Heavy buying helps markets to reach intraday high points

Heavy buying helped Indian equity benchmarks to reach their intraday high points, with Sensex and Nifty gaining around 0.60% each, amid positive cues from other Asian markets. Domestic sentiments got a boot, after the annual rate of inflation based on all India Wholesale Price Index (WPI) number is (-) 0.92% (Provisional) for the month of April 2023 against 1.34% recorded in March 2023. Decline in the rate of inflation in April, 2023 is primarily contributed by fall in prices of basic metals, food products, mineral oils, textiles, non-food articles, chemical & chemical products, rubber & plastic products and paper & paper products. Further, the finance ministry urged Regional Rural Banks to further improve their performance in achieving financial inclusion and credit delivery in rural areas.

On the global front, Asian markets were trading mostly in green, even after producer prices in Japan were up 5.8 percent on year in April, shy of expectations for an increase of 7.1 percent and down from the upwardly revised 7.4 percent jump in March (originally 7.2 percent). On a monthly basis, producer prices rose 0.2 percent versus expectations for a gain of 0.1 percent following the upwardly revised 0.1 percent increase in the previous month (originally -0.3 percent).

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 62410.73, up by 382.83 points or 0.62% after trading in a range of 61950.30 and 62426.29. There were 25 stocks advancing against 5 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index rose by 0.63%, while Small cap index was up by 0.48%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Realty up by 3.94%, Telecom up by 1.16%, TECK up by 0.99%, Auto up by 0.97% and IT up by 0.96%, while Power down by 0.19% and Utilities down by 0.12% were the only losing indices on BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Tata Motors up by 3.05%, Tech Mahindra up by 2.02%, Power Grid Corporation of India up by 1.57%, Infosys up by 1.47% and Larsen & Toubro up by 1.31%. On the flip side, Sun Pharma down by 0.44%, Bajaj Finserv down by 0.22%, Maruti Suzuki down by 0.12%, Bajaj Finance down by 0.03% and Nestle down by 0.02% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, expressing optimism over cooling off in headline inflation, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Shaktikanta Das has said the headline inflation coming down to 4.7 per cent during April is ‘very satisfying’. He added that the release of the official data gives confidence that the ‘monetary policy is on the right track’.

He further said the RBI is ‘quite optimistic and fairly confident’ about the country's 6.5 per cent real GDP growth rate in FY24 even though other analysts are not so sanguine. Admitting that there is a statistical base effect, he said one must speak to any entrepreneur to understand the growth momentum of higher sales every month.

He highlighted that private investments are also picking up, and enlisted steel, cement and petrochemicals as among the sectors where this is seen. He said if India grows at 6.5 per cent, it will contribute 15 per cent of the world growth in the year, and stressed that this is no mean achievement. He also said that the expenditure on research and development has to go up in both the private sector as well as public sector. He said ‘we also need to continue with reforms and also ensure that we keep accessing the best of technology’.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 18420.00, up by 105.20 points or 0.57% after trading in a range of 18287.90 and 18423.60. There were 39 stocks advancing against 11 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Tata Motors up by 3.04%, Hero MotoCorp up by 2.77%, Tech Mahindra up by 1.97%, Eicher Motors up by 1.54% and Power Grid Corporation of India up by 1.51%. On the flip side, Adani Enterprises down by 2.83%, Cipla down by 2.50%, Divi's Laboratories down by 1.14%, BPCL down by 0.68% and Grasim Industries down by 0.56% were the top losers.

Asian markets were trading mostly in green; Hang Seng advanced 384.83 points or 1.96% to 20,012.07, Nikkei 225 surged 238.04 points or 0.8% to 29,626.34, Shanghai Composite strengthened 33.31 points or 1.02% to 3,305.67, Straits Times rose 4.82 points or 0.15% to 3,213.37 and KOSPI increased 3.93 points or 0.16% to 2,479.35, while Taiwan Weighted lost 27.31 points or 0.18% to 15,475.05 and Jakarta Composite plunged 40.35 points or 0.6% to 6,667.41.