Uno Minda has entered into a technical licence agreement with Ascentec

Opening Bell:

SGX Nifty is up by 75.0 points in the early morning trade, indicating a positive opening for Indian stock market.

Markets in the Asia-Pacific traded mixed after Wall Street ended its four-day losing streak as global bonds rose after the Bank of Japan adjusted its yield curve control tolerance. The Japanese Nikkei is down by 0.05 percent. South Korea’s Kospi added 0.24 percent. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng is up by 0.16 percent in the early morning trades.

Wall Street closed slightly higher on Tuesday after four sessions of declines, but investors fretted about weak holiday shopping and rising bond yields added pressure after the Bank of Japan’s (BoJ) surprise tweak of monetary policy. S&P 500 gained 0.10 percent whereas Nasdaq composite added 0.01 percent.

Stocks News:

?Bharti Airtel has entered into an agreement for acquisition of 8% stake in a technology startup, Lemnisk (Immensitas Private Limited). The acquisition is under Airtel’s Start Up Accelerator Program. Lemnisk is a Bengaluru based start up that offers real-time marketing automation and secure customer data platform (CDP).

?Mindspace Business Parks REIT has completed issuance of commercial papers of Rs 100 crore. CRISIL has rated these commercial papers as ‘A1+’. The funds will be utilized towards the working capital requirements of Mindspace REIT’s asset SPVs.

?Sunpharma has received a warning letter from the US health regulator for its Halol facility which is already under an import alert. The warning letter summarises violations with respect to Current Good Manufacturing Practice (cGMP) regulations.

?Uno Minda has entered into a technical licence agreement with Ascentec, Korea to strengthen its advance automotive sensors product portfolio. Asentec, a subsidiary of Sejong Industrial, specialises in mobility parts centered on sensors and actuators with manufacturing facilities in Korea, Vietnam and China.

?Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) have net bought shares worth Rs 455.94 crore, while domestic institutional investors (DIIs) net purchased shares worth Rs 494.74 crore on December 20, as per provisional data available on the NSE.

Domestic and International Events

• The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) tweaked the present share buyback norms for listed companies and tightened disclosure rules in its bid to increase transparency and credibility of markets.
• Fitch Ratings on December 20 said it has affirmed India’s long-term foreign-currency issuer default rating (IDR) at ‘BBB-‘ while maintaining the “stable outlook” that it assigned to the country in June this year.
• The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) sold $922 million worth of foreign currency on a net basis in October to shore up the rupee, which is sharply lower than it did in September. Data released by the central bank on December 20 showed net sales of foreign currency in October was $25.78 billion and net purchases was $24.86 billion.
• Oil prices ended mostly flat on Tuesday in a volatile session as a worsening outlook for a major US winter storm sparked fears that millions of Americans might curb travel plans during the holiday season.

Key Equity Indices