Farewell fix from FM

And by the way, everything in life is writable about, if you have the outgoing guts to do it, and the imagination to improvise...- Sylvia Plath. Outgoing Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee has promised measures to restore investor confidence in the Indian economy and rescue the sliding rupee. The Prime Minister too has vowed to lift the sagging Indian economy from the current gloom. He has also assured positive movement action on the policy front. So, it remains to be seen what new measures the Government and/or the RBI announce this week to check the freefall in the rupee. Markets will also be keen to know as to who would take charge of the Finance Ministry once Pranab Mukherjee moves to Rashtrapati Bhavan. We expect a cautious start as most Asian markets are trading with a negative bias. US markets managed to close higher on Friday while their European counterparts closed in the red. Another area of concern for the Indian policymakers is the unsatisfactory start to the southwest monsoon. The last thing India needs at this stage is a failed monsoon. Global investors continue to monitor events out of Europe ahead of yet another EU leaders’ summit this week. Volatility could gradually increase in light of the F&O expiry on Thursday. Trend in FII flows: The FIIs were net sellers of Rs 1.74bn in the cash segment on Friday while the domestic institutional investors (DIIs) were net sellers of Rs 12.7mn, as per the provisional figures released by the NSE. The FIIs were net buyers of Rs 6.63bn in the F&O segment on Friday, according to the provisional NSE data. The foreign funds were net sellers of Rs 2.38bn in the cash segment on Thursday and the mutual funds were net sellers of Rs 208mn on the same day, according to the SEBI figures. Global Data Watch today: EU ECB’s Asmussen Speech, UK Nationwide Housing Prices (May and Jun), US New Home Sales (May), US Dallas Fed Manufacturing Business Index (Jun) and Chicago Fed National Activity Index (May).