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Indian benchmark equity indices, BSE Sensex and Nifty 50, opened lower on Friday, following a negative close on Wall Street overnight.
Stock Market Updates
Sensex Today: Benchmark equity indices closed the last trading day of the week in the green. The 30-share BSE Sensex, after recovering from early losses, ended at 82,133.12, up 843.16 points or 1.04% from its previous close. The index traded between 82,192.61 and 80,082.82 during the session.
Similarly, the NSE Nifty50 gained 219.60 points or 0.89%, settling at 24,768.30. The index hit a low of 24,180.80 and a high of 24,792.30 during the day.
The session favored the bulls, with 41 out of 50 Nifty constituents closing in the positive territory. Bharti Airtel, ITC, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Hindustan Unilever, and UltraTech Cement led the gains, rising up to 4.44%. On the downside, Shriram Finance, Tata Steel, Hindalco, IndusInd Bank, and JSW Steel were among the 9 stocks that ended lower, with losses up to 2.44%.
V K Vijayakumar, Chief Investment Strategist at Geojit Financial Services, noted that the strengthening dollar could lead to imported inflation, which is a concern for the markets. He also pointed out renewed selling by Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs), who offloaded Indian equities worth Rs 4,572 crore over December 11 and 12. “With high valuations in India, FIIs are likely to sell more at every market rise. The dollar’s appreciation post-US elections has made selling profitable for FIIs,” he said.
In a positive development, India’s Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation eased to 5.48% in November, down from 6.21% in October, as reported by the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation. Food and beverage inflation softened to 8.2% from 9.69%, mainly due to a cooling in vegetable prices, which dropped to 29.33% from 42.18%.
Global Cues:
Markets across the Asia-Pacific region were lower, with Chinese stocks leading the declines.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index dropped 1.39%, while mainland China’s CSI 300 fell 0.94%, and the Shanghai Composite declined by 1.11%. Japan’s Nikkei 225 lost 1.16%, while the broader Topix index was down by 1.12%.
South Korea’s Kospi slipped 0.1%, though the small-cap Kosdaq rose 0.8%. And, Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 fell 0.69%.
In the U.S., the Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 234.44 points, or 0.53%, to 43,914.12, while the S&P 500 lost 32.94 points, or 0.54%, to 6,051.25. The Nasdaq Composite fell by 132.05 points, or 0.66%, to 19,902.84.
While mega-cap and growth stocks showed mixed results, Nvidia dropped by 1.4%, whereas Microsoft gained 0.1%.
European stocks also closed lower on Thursday after the European Central Bank cut interest rates by 25 basis points as anticipated, signaling potential further easing to support a sluggish economy amid rising political uncertainties. The pan-European STOXX 600 index ended the volatile session down by 0.1%, although eurozone bank stocks, which are sensitive to interest rates, rose 0.3%.
