Bourses continue upward rally in late afternoon session

The Indian benchmarks continued their upward rally in late afternoon session, with the Sensex and Nifty gaining more than 900 and 250 points, respectively. A lack of major negative developments regarding the banking industry mainly build the confidence among the investors. Besides, traders were hoping that interest rate hikes are nearly at an end. Investors were keenly awaiting the Reserve Bank of India's (RBI) bimonthly monetary policy. Sector wise, steel sector remained in limelight as credit rating agency Crisil in its latest report has said that the domestic stainless steel demand is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 9 per cent till 2024-25 financial year. The domestic demand for stainless steel was at 4 million tonnes (MT) in fiscal 2021-2022.

On the global front, Asian markets were trading mostly in green with easing concerns about the global banking system as well as strong readings on Chinese manufacturing, services and construction activity helping boost investor sentiment. European markets were trading higher ahead of inflation data that will shape the ECB's interest rate plans, while investor expectations U.S. rates are near peaking meant the dollar headed for a second consecutive quarterly loss.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 58953.30, up by 993.21 points or 1.71% after trading in a range of 58273.86 and 59011.79. There were 28 stocks advancing against 2 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index gained 1.16%, while Small cap index was up by 1.60%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were IT up by 2.34%, TECK up by 2.11%, Realty up by 2.02%, Energy up by 1.95% and Telecom was up by 1.73%, while there were no losing sectoral indices on the BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Reliance Industries up by 4.38%, Infosys up by 3.13%, ICICI Bank up by 3.06%, Tata Motors up by 2.81% and Nestle up by 2.39%. On the flip side, Asian Paints down by 0.29% and Sun Pharma down by 0.19% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, in a big relief, the Government has given full exemption from basic customs duty on all drugs and Food for Special Medical Purposes imported for personal use for treatment of all Rare Diseases listed under the National Policy for Rare Diseases 2021 through a general exemption notification.

In order to avail this exemption, the individual importer has to produce a certificate from Central or State Director Health Servicesor District Medical Officer/Civil Surgeon of the district. Drugs/Medicines generally attract basic customs duty of 10%, while some categories of lifesaving drugs/vaccines attract concessional rate of 5% or Nil.

This exemption will result in substantial cost savings and provide much needed relief to the patients. The Government has also fully exempted Pembrolizumab (Keytruda) used in treatment of various cancers from basic customs duty.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 17360.55, up by 279.85 points or 1.64% after trading in a range of 17204.65 and 17374.25. There were 46 stocks advancing against 4 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Reliance Industries up by 4.44%, Infosys up by 3.21%, ICICI Bank up by 3.14%, Tata Motors up by 2.81% and Nestle up by 2.53%. On the flip side, Apollo Hospital Ent. down by 0.55%, Asian Paints down by 0.33%, Sun Pharma down by 0.30% and Divi's Lab down by 0.03% were the top losers.

Asian markets were trading mostly in green, Nikkei 225 surged 258.55 points or 0.92% to 28,041.48, Hang Seng advanced 90.98 points or 0.45% to 20,400.11, KOSPI increased 23.7 points or 0.96% to 2,476.86, Taiwan Weighted added 18.63 points or 0.12% to 15,868.06, Shanghai Composite strengthened 11.61 points or 0.35% to 3,272.86 and Straits Times was up by 5.16 points or 0.16% to 3,262.34. On the flip side, Jakarta Composite was down by 3.67 points or 0.05% to 6,805.28.

European markets were trading higher, UK’s FTSE 100 increased 9.97 points or 0.13% to 7,630.40, France’s CAC rose 22.12 points or 0.3% to 7,285.49 and Germany’s DAX was up by 30.84 points or 0.2% to 15,553.24.