Mr. Vishal Wagh, Research Head, BONANZA PORTFOLIO LTD
Indian indices opened higher today, with Nifty above 16000. At the time of closing, Sensex gained 344.63 points or 0.65% at 53,760.78 & Nifty gained 110.55 points or 0.69% at 16,049.20.
During the day, India's merchandise trade deficit rose to a record $26.1 billion in June 2022, 172% higher than June 2021 as a continuing global commodity super cycle kept the prices of key energy and metal imports high. Figures are higher than the government's initial estimates of $25.6 billion. Exports in June rose by 23.5% to $40.13 billion, imports shot up by 57.5% to $66.31 billion. The rupee breached the psychologically important 80 to the dollar mark in the over-the-counter and derivative markets on expectations that portfolio investors will hasten sales of equities amid fears that the US Fed will raise interest rates by 1%. Oil prices rose in early Asian trading amid uncertainty around how aggressive the U.S. Federal Reserve will be in hiking interest rates to combat rampant inflation. China's economy grew at the slowest pace since the initial coronavirus outbreak in Wuhan, Q2 GDP was up 0.4%, YoY. The June Industrial Output was up 3.9% and Retail sales were up 3.1% YoY. Asian stocks hit a two-year low & dollar was set for its third week of gains as a fresh slew of rate hikes around the world. On the sectoral front, the Auto index added 2% and FMCG and Capital Goods indices rose 1% each. However, Metal index fell 1%.
Nifty 50 top gainers are TataConsum, Titan, HindUnilvr, Tatamotors & LT while TataSteel, powerGrid, HCLTech Wipro & JSWSteel were among the top losers.