Bulls continue to roar over Dalal Street

Bulls continued to roar over the Dalal Street in early afternoon deals, with both Sensex and Nifty holding strong gains, aided by positive cues from other Asian markets. Sentiments remained positive, as Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal said that foreign investors should explore business opportunities in India as it provides a huge domestic market and investment-friendly environment. Besides, the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) expects world oil demand to grow to 2.2 million barrels per day (bpd) in 2024 for an average of 104.4 million bpd, unchanged from its previous assessment. The oil cartel said in a report that oil demand is expected to be supported by resilient global GDP growth, amid continued improvements in economic activity in China. 

The street paid no heed towards reports that India’s inflation based on wholesale price index (WPI) rose 0.26 per cent in November from a year ago driven by the increase in prices of food articles, electricity, computer, electronics & optical products, motor vehicles, other transport equipment and other manufacturing etc. In October, the WPI inflation was - 0.52 per cent.

On the global front, Asian markets were trading mostly in green, after Japan's industrial production expanded more than initially estimated in October. The latest report from the Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry said that industrial production advanced 1.3 percent month-over-month in October, following a 0.5 percent recovery in the previous month, which was the first rise in three months. In the initial report, the rate of change in production was an increase of 1.0 percent.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 70431.04, up by 846.44 points or 1.22% after trading in a range of 70110.75 and 70540.00. There were 24 stocks advancing against 6 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index rose 1.03%, while Small cap index was up by 0.91%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Realty up by 3.06%, IT up by 2.94%, TECK up by 2.42%, Telecom up by 1.81% and Bankex up by 1.34%, while there were no losing sectoral indices on the BSE.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Tech Mahindra up by 3.51%, Bajaj Finance up by 3.12%, HCL Tech. up by 3.01%, Infosys up by 2.79% and Indusind Bank up by 2.69%. On the flip side, Power Grid down by 1.82%, Nestle down by 0.86%, Maruti Suzuki down by 0.49%, Titan down by 0.28% and Hindustan Unilever down by 0.11% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, Mukesh Aghi, CEO of the USIndia Strategic and Partnership Forum (USISPF) has said that the relationship between India and the US has moved in a positive direction ranging from trade to defence and the two nations have shown a sense of deep understating of each other's differences. He also said that there is more alignment between the two countries when it is looked at from the geopolitical QUAD perspective.

He said ‘what I see is that 2023 is a year of highlights between two countries. More important is that both countries have settled down; there is a sense of maturity, there is a sense of deep understanding of each other's differences, and there's a way to manage the differences and also respect each other's position from that perspective.’ 

He further said the US companies are investing more and more in India. They are exploring how to derisk from China. They're exploring how to gather the growing market in India and capture the market share itself. Both from a derisking perspective and market opportunity, US companies are spending more and more in India to be able to position themselves in the medium and long term. Aghi said he would like to have a stable government which has an agenda to become more transparent in the policymaking, basically approving the investments, and approving the trade going up.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 21162.40, up by 236.05 points or 1.13% after trading in a range of 21074.45 and 21189.55. There were 36 stocks advancing against 14 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Tech Mahindra up by 3.73%, LTIMindtree up by 3.50%, Bajaj Finance up by 3.17%, HCL Tech. up by 2.98% and Infosys up by 2.83%. On the flip side, Power Grid down by 1.92%, HDFC Life Insurance down by 1.85%, BPCL down by 0.87%, Nestle down by 0.86% and Tata Consumer Products down by 0.85% were the top losers.

Asian markets were trading mostly in green; Hang Seng advanced 128.39 points or 0.79% to 16,357.14, Taiwan Weighted added 184.18 points or 1.04% to 17,653.11, Jakarta Composite gained 101.67 points or 1.44% to 7,177.01, Straits Times rose 21.23 points or 0.68% to 3,125.49 and KOSPI increased 33.52 points or 1.32% to 2,544.18, while Shanghai Composite weakened 9.77 points or 0.33% to 2,958.99 and Nikkei 225 slipped 240.1 points or 0.73% to 32,686.25.