Post Session: Quick Review

Holi brought cheer for the Dalal Street on Thursday, with both Sensex and Nifty ending on a strong note, tracking global rallies linked to a US Fed rate hike and another pullback in oil prices. After a wonderful start, markets remained under the grip of bulls, as the income tax department said income tax refunds worth over Rs 1.92 lakh crore have been issued to more than 2.24 crore taxpayers so far this fiscal. Besides, a private report stated that a significant percentage of employers are keen to increase their apprentice appointment in the first six months of this year, mainly on account of awareness and reforms in the apprenticeship system.

Domestic sentiments remained positive during the trading session, supported with a private report stating that private equity and venture capital investments for the month of February 2022 were about $5.8 billion, 2.3 times the value recorded in February 2021 ($2.5 billion) and 24 per cent higher than investments in January 2022 ($4.6 billion). Traders were also upbeat with Minister of State for Commerce and Industry Anupriya Patel’s statement that the bilateral trade in goods is projected to increase from the current $60 billion to $100 billion annually within five years of the implementation of the India-UAE free trade agreement.

On the global front, European markets were trading higher with investors widely expecting the Bank of England to announce a third straight interest rate rise to combat decades-high UK inflation. Asian markets ended mostly higher, after the value of core machine orders in Japan was up 5.1 percent on year in January, the Cabinet Office said - coming in at 899.6 billion yen. That was shy of expectations for an increase of 8.1 percent but was unchanged from December's annual reading. On a seasonally adjusted monthly basis, core machine orders were down 2.0 percent - beating forecasts for a decline of 2.2 percent after slipping 3.6 percent in December.

The BSE Sensex ended at 57863.93, up by 1047.28 points or 1.84% after trading in a range of 57518.06 and 58095.84. There were 28 stocks advancing against 2 stocks declining on the index. (Provisional)

The broader indices ended in green; the BSE Mid cap index was up by 1.07%, while Small cap index up by 1.18%. (Provisional)

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Realty up by 3.14%, Consumer Durables up by 2.73%, Energy up by 2.68%, Auto up by 2.15% and Consumer Disc up by 2.15%, while IT down by 0.43% and TECK down by 0.26% were the only losing indices on BSE. (Provisional)

The top gainers on the Sensex were HDFC up by 5.50%, Titan Co up by 4.50%, Kotak Mahindra Bank up by 3.29%, Reliance Industries up by 3.18% and Asian Paints up by 3.07%. On the flip side, Infosys down by 1.81% and HCL Tech. down by 0.23% were the top losers. (Provisional)

Meanwhile, credit rating agency, Moody's Investors Service in its ‘Global Macro Outlook 2022-23 (March 2022 Update)’ has lowered India's growth estimate by 0.4 percentage point for the current year to 9.1 per cent, from 9.5 per cent earlier, as the agency is expecting high fuel and potentially fertilizer costs would weigh on government finances down the road, potentially limiting planned capital spending.

Moody's Investors Service further said that India is particularly vulnerable to high oil prices, given that it is a large importer of crude oil. Because India is a surplus producer of grain, agricultural exports will benefit in the short-term from high prevailing prices.

In the report titled ‘Economic Growth will suffer as fallout from Russia's invasion of Ukraine builds’, the rating agency said that India's growth is likely to be 5.4 per cent in 2023. Besides, it said that the forecast revisions also factor in the somewhat stronger underlying momentum than the agency had not accounted for previously.

The CNX Nifty ended at 17287.05, up by 311.70 points or 1.84% after trading in a range of 17175.75 and 17344.60. There were 45 stocks advancing against 5 stocks declining on the index. (Provisional)

The top gainers on Nifty were HDFC up by 5.37%, JSW Steel up by 4.56%, Titan Co up by 4.47%, SBI Life Insurance up by 3.94% and Kotak Mahindra Bank up by 3.38%. On the flip side, Infosys down by 1.84%, Cipla down by 0.69%, Indian Oil Corp. down by 0.49%, HCL Tech. down by 0.22% and Coal India down by 0.20% were the top losers. (Provisional)

European markets were trading higher, UK’s FTSE 100 increased 20.67 points or 0.28% to 7,312.35, France’s CAC increased 33.45 points or 0.51% to 6,622.09 and Germany’s DAX was up by 25.24 points or 0.17% to 14,465.98.

Asian markets ended mostly higher on Thursday following the broadly positive cues overnight from U.S.  markets, following the U.S. Federal Reserve's monetary policy announcement. The U.S. Fed announced its widely expected decision to raise interest rates for the first time since December of 2018 in an effort to combat inflation at 40-year highs. The Fed raised the target range for the federal funds rate by 25 basis points to 0.25 to 0.5 percent. Meanwhile, China’s strong support to stabilize financial markets also increased positive sentiment for Chinese equities while also triggering a risk-on sentiment for equities in the region. Hang Seng was the top gainer with a 7 percent surge. The Japanese benchmark Nikkei 225 ended higher tracking in a big way the gains at Wall Street. The Bank of Japan (BoJ) is expected to keep interest rates on hold in the current monetary policy review concluding on Friday amidst comments from BoJ Governor that Japan was unlikely to see inflation hitting the 2 percent target, despite rising energy costs.