The wholesale weekly inflation rate decreased to a 13-month low as prices of food and cereals dropped. Wholesale prices advanced 4.03% in the week ended June 16 from a year earlier, down from 4.28% in the previous week, beating analysts’ expectations for 4.13%.

The Indian rupee advanced 0.2% to 40.765 against the dollar in morning trading in Mumbai. It has risen 6.7% this quarter, the best performance among ten of the most traded Asian currencies. The rupee advance is according to investors due to the booming economy and strong market attracting a lot of investment from abroad.

Trading highlights

SBI was the most active stock with a turnover of Rs 154.80 crore followed by GMR Infrastructure and Reliance Industries.

Advancers

Reliance Energy zoomed nearly 6% to Rs 614. Reliance Energy’s subsidiary Rosa Power Supply, on June 26 2007 took out long-term loans of around Rs 2,000 crore for the first stage of its 600 MW power project. HDFC Bank soared nearly 5% to Rs 1,144. Other banking stocks also rose. ICICI bank rose 1.3% to Rs 955 and the State Bank of India, advanced 3.7% to Rs 1,523. SBI surged as reports circulate that the bank intends to launch a private equity fund with a corpus of $1 billion.

Cement shares surged for the second straight day. Cement large-cap ACC gained 3.9% to Rs 934 and Grasim was up 0.6% to Rs 2,638. Pharmaceutical stocks also gained with Cipla up 2.7% to Rs 208, and Ranbaxy Laboratories rising 2% to Rs 355. Capital goods stocks were in demand too. BHEL advanced 3.3% to Rs 1,538 and L&T gained nearly 2% to Rs 2,196. Index heavy Reliance Industries gained 0.5% to Rs 1,700.

Decliners

Hindalco plunged 5.2% to Rs 160. Auto large-cap Maruti Udyog lost 0.9% to Rs 743 while telecom services provider Bharti Airtel dipped 0.8% to Rs 836. Oil exploration large-cap ONGC also lost, down 0.5% to Rs 902 and Gujarat Ambuja Cements declined 0.4% to Rs 125.


7:00AM European markets gain slightly on Friday, cautiously responding to Fed’s decision.

European markets edged higher on Friday. The German DAX 30 gained 0.2% at 7,937.86, the French CAC 40 rose 0.2% at 6,017.92 and the U.K. FTSE 100 slipped 0.1% at 6,567.30.

Advancers

BT Group advanced 1.7% as according to CEO Ben Verwaayen analysts are underestimating sales growth. U.K. builder Berkeley rose 2.3% after the adjusted profit of the company advanced a faster-than-forecast 12%. Forklift maker Linde rose 3.3% and Swatch was up 2.9% after Deutsche Bank hiked its rating to buy on favorable trends in the watch industry and on margin hopes.

Decliners

Segro tumbled 4% as HSBC cut the property company rating to neutral from overweight. U.K. coal power firm Drax dropped 2.8% after announcing results in line with expectations. Security Land shares slipped 0.8% and British Land fell 1.1%.

Commodities

Oil prices were steady below $70 a barrel Friday after jumping above that mark in the previous session the first time in ten months on concerns about gasoline supplies. Crude oil for August delivery gained 15 cents to $69.63 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Gold opened Friday at a bid price of $647.90 a troy ounce, down from $648.80 late Thursday.

Currencies

The U.S. dollar was trading at 123.44 yen midafternoon, up from 123.18 yen late Thursday in New York. The euroo rose to $1.3456 from $1.3432. The British pound also climbed slightly to $2.0027.