremendous pressure on a new-born isn't it?

The celeb baby phenomenon has just come in to Bollywood. Abhishek and Shweta had star parents as well, as did Esha Deol. But their birth and childhood was never half as high profile.

In the recent past, Ajay Devgan and Kajol's children and Twinkle and Akshay Kumar's son – has been in the news only when spotted with their star-parents. They aren't stars yet. The Abhi-Ash child will come in to an industry that worships the parents and the grandparents.

Aishwarya gives birth to a girl

Bollywood actress Aishwarya Rai Bachchan has delivered a baby girl today at the Seven Hills Hospital in suburban Andheri here.

"IT'S A GIRL!!!!!! :-)))))," Abhishek Bachchan wrote on social networking site twitter. "I AM DADA to the cutest baby girl !! Dadaji... ecstatic!!!!," Amitabh Bachchan wrote on twitter.

It was in June this year that Amitabh Bachchan had broken the news that his daughter-in-law was 

Nifty slips towards 5000

The 30-share BSE Sensex has continued to trade with 100 points fall due to sell-off in private banking, capital goods, select technology and auto stocks. Heavyweight Reliance Industries too fell into bears' grip, falling 2%. The 30-share BSE Sensex dropped 164 points to 16,719 and the 50-share NSENifty slipped 57 points to 5,011.

Among the largecaps, SAIL, BPCL, GAIL, Hero Motocorp, Jaiprakash Associates and Coal India dropped 2-4%. BHEL was the biggest loser on the street, losing 5% while L&T crashed nearly 4%.

However, M&M, Jindal Steel, SBI, Cipla, Bharti Airtel, Reliance Communications and DLF gained 1-2%.

SBI, L&T, ICICI Bank, Idea Cellular, Tata Steel, Bharti Airtel and Axis Bank were most active shares on exchanges.

Indian rupee has depreciated by 20 paise to 50.86 a dollar today, though it showed some recovery.

PN Vijay, portfolio manager shares that the midcap damage over the past few days could be courtesy the earnings performance. He says the Q2 earnings has been primarily hit by two reasons — the rupee-dollar scenario and the demand destruction. He expects RBI’s intervention to get rupee back to sub 50 levels.

In the midcap space, DB Realty, Shriram City, Sterling Tools, Shree Global and Bajaj Hindusthan rallied 3-10% while Kwality Dairy plunged 20%. Sintex Industries, KSK Energy Ventures, Rashtriya Chemical and SKS Microfinance slipped 5-7.5%.

The market breadth has remained in favour of declines; more than three shares slipped for every share rising on the National Stock Exchange.

At -:20 hours IST : Sensex falls 100 pts in opening; rupee nears 51 per dollar

Indian equity benchmark Sensex fell 100 points in the opening trade due to depreciating rupee to near 51 a dollar (falls 0.5%). Weak Asian cues on eurozone debt crisis too weighed on the India; Shanghai, Hang Seng dropped 2%. Nikkei, Straits Times, Kospi and Taiwan fell 0.5-1%.

The 30-share BSE Sensex slipped 97.55 points to 16,785.12 and the 50-share NSE Nifty lost 34 points to 5,034.45.

Oil marketing companies like BPCL, IOC and HPCL fell 2-3% after cut in petrol prices with effective from midnight.

Capital goods space: L&T, BHEL and Siemens were down 2% each.

JSPL, SAIL, Sesa Goa, Axis Bank, ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank, HCL Tech, Cola India, Tata Power, Hero Motocorp, Ranbaxy and Reliance Industries too were under pressure.

However, Bharti Airtel, DLF, Dr Reddy's Labs and Reliance Infrastructure were on buyers' radar.

The CNX Midcap fell 25 points to 6,837. About two shares declined for every share rising on National Stock Exchange.

Stocks in news

Jet Airways lost 2% while Kingfisher Airlines was up 1.5%.

MSCI added in its portfolio: PFC was up 2% and Idea rallied 3.5%.

Educomp Solutions rose 1% on short covering as it lost 25% in previous three days.

Shree Renuka Sugars too saw short covering, gaining 2% after losing over 30% in earlier three days.

Tech Mahindra declined over 1% post Q2 numbers.

IVRCL dropped 3.5% and UCO Bank lost 2%. Sintex crashed 7%.

Petrol cheaper by Rs 1.80 per litre across India tonight

New Delhi:  There is finally good news for all of us. After a nationwide outrage over the recent fuel price hike, oil marketing companies have reduced petrol prices by Rs 1.80 per litre before VAT.

What this means is that in Delhi, petrol will be Rs 2.25 cheaper per litre. Price cuts are expected to be higher in other cities like Mumbai and Kolkata, where VAT is higher.

Prices have been raised four times this year, the last two price hikes coming within two months of each other. Petrol prices went up by Rs 3.14 in September and then by Rs 1.82 two weeks ago, causing much outrage among people and political parties.

Last week, RS Butola, the Chairman of the state-owned Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), India's largest fuel retailer, said the oil companies would cut petrol prices by today, as long as crude prices continued to fall globally.

In an exclusive interview to NDTV, Mr Butola had said that oil companies were committed to passing on any benefit from lower prices to consumers, even though they had already incurred a loss of around Rs. 2,500 crores  on the sale of petrol this year.

Petrol was deregulated or freed from government control in June 2010. This allows oil companies to raise or lower prices in keeping with global market dynamics.