Indian headline indices ended marginally higher on Tuesday after giving up most of their morning gains dragged mainly by banks. While the S&P BSE Sensex settled at 71,386.21, up 31 points or 0.04, the broader Nifty ended at 21,544.85, higher by 32 points or 0.15%.
Bank stocks fell into the red after a strong opening. IT stocks, too, were off their day’s highs.
Top Gainers and Losers
While the market breadth remained marginally skewed in favour of the bulls with 27 stocks in Nifty trading in the green, several heavy-weights pared-off morning gains. The top gainers were Hero MotoCorp, Adani Ports, SBI Life Insurance Company, Apollo Hospitals and Adani Enterprises while biggest laggards included Britannia Industries, Bajaj Finserv, Nestle India, HDFC Life and Asian Paints. Of the 15 Nifty sectoral indices, selling pressure was witnessed in seven even as eight ended in the green. Banking gauge gave up its 300 points morning lead to end over 200 points or 0.44% lower at 47,242.65. FMCG stocks also took the beating at the hands of investors. Among gainers were auto and IT stocks along with previous week’s hero realty.
Global markets
Most major Asian indices ended Tuesday’s trade in the positive. Nikkei was the top gainer with over 1% gains. China’s Shanghai Composite closed with an uptick of 0.20% while Singapore’s FTSE Straits Times Index settled 0.34% higher over the previous closing. Meanwhile, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng closed with declines of 0.21%.Among the European markets, Germany’s Dax traded 33 points lower at 16,682.90. French index CAC 40, FTSE MIB Index, Spain’s IBEX and Stoxx 600 fell up to 1.66% around 3:50 pm.
Expert Take
“Positive sentiments in the Indian IT sector fuelled by a US tech rally and demand on emerging technologies, overshadowed the anticipated muted Q3 results of the sector. Auto & realty continued to remain favourites on account of strong demand. Market optimism about potential softening of US inflation is driving expectations of near-term rate cuts, bolstering overall sentiment,” said Vinod Nair, Head of Research at Geojit Financial Services. But in-between profit booking emerged due to mixed cues from Asian markets as well as high valuation concerns, he added.
Currency Watch
The Indian rupee ended little changed on Tuesday after dollar demand from state-run banks ate into the local unit’s early gains in the light of a proposal to include eligible Indian bonds in the Bloomberg Emerging Market Local Currency Index.
The rupee ended at 83.1150 against the US dollar, barely changed compared to its close at 83.1375 in the previous session.
Late on Monday, Bloomberg Index Services proposed including eligible Indian bonds in its emerging market local currency index from September.
The local unit had risen to an intraday high of 83.0450 early in Tuesday’s session on the back of positive sentiment but dollar demand from state-run banks ate into those gains, traders said.
“Rupee opened at 83.0575, made an intra-day high of 83.03 and then $ was bought by RBI who ensured rupee did not appreciate beyond 83.00. The Asian currencies were all range-bound, oil was in small range, US yields at 4.05% and dollar index a tad weaker at 102.34. Markets are range-bound before the all important CPI release on Thursday. Equities rallied after yesterday’s fall but closed lower from today’s high due to profit booking,” said Anil Kumar Bhansali, head of treasury and executive director at Finrex Treasury Advisors LLP.
On Wednesday’s outlook, Bhansali said INR is expected to be in a range of 83.00 to 83.30 as flows get absorbed by RBI, who is for the present ensuring 83.00 level remians protected.
Commodity News
Commodity markets saw gold, silver and crude oil trading in the green around 4 pm. While the MCX February Gold futures were trading at Rs 62,375 per 10 gram, up by Rs 280 and 0.45%, the March Silver futures were hovering near Rs 72,686 per kg mark, up by Rs 259 or 0.36%. As for crude oil, the January futures were trading at Rs 6010 per BBL, higher by Rs 147 or 2.51%.
(With inputs from agencies)
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