Market to start weak;Hero Honda,TCS results eyed

Headlines for the day:

RBI to talk tough on teaser rates

Unitech floats Rs300 crore Mumbai redevelopment fund

Videocon aims to double Pipavav plant capacity to 2400MW

Events for the day:

Major corporate action

Ex-date for dividend of Atlas Copco
Results: Hero Honda, Sesa Goa, TCS
For more events, log on to Sharekhan.com

Pre-market report

Global signals

The European shares fell sharply on Friday, led lower by banking stocks, after investment bank Goldman Sachs was charged with fraud by the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

In the US markets, the financial stocks plunged on Friday in the heaviest trading this year, dramatically ending Wall Street's six-day winning streak as fraud charges against Goldman Sachs and disappointing earnings sent investors running for cover.

In today's trade, the Asian markets were trading on a negative note. At the time of writing this report, SGX Nifty was trading 76 points lower.

Indian markets

All is red for the Asian indices, which are down by over 1% each for the first trading session of this week. Even the US and European markets closed in the negative zone with over 1% losses on Friday. Further, we have the Reserve Bank of India (RBIs)' monetary policy announcement slated for tomorrow (April 20, 2010), wherein the market participants are expecting rate hike on the back of higher and uncomfortable levels of inflation. All this may result in the weak opening for the Sensex, this morning. Though, the on going March quarter earnings announcements may bring some respite for the markets. With major companies like the Hero Honda, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) and Sesa Goa announcing its results today - the stocks will be in a focus.

Commodity cues

In the commodity space, the crude oil prices reported loss, with the Nymex light crude oil for the May series declined by $2.27 per barrel, whereas in the metals space, the Comex Gold for the May series down by $23.40 and the Comex Silver for the May series was declined by $0.75 to a troy ounce respectively.

Daily trend of FII/MF investment in equities

On April 16, 2010, the FIIs were the net buyers of the Indian stocks to the tune of Rs343.10 crore, whereas the domestic mutual funds, on April 09, 2010, were the net sellers of the stocks to the tune of Rs257.90 crore.