Even though market closed in green but the market breadth remained in favour of declines with the advance-decline ratio at 1:1. HDFC twins kept Nifty & Nifty bank gains in check; both stocks down 1% each.
Another strong day for Indian equity markets with Nifty closing above its crucial resistance level of 10400 on Tuesday, although it did pare some gains from its intraday high. The S&P BSE Sensex rose nearly 100 points, led by gains in banks, metals, realty and capital goods stocks.
Banking stocks mildly outperform with ICICI Bank and Axis Bank leading the charge from the front. Axis Bank was the top Sensex gainer, up 5.4%, followed by ICICI Bank which closed 3.01% higher.
Even though market closed in green but the market breadth remained in favour of declines with the advance-decline ratio at 1:1. HDFC twins kept Nifty & Nifty bank gains in check; both stocks down 1% each.
Global equity markets along with India rallied after Chinese President Xi Jinping’s promised to cut import tariffs which eased investor concerns about an escalating U.S.-China trade row.
Speaking at the Boao Forum for Asia in Hainan province, Xi vowed to open China’s economy, protect the intellectual property of foreign firms and he criticized isolationism in his first public comments since the trade dispute with U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration erupted, said a Reuters report.
"Stock markets in Asia, including those in India, opened the day on a buoyant note. Positive investor sentiment was given a fillip after comments from Chinese President Xi Jinping on measures planned to further open up the Chinese economy assuaged fears of an escalating US-China trade row," Anand Shah, Deputy CEO & Head of Investments, BNP Paribas Mutual Fund told Moneycontrol.
"While benchmark indices in India opened higher and hit fresh intraday high in morning trade, they subsequently succumbed to profit booking at higher levels to finally close the day with marginal gains. The auto and healthcare indices on the National Stock Exchange (NSE) closed the day in the red, while the metals and banking indices witnessed sharp gains," he said.
Sectorally, the S&P BSE Metal index rallied 2%, followed by BSE Realty index which gained 1.2%, BSE Capital Goods index closed 1.08% higher, and banking index ended higher by nearly 1%.
The S&P BSE Auto index closed 0.6% lower, followed by Consumer discretionary which closed 0.35% down, and healthcare stocks closed flat with a negative bias.
The S&P BSE Midcap index rose 0.18%, and the S&P BSE Smallcap index slipped 0.2% in red.
Stocks in news:
Axis Bank climbed over 5% after MD & CEO Shikha Sharma’s term has been reduced to seven months from three years at her request. Sharma's re-appointment as the Managing Director & CEO of the bank was revised from June 1, 2018, up to December 31, 2018.
The impending exit of Axis Bank’s long-serving CEO will allow it to mend relations with regulators and investors, some analysts said, helping shares of the third-biggest private sector Indian lender, said a Reuters report.
ICICI Bank Ltd: Shares of private sector lender rose 3% even though global rating agency, Fitch said that the allegations pose reputational risks and will take appropriate action if risks to reputation and financial profile rise.
Metal stocks are on buyers’ radar on the back of rising aluminium prices as well as cooling off of trade war concerns between US and China.
The Nifty Metal index gained over 2 percent, led by gains in stocks such as Hindalco, Tata Steel, NMDC, NALCO, and Hindustan Copper, among others. These scrips gained up to 4 percent.
Wipro has announced to the National Stock Exchange that one of its telecom service provider clients in India filed a petition to initiate insolvency resolution process with the National Company Law Tribunal in February 2018.
Shares of Gravita India added 2.2 percent as the company started commercial production at Chittoor plant. The company started commercial production of PPCP Granules by installing new imported washing line and extrusion line which is having an annual capacity of 1200 MTPA.
Welspun Corp said it has been awarded a contract for the supply of 417 K MTs of large diameter pipes for a water project in the MENA Region. The stock closed 2.6% higher at Rs145.85.
The share price of Dilip Buildcon gained 1.3 percent intraday on the execution of concession agreement with NHAI.The company's wholly-owned subsidiary DBL Chandikhole Bhadrak Highways has executed the concession agreement with the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), Ministry of Road Transport and Highways.
Other News & Global Update:
E-way bill for movement of goods within the state will be rolled out from April 15, starting with 5 states including Gujarat, UP and Kerala.
From April 1, the government had launched the electronic-way or e-way bill system for moving goods worth over Rs 50,000 from one state to another.
Domestic passenger vehicle sales were up 6.38 percent at 3,00,722 units in March as against 2,82,698 units in the same month last year.
Car sales were marginally up at 1,91,082 units last month as against 1,90,236 units in March last year, according to the data released by the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM) today.
Global markets were higher on hopes that trade war between world's largest economies may be resolved soon. European stocks - France's CAC, Germany's DAX and Britain's FTSE were up 0.5-1 percent at the time of writing this article.