Today’s Market Summarised
Market falls for the second straight day as financial stocks continue bearishness.
NIFTY opened at 16,723 with a gap-up of more than 100 points. After falling immediately, the index consolidated around yesterday’s closing level before falling again. NIFTY traded within the levels of Monday’s high and low and closed the day at 16,498, down 107 points of 0.65%.
BANK NIFTY opened at 35,683 with a gap-up and crashed down. It tried to take support and move back up multiple times, but these were half-hearted attempts. The index eventually crashed 1,000 points from its day-high before slightly recovering. Bank Nifty closed at 34,944, down by 428 points or 1.21%.
NIFTY IT (+1.2%) and NIFTY Metal (+1.2%) closed with gains of more than 1%. NIFTY Auto (-2.2%), Bank (-1.2%) and Finserv (-1.1%) fell again for the second day.
Asian markets closed mostly in the green today. But, European markets are all trading in the red currently.
News Picks
ONGC (+4.5%) closed as the top-gainer in NIFTY 50 with energy stocks once again performing. Crude oil prices have hit an 8-year high.
Other energy stocks PowerGrid (+3.3%), Coal India (+2.2%) and IOC (+2.1%) were among the other gainers. Reliance (-0.84%) closed in red for the day while GAIL (+4.2%), Hindustan Petroleum (+4.5%) and Suppetro (+10.1%) moved up.
UPL (+3.5%) shot up in the day after approving a Rs 1,100 crores buyback. There was also a report that global players are interested in a takeover of the company.
Lower demand and steep increases in fuel prices are affecting cement stocks. UltraTech Cement (-6.5%), Shree Cement (-4.6%), Ambuja Cement (-4.5%), Ramco Cement (-5.9%) and ACC (-5.4%) crashed down.
Paint stocks were also affected with Asian Paint (-5.1%) leading to the fall.
Vodafone Idea (+6.2%) moved up as the board is assessing the proposal to raise funds today.
Sugar stocks moved up in the day as the industry looks to ramp up ethanol production. The added capacity is going to be used to compensate for the high prices of crude due to the Ukraine crisis.
Shipping Corporation (+16.7%) and Power India (+12.7%) gave breakout moves in the day.
Bombay Dyeing (+4.2%) moved up with plans to demerge its real estate arm and list it separately on the exchanges.
HDFC Life (-5.1%), SBI Life (-3.5%) and ICICI Prudential Life (-4.6%) fell and lost gains after yesterday’s rally.
Markets Ahead
The first weekly expiry of March was surely exciting! NIFTY and Bank Nifty giving clear directional moves would have been a good thing for all traders.
Markets are already seeing pressure from the increasing crude oil prices. Stocks from paints to cement and engineering are moving down. But this is the normal working of the market. You can see that on the other side, we have metal stocks continuing their rally.
If we look at the options data for next week, NIFTY has good support at the 16,000 zone. The open contracts indicate that smart money expects markets to trade between 16k and 17k with a consolidation around 16,500 levels.
As we can see from past data from wars, the market may start moving back up soon if no fresh triggers come. Germany is increasing its supply of weapons into Ukraine with the first arms delivery of 1,000 anti-tank and another 500 anti-aircraft missiles. This may brew up political pressure, but we never know how crazy leaders will react!
Right now, the market looks like it is ready to consolidate unless significant news comes out. What do you think of this situation? Let us know in the comments of the marketfeed app!
See you at The Stock Market Show at 7 PM!