The Indian equity benchmarks opened on a positive note as indicated by the SGX index owing to the indication by the US Fed that it intends to move “expeditiously” to raise interest rates back to a more neutral level in order to tame inflation. At 9:19 am, Sensex was up 271 points or 0.51 per cent at 54,021, whereas the Nifty 50 index advanced 76 points or 0.48 per cent at 16,102.
Barring the stocks of auto, metal, consumer durables, oil, and gas and realty, all other sector sectoral indices witnessed buying between 0.48 per cent to 0.93 per cent. The Nifty Midcap 50 surged 0.16 per cent at 7,407, whereas the Nifty Midcap 100 surged 0.25 per cent at 26,984.
Amongst the Nifty 50 companies, Hindalco, HDFC twins, Wipro, and ICICI Bank were amongst the top gainers, whereas BPCL, ONGC, UPL Limited, Asian Paint, and NTPC were the top losers. Amongst the BSE-listed companies, Nestle India, Tech Mahindra, HDFC Twins, Wipro and TCS were the top gainers, whereas Asian Paint, Hindustan Unilever Limited, NTPC, Maruti, and Mahindra & Mahindra were the top losers.
In Asia, after initial gains, major indices edged lower. South Korea’s KOSPI climbed 0.26 per cent to 2,625. The MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific outside Japan was down 0.11 per cent. While the Hang Seng index was down 0.98 per cent, Japan’s Nikkei slipped 0.11 per cent to 26,650. The Shanghai Composite was down 0.22 per cent at 3,099.
After the Fed’s indication, indices in the US climbed higher. The S&P 500 index rose 37.25 points or 0.9 per cent to 3,978. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 191.66 points or 0.6 per cent to 32,120. The Nasdaq surged 170.29 points or 1.5 per cent to 11,434.
Amidst the supply chain crunch, the oil prices edged higher for fourth time this week on Thursday. Brent crude futures was up 7 cents or 0.1 per cent at $114.10 per barrel. On Wednesday, Rupee recovered 2 paise to settle at 77.55 against US Dollars.
On Wednesday, the foreign institutional investors (FII) remained the net sellers worth Rs 1,803 crore, whereas the domestic institutional investors (DII) were the net buyers worth Rs 2,229 crore.
The stocks of InterGlobe Aviation, Coal India, Hindalco, NHPC, and Infosys will remain in focus today. On Wednesday, InterGlobe Aviation reported a net loss of Rs 1,681 crore in the March quarter, compared to the net loss of Rs 1141.98 crore in the corresponding quarter of the previous fiscal. Meanwhile beating estimates the profit of Coal India Limited surged 46 per cent at Rs 6,692 crore in the March quarter, compared to Rs 4,586 crore in the same quarter last fiscal.
