NSE gauge -- Nifty50 -- continued its free fall on Thursday amid F&O expiry. Market made negative start, as India has registered 53,419 fresh cases of Covid-19 in the past 24 hours, taking to tally to 11,787,013, according to Worldometer. The death toll from the deadly infection jumped to 160,726. India has the 7th highest number of active cases globally. Market extended its losses despite Fitch Ratings in its latest report has revised India's Gross domestic product (GDP) growth estimate to 12.8 percent for the next fiscal year beginning April 1 from its previous estimate of 11 percent. It also said that India's recovery from the depths of the lockdown-induced recession in 2020 (calendar year) has been swifter than expected. Sentiments remained down-beat even after central bank chief has said that India's revival of economic activity is expected to be ‘unabated’, despite a rise in coronavirus infections in many areas and 2022 growth projections might not need to be cut.
Finally, Nifty ended the day’s trade with the cut of above one and half a percent, as India Ratings and Research said that privatisation of two public sector banks can impact their ratings as the government support to the two entities will disappear. The rating agency said the budget proposal to privatise the as yet unidentified PSBs “could lead to material negative migration of the long-term issuer ratings (mapped to senior instruments such as infrastructure bonds) and the ratings on Tier 2 instruments of the identified banks”.
Most of the sectoral indices ended in red except Metal. The top gainers from the F&O segment were SAIL, Alkem Laboratories and Tata Steel. On the other hand, the top losers were Info Edge India, AU Small Finance Bank and Vodafone Idea. In the index option segment, maximum OI continues to be seen in the 14700 - 16700 calls and 13,900 - 14,600 puts indicating this is the trading range expectation.
India Volatility Index (VIX), a gauge for market’s short term expectation of volatility increased by 1.07% and reached 22.70. The 50 share Nifty down by 224.50 points or 1.54% to settle at 14,324.90.
Nifty April 2021 futures closed at 14447.00 (LTP) on Thursday, at a premium of 122.10 points over spot closing of 14324.90, while Nifty May 2021 futures ended at 14495.00 (LTP), at a premium of 170.10 points over spot closing. Nifty April futures saw an addition of 40,099 units, taking the total open interest (Contracts) to 1,34,237 units. The near month derivatives contract will expire on April 29, 2021.
From the most active contracts, Reliance Industries April 2021 futures traded at a premium of 14.65 points at 2008.60 (LTP) compared with spot closing of 1993.95. The numbers of contracts traded were 63,527 (Provisional).
ICICI Bank April 2021 futures traded at a premium of 4.90 points at 575.50 (LTP) compared with spot closing of 570.60. The numbers of contracts traded were 38,914 (Provisional).
SBIN April 2021 futures traded at a premium of 2.80 points at 359.10 (LTP) compared with spot closing of 356.30. The numbers of contracts traded were 35,381 (Provisional).
Bharti Airtel April 2021 futures traded at a premium of 4.05 points at 511.25 (LTP) compared with spot closing of 507.20. The numbers of contracts traded were 29,171 (Provisional).
HDFC April 2021 futures traded at a premium of 17.00 points at 2495.00 (LTP) compared with spot closing of 2478.00. The numbers of contracts traded were 28,636 (Provisional).
Among, Nifty calls, 15000 SP from the April month expiry was the most active call with an addition of 3,266 units open interests. Among Nifty puts, 14000 SP from the April month expiry was the most active put with an addition of 3,458 units open interests. The maximum OI outstanding for Calls was at 15000 SP (27,979 units) and that for Puts was at 14000 SP (44,642 units). The respective Support and Resistance levels of Nifty are: Resistance 14,512.20 -- Pivot Point 14,388.30 -- Support -- 14,201.00.
The Nifty Put Call Ratio (PCR) finally stood at (1.61) for April month contract. The top five scrips with highest PCR on BOSCH (3.81), L&T Technology Services (3.14), Muthoot Finance (2.41), Indus Tower (1.73) and PVR (1.60).
Among most active underlying, SBIN witnessed an addition of 9,604 units of Open Interest in the April month futures contract followed Tata Motors witnessed an addition of 3,746 units of Open Interest in the April month futures contract, Reliance Industries witnessed an addition of 28,301 units of Open Interest in the April month futures contract, ICICI Bank witnessed an addition of 11,314 units of Open Interest in the April month futures contract and Tata Steel witnessed an addition of 3,699 units of Open Interest in the April month futures contract (Provisional).