Market may open higher on firm Asian stocks

The market may open higher on firm Asian stocks. Trading of CNX Nifty futures on the Singapore stock exchange indicates that the Nifty could gain 43 points at the opening bell. Asian stocks rose on Friday as US jobless claims fell and investors weighed company earnings.

Tata Power Company announces its Q3 results today, 7 February 2014.

State Bank of India (SBI) will be in focus as shares allotted by the state-run bank to institutional investors under the recently concluded qualified institutional placement (QIP) will be admitted for trading on the bourses today, 7 February 2014. SBI had raised Rs 8031.64 crore from issue of 5.13 crore equity shares to institutional investors at a price of Rs 1,565 per share.

Bhel turns ex-dividend today, 7 February 2014 for the interim dividend of Rs 1.31 per share for the year ending 31 March 2014.

Tata Motors announced after market hours on Thursday, 6 February 2014 that as an interim measure, consequent upon the sudden demise of the company's Managing Director, Mr. Karl Slym, a Corporate Steering Committee (CSC) will provide oversight of strategy and key aspects of the company's operations. Mr. Cyrus P. Mistry will chair the CSC, which comprises all the current members of the company's Executive Committee (Mr. Ravindra Pisharody, Mr. Satish B. Borwankar, Mr. C Ramakrishnan, Dr. T. A. Leverton, Mr. Ranjit Yadav, Mr. Mamillapalle Venkatram, Mr. Ankush Arora and Mr. Rajesh Bagga).Mr. Mistry will also chair New Product Design and Engineering Review meetings.

Finance Minister P Chidambaram will present the Vote-on-Account or interim budget on 17 February 2014. The objective of a Vote-on-Account is to get Parliament's nod for expenditure to be incurred in the months prior to elections. The next full-fledged budget will be presented by the new government which comes to power after the Lok Sabha polls in April-May 2014.

The Reserve Bank of India next undertakes monetary policy review on 1 April 2014. Sighting elevated consumer price inflation, the Reserve Bank of India raised its key lending rates by 25 basis points after Third Quarter Review of Monetary Policy for 2013-14 on 28 January 2014.

Key benchmark indices edged higher in choppy trade, with the 50-unit CNX Nifty regaining the psychological 6,000 level after falling below that mark earlier during the trading session on Thursday, 6 February 2014. The S&P BSE Sensex garnered 49.71 points or 0.25% to settle at 20,310.74 on that day, its highest closing level since 31 January 2014.

Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) bought shares worth a net Rs 10.75 crore on Thursday, 6 February 2014, as per provisional data from the stock exchanges.

Asian stocks rose on Friday as US jobless claims fell and investors weighed company earnings. Key benchmark indices in Indonesia, South Korea, Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore and Taiwan rose 0.42% to 1.61%.

The China's Shanghai Composite Index lost 0.48% as China's markets opened today after Lunar New Year holidays. Private data today showed China's services activity expanded at a slower pace in January.

After a rocky start to the week, US stocks roared back on Thursday, giving major stock indexes their biggest gain of the year.

Initial jobless claims dropped for the first time in three weeks, falling 20,000 to 331,000 in the period ended Feb. 1, according to the Labor Department.

The Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) next undertakes monetary policy review on 18-19 March 2014. After a monetary policy review, the FOMC on 29 January 2014 announced it will reduce monthly bond purchases by another $10 billion to $65 billion. The Fed also signaled that it is likely to keep reducing bond purchases in the coming months, citing a pickup in US economic activity and improvement in the US labor market.

In Europe, the European Central Bank kept interest rates unchanged on Thursday as officials chose to set aside concerns that inflation may stay low for too long. The 24-member Governing Council, convening in Frankfurt Thursday, left the main refinancing rate at 0.25%. The ECB also held the deposit rate at zero and the marginal lending rate at 0.75%.

The Bank of England kept its benchmark rate at a record-low 0.5%, while its bond-purchase plan stayed at 375 billion pounds ($611 billion) on Thursday.