Bourses turn bullish in late afternoon session

Barometer gauges rebounded from losses and traded higher around a percent each in late afternoon session led by gains in Energy, Oil & Gas and IT stocks. Globally investors took support after US Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said that the central bank will, if required, move ‘more aggressively’ to raise federal funds rate by more than 25 basis points at its policy meetings in an effort to curb inflation. Sector wise, energy sector remained in focused, as Petroleum Minister Hardeep Singh Puri said India buying more volumes of crude oil from Russia is still less than 1 per cent of the total oil imports while the volumes from the US will rise significantly. On the global front, Asian markets were trading mostly in green and European markets were trading higher amid higher oil prices and gains for banks following hawkish comments from the U.S. Federal Reserve chair.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 57884.69, up by 592.20 points or 1.03% after trading in a range of 56930.30 and 57998.60. There were 24 stocks advancing against 6 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading mixed; the BSE Mid cap index declined 0.02%, while Small cap index was up by 0.12%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Energy up by 1.82%, Oil & Gas up by 1.70%, IT up by 1.63%, TECK up by 1.49%, Telecom up by 1.01% while, Realty down by 1.23%, FMCG down by 0.64%, Consumer Durables down by 0.55%, Healthcare down by 0.42%, Capital Goods down by 0.15% were the top losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Reliance Industries up by 2.70%, Tech Mahindra up by 2.33%, Power Grid up by 2.12%, ITC up by 2.11% and Infosys up by 1.80%. On the flip side, Nestle down by 2.58%, Hindustan Unilever down by 2.56%, Tata Steel down by 0.38%, Ultratech Cement down by 0.20% and Sun Pharma down by 0.16% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, with an aim to boost domestic agriculture sector, environment benefits, reducing import dependency and savings in foreign exchange, the Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Gas, Rameswar Teli has said that the Government is promoting Ethanol Blended Petrol (EBP) Programme.

The minister noted that ethanol from sugarcane route is not sufficient to achieve blending targets and for other uses. In view of surplus availability of food grains like maize and rice, ethanol from damaged food grains, maize and surplus rice with FCI has been allowed.

Besides, the Government is encouraging farmers to diversify from water intensive crops like rice, sugarcane, etc. to more sustainable crops like maize. Further, National Food Security Mission (NFSM) is being implemented in the country for increasing the production and productivity of food-grains including maize. The Minister also said that the Government is already providing subsidized food grains to more than 80 crore beneficiaries across the country through ‘PM Gareeb Kalyan Yojana’.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 17286.05, up by 168.45 points or 0.98% after trading in a range of 17006.30 and 17320.85. There were 41 stocks advancing against 9 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Tata Motors up by 2.63%, Reliance Industries up by 2.58%, Tech Mahindra up by 2.48%, ITC up by 2.21% and Power Grid up by 2.07%. On the flip side, Nestle down by 2.80%, Hindustan Unilever down by 2.62%, Britannia down by 1.82%, Cipla down by 1.73% and Ultratech Cement down by 0.23% were the top losers.

Asian markets were trading mostly in green, Hang Seng increased 667.94 points or 3.15% to 21,889.28, Nikkei 225 surged 396.68 points or 1.48% to 27,224.11, Jakarta Composite soared 45.64 points or 0.66% to 7,000.82, KOSPI rose 23.95 points or 0.89% to 2,710.00 and Shanghai Composite was up by 6.17 points or 0.19% to 3,259.86. On the flip side, Taiwan Weighted dropped 0.65 points or 0% to 17,559.71 and Straits Times was down by 1.38 points or 0.04% to 3,354.13.

European markets were trading higher, UK’s FTSE 100 increased 44.15 points or 0.59% to 7,486.54, France’s CAC increased 41.90 points or 0.64% to 6,624.23 and Germany’s DAX was up by 117.15 points or 0.82% to 14,444.12.