The Indian equity benchmarks added more points on the street in late afternoon session, with the Sensex and Nifty gaining above 150 and 50 points, respectively. Among heavy-weights Tata Steel, Axis Bank and SBI exhibited a smart performance. Traders remain energized, as Chief Economic Adviser K V Subramanian said food inflation is likely to moderate on account of the twin impact of opening up of economic activities and good monsoon. Moreover, he asserted that high food inflation has not impacted a large section of population as they are being given free ration under the Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Yojana. Besides easing of restrictions, Subramanian said, a good monsoon will also have a benign impact on food prices. Traders took note of report that Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman discussed opportunities in India for growth and investment on the back of the reform measures taken by government, during a global investors roundtable organised by the US-India Strategic Partnership Forum (USISPF).
On the global front, Asian markets were trading mostly in green buoyed by a rally on Wall Street that came after President Joe Biden announced a bipartisan deal on infrastructure spending. European markets were trading mostly in red.
The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 52,887.66, up by 188.66 points or 0.36% after trading in a range of 52614.49 and 52973.07. There were 19 stocks advancing against 11 stocks declining on the index.
The broader indices were trading in green; the BSE Mid cap index gained 1.06%, while Small cap index was up by 0.57%.
The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Metal up by 2.68%, Bankex up by 1.90%, Healthcare up by 1.38%, Basic Materials up by 1.30% and Capital Goods was up by 1.24%, while Energy down by 1.50%, Consumer Durables down by 0.83%, Oil & Gas down by 0.80%, Utilities down by 0.79% and Power was down by 0.43% were the top losing indices on BSE.
The top gainers on the Sensex were Tata Steel up by 3.91%, Axis Bank up by 3.58%, SBI up by 2.75%, ICICI Bank up by 2.36% and Sun Pharma up by 1.70%. On the flip side, Reliance Industries down by 1.97%, Titan Company down by 1.94%, Asian Paints down by 1.64%, Hindustan Unilever down by 1.41% and NTPC down by 1.36% were the top losers.
Meanwhile, with an aim to boost agricultural and processed food products exports, the Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority (APEDA) in collaboration with Indian embassy has organized a virtual buyer seller meet (VBSM) with Algeria where key stakeholders in the agricultural value chains from both the countries participated.
Due to the ongoing Covid19 pandemic, the export promotion programmes were not possible to be organized physically. APEDA has been organizing a series of VBSMs with various countries for providing platform to the exporters and importers.
In the VBSM held with trade and government officials from Algeria, the scope of increasing exports of India’s Geographical Indications (GI) certified agricultural products were discussed. Export potential of products including cereals, animal product, non-basmati and basmati rice etc to Algeria were discussed during VBSM.
The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 15,855.70, up by 65.25 points or 0.41% after trading in a range of 15772.30 and 15870.45. There were 33 stocks advancing against 17 stocks declining on the index.
The top gainers on Nifty were Tata Steel up by 4.14%, Axis Bank up by 3.44%, SBI up by 3.03%, ICICI Bank up by 2.30% and Hindalco up by 2.07%. On the flip side, Titan Company down by 1.95%, Reliance Industries down by 1.94%, Asian Paints down by 1.73%, Hindustan Unilever down by 1.46% and NTPC down by 1.31% were the top losers.
Asian markets were trading mostly in green, Hang Seng increased 405.76 points or 1.4% to 29,288.22, Nikkei 225 surged 190.95 points or 0.66% to 29,066.18, Taiwan Weighted strengthened 95.03 points or 0.55% to 17,502.99, Shanghai Composite gained 40.91 points or 1.15% to 3,607.56, KOSPI rose 16.74 points or 0.51% to 3,302.84 and Jakarta Composite was up by 10.34 points or 0.17% to 6,022.40. On the flip side, Straits Times was down by 3.59 points or 0.12% to 3,116.03.
European markets were trading mostly in red, France’s CAC decreased 14.42 points or 0.22% to 6,616.73 and Germany’s DAX was down by 31.05 points or 0.2% to 15,558.18. On the flip side, UK’s FTSE 100 was up by 6.72 points or 0.09% to 7,116.69.