Nifty ends slightly in green

After seesawing between the green and red territory, domestic benchmark Nifty finished the session marginally in green zone on Tuesday. Market made an optimistic start, as sentiment got boost with a private report that the phase 2 human clinical trial of the Oxford COVID-19 vaccine candidate by Pune-based Serum Institute of India (SII) is set to begin from Tuesday. The observer-blind, randomised controlled study to determine the safety and immunogenicity of Covishield on healthy Indian adults will begin at Bharati Vidyapeeth Medical College and Hospital in Pune. However, market failed to continue its trade in green zone and turned volatile, after private report stated that amid uncertain business environment and liquidity pressure arising due to the coronavirus crisis, merger and acquisition (M&A) deals will continue to see deferral or cancellation in the short term as buyers assess the impact of the lockdown. But, at the end of the day, index managed to end higher, as ratings agency Crisil expects India’s retail food inflation, measured through the Consumer Price Index (CPI), to ease in the second half of this financial year, owing to the effect of high base of previous year coupled with a bumper rabi harvest and good prospect of kharif harvest.

Traders were seen piling up positions in PSU Bank, Bank and Financial Services, while selling was witnessed in Realty, FMCG and Metal. The top gainers from the F&O segment were Adani Enterprises, Max Financial Services and LIC Housing Finance. On the other hand, the top losers were Bharat Heavy Electricals, Page Industries and Jindal Steel. In the index option segment, maximum OI continues to be seen in the 11,300 - 11,600 calls and 10,900 - 11,100 puts indicating this is the trading range expectation.

India Volatility Index (VIX), a gauge for market’s short term expectation of volatility increased by 2.04% and reached 19.62. The 50 share Nifty up by 5.80 points or 0.05% to settle at 11,472.25.

Nifty August 2020 futures closed at 11476.05 (LTP) on Tuesday, at a premium of 3.80 points over spot closing of 11472.25, while Nifty September 2020 futures ended at 11485.30 (LTP), at a premium of 13.05 points over spot closing. Nifty August futures saw an addition of 0.66 million (mn) units, taking the total outstanding open interest (OI) to 9.02 mn units. The near month derivatives contract will expire on August 27, 2020 (Provisional).

From the most active contracts, ICICI Bank August 2020 futures traded at a discount of 0.15 points at 385.40 (LTP) compared with spot closing of 385.55. The numbers of contracts traded were 65,092 (Provisional).

SBIN August 2020 futures traded at a premium of 0.15 points at 208.40 (LTP) compared with spot closing of 208.25. The numbers of contracts traded were 54,106 (Provisional).

Bajaj Finance August 2020 futures traded at a discount of 5.25 points at 3652.75 (LTP) compared with spot closing of 3658.00. The numbers of contracts traded were 47,386 (Provisional).

HDFC Bank August 2020 futures traded at a discount of 1.75 points at 1119.00 (LTP) compared with spot closing of 1120.75. The numbers of contracts traded were 39,739 (Provisional).

Axis Bank August 2020 futures traded at a premium of 0.40 points at 452.00 (LTP) compared with spot closing of 451.60. The numbers of contracts traded were 35,559 (Provisional).

Among, Nifty calls, 11500 SP from the August month expiry was the most active call with an addition of 0.70 million open interests. Among Nifty puts, 11400 SP from the August month expiry was the most active put with an addition of 0.01 million open interests. The maximum OI outstanding for Calls was at 11500 SP (4.32 mn) and that for Puts was at 11000 SP (4.37 mn). The respective Support and Resistance levels of Nifty are: Resistance 11,524.32 -- Pivot Point 11,473.83 -- Support -- 11,421.77.

The Nifty Put Call Ratio (PCR) finally stood at (1.25) for August month contract. The top five scrips with highest PCR on JSW Steel (1.76), Maruti Suzuki India (1.53), Ashok Leyland (1.36), ICICI Prudential Life Insurance (1.24) and Adani Enterprises (1.23).

Among most active underlying, Bajaj Finance witnessed an addition of 0.19 million units of Open Interest in the August month futures contract, followed by Reliance Industries witnessing an addition of 2.73 million units of Open Interest in the August month contract, SBIN witnessed a contraction of 1.41 million units of Open Interest in the August month contract, ICICI Bank witnessed an addition of 19.64 million units of Open Interest in the August month contract and Bharti Airtel witnessed an addition of 17.70 million units of Open Interest in the August month future contract (Provisional).