Bulls make comeback on Dalal Street; Nifty reclaims 9,100 mark

Thursday turned out to be a fabulous day of trade for Indian equity benchmarks with frontline gauges recapturing their crucial 9,100 (Nifty) and 31,150 (Sensex) levels, tracking a rise in the global markets on hopes the coronavirus pandemic is nearing a peak and that governments would roll out more stimulus measures. Key indices commenced the session with a gap-up opening as traders took encouragement with a private report stating that a second stimulus package India is poised to announce in coming days will be worth around Rs 1 lakh crore ($13 billion) and focus on help for small and medium businesses weathering the coronavirus outbreak. The mood remained upbeat as the Ministry of Corporate Affairs issued a slew of measures to facilitate the functioning of companies as they grapple with the ongoing nationwide lockdown due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Key indices continued their rally mood to reach at fresh intraday high points in last leg of trade, taking support from Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal assured that the ministry will make efforts for release of 'urgent and important' export orders which are stuck for some reasons. He said the ministry is working aggressively to revitalize exports, and looking for export opportunities to expand. Investors paid no heed towards UN report stating that India's GDP growth for the current fiscal is expected to slow down to 4.8 per cent, warning that the COVID-19 pandemic is expected to result in significant adverse economic impacts globally. Investors also awaited the Index of Industrial Production (IIP) data to be out later in the day.

On the global front, Asian markets ended mostly higher on Thursday, while European markets were trading mostly in green, on hopes the coronavirus pandemic was close to peaking, with investors attention also focused on a meeting of the bloc's finance ministers to discuss an economic rescue package. Back home, some stocks related to cement sector ended lower with India Ratings and Research stating that the domestic cement industry is likely to face yet another decline in demand in FY21 after posting negative growth last fiscal. It expects a washout in April 2020 due to the ongoing lockdown, followed by demand decline of around 40 percent in May. However, it expects a gradual recovery thereafter. 

Finally, the BSE Sensex gained 1265.66 points or 4.23% to 31,159.62, while the CNX Nifty was up by 363.15 points or 4.15% to 9,111.90.    

The BSE Sensex touched high and low of 31,225.20 and 30,420.22, respectively and there were 26 stocks advancing against 4 stocks declining on the index.
The broader indices ended in green; the BSE Mid cap index rose 3.63%, while Small cap index was up by 3.15%.

The gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Auto up by 10.26%, Consumer Durables up by 7.10%, Consumer Discretionary up by 6.04%, Finance up by 5.79%, Telecom up by 5.72%, Bankex up by 5.56%.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Mahindra & Mahindra up by 16.74%, Maruti Suzuki up by 13.16%, Titan Company up by 11.12%, Hero MotoCorp up by 9.65% and Bajaj Finance up by 9.32%. On the flip side, Hindustan Unilever down by 3.49%, Tech Mahindra down by 2.42%, Indusind Bank down by 0.83% and Nestle down by 0.11% were the top losers. 

Meanwhile, in order to meet the expenses in dealing with COVID-19 pandemic, the Finance Ministry has allowed all states to borrow a cumulative Rs 3.20 lakh crore from market between April-December. The move comes amid states demand for higher funds from the Centre.  In a letter to the RBI, the ministry said that the Centre has decided to permit states to raise open market borrowing on the basis of 50 percent the Net Borrowing Ceiling fixed for the year 2020-21 for financing the states' annual plan for the fiscal.

The letter said RBI is requested to make necessary arrangement in consultation with state government to raise the open market borrowing. It also said that further consent for raising open market borrowing during April-December will be processed after receiving complete information from states.

As per the letter, 28 states have been allowed to borrow a cumulative Rs 3,20,481 crore from markets on an ad-hoc basis for the first nine months of the current fiscal. Accordingly, West Bengal can borrow Rs 20,362 crore, Maharashtra (Rs 46,182 crore), Uttar Pradesh (Rs 29,108 crore), Karnataka (Rs 27,054 crore), Gujarat (Rs 26,112 crore) and Rajasthan (Rs 16,387 crore).

The CNX Nifty traded in a range of 9,128.35 and 8,904.55 and there were 43 stocks advancing against 7 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Mahindra & Mahindra up by 17.49%, Maruti Suzuki up by 13.38%, Cipla up by 13.12%, Titan Company up by 11.29% and Tata Motors up by 10.21%. On the flip side, Hindustan Unilever down by 3.34%, Dr. Reddys Lab down by 2.16%,Tech Mahindra down by 2.13%, Indusind Bank down by 1.16% and Nestle India down by 0.34% were the top losers.

European markets were trading mostly in green; UK’s FTSE 100 increased 27.50 points or 0.48% to 5,705.23 and Germany’s DAX rose 83.82 points or 0.81% to 10,416.71, while France’s CAC was down by 10.46 points or 0.24% to 4,432.29. 

Asian markets ended mostly higher on Thursday on expectations that governments would roll out more stimulus measures amid optimism that corona virus infections around the world are nearing a peak. Oil prices are rising ahead of a meeting of major global oil producers on expectations that they will agree production cuts to counter the slump in demand caused by corona virus lockdowns. Chinese shares ended up as Wuhan, the Chinese city where the outbreak was first recorded late last year, returned to normalcy following the easing of lockdown restrictions in the city. Though, Japanese shares finished marginally lower on worries about the impact of the corona virus pandemic on corporate Japan's earnings. Japan recorded 503 new corona virus infections on Wednesday, its biggest daily increase since the outbreak.