What changed for the market while you were sleeping? 12 things to know

The market closed in the red on June 4 after touching historic highs in the previous session, as traders turned cautious ahead of Monetary Policy Committee's interest rate decision on June 6. But benchmark indices managed to hold the psychological levels of 40,000 on the Sensex and 12,000 on Nifty.

Experts expect the MPC to reduce repo rate by at least 25 basis points (bps) and introduce some liquidity measures to could support the market in the near term.

The broader markets managed to outperform frontline indices with the Nifty Midcap and Smallcap indices closing 0.08 percent and 0.16 percent lower respectively.

According to the Pivot charts, the key support level is placed at 11,986.6, followed by 11,951.5. If the index starts moving upward, key resistance levels to watch out are 12,076 and 12,130.3.

The Nifty Bank index closed at 31,589.05, down 64.60 points on June 4. The important Pivot level, which will act as crucial support for the index, is placed at 31,483.77, followed by 31,378.44. On the upside, key resistance levels are placed at 31,723.57, followed by 31,858.03.

Stay tuned to Moneycontrol to find out what happens in currency and equity markets today. We have collated a list of important headlines from across news agencies.

Wall Street climbs as weak private jobs data boost rate cut hopes

Wall Street’s major indexes rose on Wednesday as investors bet on a Federal Reserve interest rate cut after weak private sector jobs data and hopes grew that the United States and Mexico would reach an agreement to avoid US tariffs on Mexican goods.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 207.39 points, or 0.82%, to 25,539.57, the S&P 500 gained 22.88 points, or 0.82%, to 2,826.15 and the Nasdaq Composite added 48.36 points, or 0.64%, to 7,575.48.

Asia markets cautious as Trump presses Mexico on trade

Asian shares got off to a hesitant start on Thursday as investors feared a looming US trade war with Mexico would further depress global growth, even as they wagered central banks would have to respond with fresh stimulus.

MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan dipped 0.01% in sparse early trade. Japan’s Nikkei dithered either side of flat, while E-Mini futures for the S&P 500 eased 0.1%.

SGX Nifty

Trends on SGX Nifty indicate a negative opening for the broader index in India, a fall of 34.5 points or 0.29 percent. Nifty futures were trading around 12,046 - level on the Singaporean Exchange.

Oil stutters at over 4-month low on rising US supply, demand fears

Oil prices on Thursday hovered around their lowest levels since January as markets remain under pressure from rising US supply and stalling demand amid an economic slowdown.

Front-month Brent crude futures, the international benchmark for oil prices, were at $60.50 at 0108 GMT. That was 13 cents, or 0.2%, below last session’s close. US West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures were at $51.62 per barrel, 6 cents, or 0.1%, below their last settlement.

World Bank retains India's growth rate for FY20 at 7.5%

India is projected to grow at 7.5 percent in the next three years supported by robust investment and private consumption, the World Bank has said. The Bank in its Global Economic Prospects released on June 4 said that India is estimated to have grown 7.2 percent in fiscal year 2018/19, which ended March 31. A slowdown in government consumption was offset by solid investment, which benefitted from public infrastructure spending.

As against a growth rate of 6.6 percent in 2018, China's growth rate in 2019 is projected to be dropped to 6.2 percent and then subsequently to 6.1 percent in 2020 and 6 per cent in 2021, the bank said. With this India will continue to retain the position of being the fastest growing emerging economy. And by 2021, its growth rate is projected to be 1.5 percent more than China's 6 percent.

US-China tariffs to slash global growth in 2020: IMF

The International Monetary Fund does not see the threat of a global recession brought on by a widening US-China trade war and potential US tariffs on Mexican goods and autos, IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde said on Wednesday.

“We don’t see a recession,” Lagarde said when asked whether U.S. President Donald Trump’s threatened tariff actions could turn global growth negative. “Decelerating growth, but growth nonetheless — 3.3 percent at the end of this year, and certainly a strong US economy. We do not see at the moment, in our baseline, a recession.”

UK economy near stagnation due to Brexit, weak global demand - PMI

British economic growth almost ground to a halt last month, as modest expansion among services firms barely offset weakness in manufacturing and construction caused by the Brexit crisis and weaker global growth, a business survey showed on June 5. The IHS Markit/CIPS services Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI) edged up to 51.0 from 50.4 in April, its strongest reading in three months and slightly above economists' average forecast in a Reuters poll.

Equivalent surveys for manufacturing and construction published earlier this week unexpectedly fell deep into contractionary territory, and taken together the three PMIs gave one of their weakest readings since 2012.

Govt may announce infusion of Rs 4,000 cr in PSU non-life firms in Budget

The government is likely to announce infusion of about Rs 4,000 crore in three public sector general insurance companies to shore up their capital. The capital infusion will help them improve their financial health to an extent that the proposed merger of the general insurance firms could take place, sources said. The announcement to this effect could be made in the first full-fledged Budget of Modi 2.0 government, to be presented in Parliament on July 5.

According to the sources, the Department of Financial Services will seek around Rs 4,000 crore in the Budget for fund infusion in three insurance companies -National Insurance Company, Oriental Insurance Company and United India Insurance Company.

FDI limit in defence sector should be raised to 51%: Study

ventures, and more jobs are created, a study has suggested.

"The government should allow a minimum of 51 percent FDI in defence sector without any riders to linkages with ‘modern technology,' so as to enable international defence companies to exercise adequate control over JVs, intellectual property rights and product quality," a joint report by Assocham and global advisory services firm BDO said.

The study pointed that the increase in FDI limit will bring in capital for establishing new facilities and scaling up the current ones while benefiting India through large scale job creation.

Rate cut unlikely to stimulate growth in near term: India Ratings

A rate cut by the RBI in the second bi-monthly monetary policy statement for 2019-20 is unlikely to stimulate demand in the near term due to the absence of quick resonance in the financial market, India Ratings said in a report. There is widespread expectation that the central bank would cut policy rate Thursday to prop up growth which has hit a five year-low of 6.8 percent in FY19.

Despite the RBI cutting policy rate by 50 basis point so far in 2019, banks have not adjusted their lending/deposit rates accordingly. On the contrary, a number of banks have raised their deposit rates to mobilise funds, the ratings agency said. At the core of this mismatch between the RBI's action and the banks' inability to pass on the benefit to the borrowers is the slowdown in household savings, it said.

Biz confidence in India drops 9.1% in Q4 of FY19: NCAER survey

Business confidence among Indian companies fell by 9.1 percent in the fourth quarter of the 2018-19 fiscal, said a survey by economic think tank NCAER June 4. The National Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER) said it tracks the business sentiments of around 600 Indian companies to compute the composite Business Confidence Index (BCI).

The BCI fell by 9.1 percent to reach 115.4 at the end of fourth quarter of the last fiscal, on a quarter-on-quarter basis. On a year-on-year basis, the BCI fell by 12.2 percent, said the NCAER 'Business Expectations Survey'.

Rupee ends flat at 69.26 a dollar ahead of RBI policy decision

The Indian rupee Tuesday settled unchanged at 69.26 against the US dollar in a lacklustre trade as participants preferred to sit on the fence ahead of the RBI monetary policy outcome on Thursday.

At the interbank foreign exchange, the domestic unit opened strong at 69.10 and went on to touch the day's high of 69.00 to the US dollar. The local currency, however, failed to sustain the gain and slipped to a low of 69.34 in intra-day deals.

One stock under F&O ban period on NSE

For June 6, IDBI Bank is under an F&O ban period. Securities in ban period under the F&O segment include companies in which the security has crossed 95 percent of the market-wide position limit.